It was somewhat remarkable that Mannering had once before tried a
similar piece of foolery at the instance of Sophia Wellwood, the
young lady to whom he was attached, and that a similar conjunction
of planetary influence threatened her with death or imprisonment
in her thirty-ninth year. She was at this time eighteen; so that,
according to the result of the scheme in both cases, the same year
threatened her with the same misfortune that was presaged to the
native or infant whom that night had introduced into the world.
Struck with this coincidence, Mannering repeated his calculations;
and the result approximated the events predicted, until at length
the same month, and day of the month, seemed assigned as the
period of peril to both.

It will be readily believed that, in mentioning this circumstance,
we lay no weight whatever upon the pretended information thus
conveyed. But it often happens, such is our natural love for the
marvellous, that we willingly contribute our own efforts to
beguile our better judgments. Whether the coincidence which I have
mentioned was really one of those singular chances which sometimes
happen against all ordinary calculations; or whether Mannering,
bewildered amid the arithmetical labyrinth and technical jargon of
astrology, had insensibly twice followed the same clue to guide
him out of the maze; or whether his imagination, seduced by some
point of apparent resemblance, lent its aid to make the similitude
between the two operations more exactly accurate than it might
otherwise have been, it is impossible to guess; but the impression
upon his mind that the results exactly corresponded was vividly
and indelibly strong.

He could not help feeling surprise at a coincidence so singular