convinced that my ears were well informed."

"Yes," said I, "this, it is plain, is no fiction of the
fancy." We again sunk into mutual and thoughtful silence. A
recollection of the hour, and of the length of our absence, made
me at last propose to return. We rose up for this purpose. In
doing this, my mind reverted to the contemplation of my own
condition. "Yes," said I aloud, but without particularly
addressing myself to Wieland, "my resolution is taken. I cannot
hope to prevail with my friends to accompany me. They may doze
away their days on the banks of Schuylkill, but as to me, I go
in the next vessel; I will fly to her presence, and demand the
reason of this extraordinary silence."

"I had scarcely finished the sentence, when the same
mysterious voice exclaimed, "You shall not go. The seal of
death is on her lips. Her silence is the silence of the tomb."
Think of the effects which accents like these must have had upon
me. I shuddered as I listened. As soon as I recovered from my
first amazement, "Who is it that speaks?" said I, "whence did
you procure these dismal tidings?" I did not wait long for an
answer. "From a source that cannot fail. Be satisfied. She is
dead." You may justly be surprised, that, in the circumstances
in which I heard the tidings, and notwithstanding the mystery
which environed him by whom they were imparted, I could give an
undivided attention to the facts, which were the subject of our
dialogue. I eagerly inquired, when and where did she die? What
was the cause of her death? Was her death absolutely certain?
An answer was returned only to the last of these questions.
"Yes," was pronounced by the same voice; but it now sounded from