THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
Son coeur est un luth suspendu; Sitot qu'on le touche il resonne..
_ De Beranger_.
DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of theyear, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I hadbeen passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract ofcountry; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drewon, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not howit was--but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense ofinsufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for thefeeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic,sentiment, with which the mind usually receives even the sternestnatural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the scenebefore me--upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of thedomain--upon the bleak walls--upon the vacant eye-like windows--upon afew rank sedges--and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees--with anutter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensationmore properly than to the after-dream of the reveller upon opium--thebitter lapse into everyday life--the hideous dropping off of the veil.There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart--an unredeemeddreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could tortureinto aught of the sublime. What was it--I paused to think--what was itthat so unnerved me in the contemplation of the House of Usher? It was amystery all insoluble; nor could I grapple with the shadowy fancies thatcrowded upon me as I pondered. I was forced to fall back upon theunsatisfactory conclusion, that while, beyond doubt, there _are_combinations of very simple natural objects which have the power of thusaffecting us, still the analysis of this power lies among considerationsbeyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected, that a mere differentarrangement of the particulars of the scene, of the details of thepicture, would be sufficient to modify, or perhaps to annihilate itscapacity for sorrowful impression; and, acting upon this idea, I reinedmy horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay inunruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down--but with a shuddereven more thrilling than before--upon the remodelled and inverted imagesof the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant andeye-like windows.
Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself asojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick Usher, had been one ofmy boon companions in boyhood; but many years had elapsed since our lastmeeting. A letter, however, had lately reached me in a distant part ofthe country--a letter from him--which, in its wildly importunate nature,had admitted of no other than a personal reply. The MS. gave evidence ofnervous agitation. The writer spoke of acute bodily illness--of a mentaldisorder which oppressed him--and of an earnest desire to see me, as hisbest, and indeed his only personal friend, with a view of attempting, bythe cheerfulness of my society, some alleviation of his malady. Itwas the manner in which all this, and much more, was said--it was theapparent _heart_ that went with his request--which allowed me noroom for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyed forthwith what I stillconsidered a very singular summons.
Although, as boys, we had been even intimate associates, yet I reallyknew little of my friend. His reserve had been always excessive andhabitual. I was aware, however, that his very ancient family had beennoted, time out of mind, for a peculiar sensibility of temperament,displaying itself, through long ages, in many works of exalted art, andmanifested, of late, in repeated deeds of munificent yet unobtrusivecharity, as well as in a passionate devotion to the intricacies, perhapseven more than to the orthodox and easily recognisable beauties, ofmusical science. I had learned, too, the very remarkable fact, that thestem of the Usher race, all time-honored as it was, had put forth, at noperiod, any enduring branch; in other words, that the entire family layin the direct line of descent, and had always, with very trifling andvery temporary variation, so lain. It was this deficiency, I considered,while running over in thought the perfect keeping of the character ofthe premises with the accredited character of the people, and whilespeculating upon the possible influence which the one, in the longlapse of centuries, might have exercised upon the other--it was thisdeficiency, perhaps, of collateral issue, and the consequent undeviatingtransmission, from sire to son, of the patrimony with the name, whichhad, at length, so identified the two as to merge the original titleof the estate in the quaint and equivocal appellation of the ”Houseof Usher”--an appellation which seemed to include, in the minds of thepeasantry who used it, both the family and the family mansion.
I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childishexperiment--that of looking down within the tarn--had been to deepen thefirst singular impression. There can be no doubt that the consciousnessof the rapid increase of my superstition--for why should I not so termit?--served mainly to accelerate the increase itself. Such, I havelong known, is the paradoxical law of all sentiments having terror as abasis. And it might have been for this reason only, that, when I againuplifted my eyes to the house itself, from its image in the pool, theregrew in my mind a strange fancy--a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that Ibut mention it to show the vivid force of the sensations which oppressedme. I had so worked upon my imagination as really to believe thatabout the whole mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiarto themselves and their immediate vicinity--an atmosphere which hadno affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from thedecayed trees, and the gray wall, and the silent tarn--a pestilent andmystic vapor, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.
Shaking off from my spirit what _must_ have been a dream, I scanned morenarrowly the real aspect of the building. Its principal feature seemedto be that of an excessive antiquity. The discoloration of ages had beengreat. Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a finetangled web-work from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from anyextraordinary dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen; andthere appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfectadaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of the individualstones. In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totalityof old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglectedvault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air. Beyondthis indication of extensive decay, however, the fabric gave littletoken of instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer mighthave discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from theroof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzagdirection, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.
Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the house. Aservant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the Gothic archway ofthe hall. A valet, of stealthy step, thence conducted me, in silence,through many dark and intricate passages in my progress to the _studio_of his master. Much that I encountered on the way contributed, I knownot how, to heighten the vague sentiments of which I have alreadyspoken. While the objects around me--while the carvings of the ceilings,the sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors,and the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I strode, werebut matters to which, or to such as which, I had been accustomed from myinfancy--while I hesitated not to acknowledge how familiar was allthis--I still wondered to find how unfamiliar were the fancies whichordinary images were stirring up. On one of the staircases, I met thephysician of the family. His countenance, I thought, wore a mingledexpression of low cunning and perplexity. He accosted me withtrepidation and passed on. The valet now threw open a door and usheredme into the presence of his master.
The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty. The windowswere long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a distance from the blackoaken floor as to be altogether inaccessible from within. Feeble gleamsof encrimsoned light made their way through the trellissed panes,and served to render sufficiently distinct the more prominent objectsaround; the eye, however, struggled in vain to reach the remoter anglesof the chamber, or the recesses of the vaulted and fretted ceiling.Dark draperies hung upon the walls. The general furniture was profuse,comfortless, antique, and tattered. Many books and musical instrumentslay scattered about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene. Ifelt that I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, andirredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all.
Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had been lying atfull length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth which had much init, I at first thought, of an overdone cordiality--of the constrainedeffort of the _ennuye_ man of the world. A glance, however, at hiscountenance, convinced me of his perfect sincerity. We sat down; and forsome moments, while he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling halfof pity, half of awe. Surely, man had never before so terribly altered,in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It was with difficulty thatI could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan being before mewith the companion of my early boyhood. Yet the character of his facehad been at all times remarkable. A cadaverousness of complexion; an eyelarge, liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin andvery pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of adelicate Hebrew model, but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similarformations; a finely moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence,of a want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness andtenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the regionsof the temple, made up altogether a countenance not easily to beforgotten. And now in the mere exaggeration of the prevailing characterof these features, and of the expression they were wont to convey, layso much of change that I doubted to whom I spoke. The now ghastly pallorof the skin, and the now miraculous lustre of the eye, above all thingsstartled and even awed me. The silken hair, too, had been suffered togrow all unheeded, and as, in its wild gossamer texture, it floatedrather than fell about the face, I could not, even with effort, connectits Arabesque expression with any idea of simple humanity.
In the manner of my friend I was at once struck with an incoherence--aninconsistency; and I soon found this to arise from a series of feebleand futile struggles to overcome an habitual trepidancy--an excessivenervous agitation. For something of this nature I had indeed beenprepared, no less by his letter, than by reminiscences of certainboyish traits, and by conclusions deduced from his peculiar physicalconformation and temperament. His action was alternately vivacious andsullen. His voice varied rapidly from a tremulous indecision (when theanimal spirits seemed utterly in abeyance) to that species of energeticconcision--that abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-soundingenunciation--that leaden, self-balanced and perfectly modulatedguttural utterance, which may be observed in the lost drunkard, or theirreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods of his most intenseexcitement.
It was thus that he spoke of the object of my visit, of his earnestdesire to see me, and of the solace he expected me to afford him. Heentered, at some length, into what he conceived to be the nature of hismalady. It was, he said, a constitutional and a family evil, and onefor which he despaired to find a remedy--a mere nervous affection, heimmediately added, which would undoubtedly soon pass off. It displayeditself in a host of unnatural sensations. Some of these, as he detailedthem, interested and bewildered me; although, perhaps, the terms, andthe general manner of the narration had their weight. He suffered muchfrom a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was aloneendurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the odorsof all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even a faintlight; and there were but peculiar sounds, and these from stringedinstruments, which did not inspire him with horror.
To an anomalous species of terror I found him a bounden slave. ”I shallperish,” said he, ”I must perish in this deplorable folly. Thus, thus,and not otherwise, shall I be lost. I dread the events of the future,not in themselves, but in their results. I shudder at the thoughtof any, even the most trivial, incident, which may operate upon thisintolerable agitation of soul. I have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger,except in its absolute effect--in terror. In this unnerved--in thispitiable condition--I feel that the period will sooner or later arrivewhen I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with thegrim phantasm, FEAR.”
I learned, moreover, at intervals, and through broken and equivocalhints, another singular feature of his mental condition. He wasenchained by certain superstitious impressions in regard to the dwellingwhich he tenanted, and whence, for many years, he had never venturedforth--in regard to an influence whose supposititious force was conveyedin terms too shadowy here to be re-stated--an influence which somepeculiarities in the mere form and substance of his family mansion, had,by dint of long sufferance, he said, obtained over his spirit--an effectwhich the _physique_ of the gray walls and turrets, and of the dim tarninto which they all looked down, had, at length, brought about upon the_morale_ of his existence.
He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much of thepeculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced to a morenatural and far more palpable origin--to the severe and long-continuedillness--indeed to the evidently approaching dissolution--of a tenderlybeloved sister--his sole companion for long years--his last and onlyrelative on earth. ”Her decease,” he said, with a bitterness which I cannever forget, ”would leave him (him the hopeless and the frail) the lastof the ancient race of the Ushers.” While he spoke, the lady Madeline(for so was she called) passed slowly through a remote portion of theapartment, and, without having noticed my presence, disappeared. Iregarded her with an utter astonishment not unmingled with dread--andyet I found it impossible to account for such feelings. A sensation ofstupor oppressed me, as my eyes followed her retreating steps. When adoor, at length, closed upon her, my glance sought instinctively andeagerly the countenance of the brother--but he had buried his facein his hands, and I could only perceive that a far more than ordinarywanness had overspread the emaciated fingers through which trickled manypassionate tears.
The disease of the lady Madeline had long baffled the skill of herphysicians. A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the person,and frequent although transient affections of a partially catalepticalcharacter, were the unusual diagnosis. Hitherto she had steadily borneup against the pressure of her malady, and had not betaken herselffinally to bed; but, on the closing in of the evening of my arrivalat the house, she succumbed (as her brother told me at night withinexpressible agitation) to the prostrating power of the destroyer;and I learned that the glimpse I had obtained of her person would thusprobably be the last I should obtain--that the lady, at least whileliving, would be seen by me no more.
For several days ensuing, her name was unmentioned by either Usher ormyself: and during this period I was busied in earnest endeavors toalleviate the melancholy of my friend. We painted and read together; orI listened, as if in a dream, to the wild improvisations of his speakingguitar. And thus, as a closer and still closer intimacy admitted me moreunreservedly into the recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly didI perceive the futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from whichdarkness, as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth upon allobjects of the moral and physical universe, in one unceasing radiationof gloom.
I shall ever bear about me a memory of the many solemn hours I thusspent alone with the master of the House of Usher. Yet I should fail inany attempt to convey an idea of the exact character of the studies,or of the occupations, in which he involved me, or led me the way. Anexcited and highly distempered ideality threw a sulphureous lustre overall. His long improvised dirges will ring forever in my ears. Amongother things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular perversion andamplification of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber. From thepaintings over which his elaborate fancy brooded, and which grew, touchby touch, into vaguenesses at which I shuddered the more thrillingly,because I shuddered knowing not why;--from these paintings (vivid astheir images now are before me) I would in vain endeavor to educe morethan a small portion which should lie within the compass of merelywritten words. By the utter simplicity, by the nakedness of his designs,he arrested and overawed attention. If ever mortal painted an idea, thatmortal was Roderick Usher. For me at least--in the circumstances thensurrounding me--there arose out of the pure abstractions which thehypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvass, an intensity ofintolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever yet in the contemplationof the certainly glowing yet too concrete reveries of Fuseli.
One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend, partaking not sorigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be shadowed forth, althoughfeebly, in words. A small picture presented the interior of an immenselylong and rectangular vault or tunnel, with low walls, smooth, white, andwithout interruption or device. Certain accessory points of the designserved well to convey the idea that this excavation lay at an exceedingdepth below the surface of the earth. No outlet was observed in anyportion of its vast extent, and no torch, or other artificial source oflight was discernible; yet a flood of intense rays rolled throughout,and bathed the whole in a ghastly and inappropriate splendor.
I have just spoken of that morbid condition of the auditory nerve whichrendered all music intolerable to the sufferer, with the exception ofcertain effects of stringed instruments. It was, perhaps, the narrowlimits to which he thus confined himself upon the guitar, which gavebirth, in great measure, to the fantastic character of his performances.But the fervid _facility_ of his _impromptus_ could not be so accountedfor. They must have been, and were, in the notes, as well as in thewords of his wild fantasias (for he not unfrequently accompanied himselfwith rhymed verbal improvisations), the result of that intense mentalcollectedness and concentration to which I have previously alludedas observable only in particular moments of the highest artificialexcitement. The words of one of these rhapsodies I have easilyremembered. I was, perhaps, the more forcibly impressed with it, ashe gave it, because, in the under or mystic current of its meaning, Ifancied that I perceived, and for the first time, a full consciousnesson the part of Usher, of the tottering of his lofty reason upon herthrone. The verses, which were entitled ”The Haunted Palace,” ran verynearly, if not accurately, thus:
I. In the greenest of our valleys, By good angels tenanted, Once a fair and stately palace-- Radiant palace--reared its head. In the monarch Thought's dominion-- It stood there! Never seraph spread a pinion Over fabric half so fair. II. Banners yellow, glorious, golden, On its roof did float and flow; (This--all this--was in the olden Time long ago) And every gentle air that dallied, In that sweet day, Along the ramparts plumed and pallid, A winged odor went away. III. Wanderers in that happy valley Through two luminous windows saw Spirits moving musically To a lute's well-tuned law, Round about a throne, where sitting (Porphyrogene!) In state his glory well befitting, The ruler of the realm was seen. IV. And all with pearl and ruby glowing Was the fair palace door, Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing, And sparkling evermore, A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty Was but to sing, In voices of surpassing beauty, The wit and wisdom of their king. V. But evil things, in robes of sorrow, Assailed the monarch's high estate; (Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow Shall dawn upon him, desolate!) And, round about his home, the glory That blushed and bloomed Is but a dim-remembered story Of the old time entombed. VI. And travellers now within that valley, Through the red-litten windows, see Vast forms that move fantastically To a discordant melody; While, like a rapid ghastly river, Through the pale door, A hideous throng rush out forever, And laugh--but smile no more.
I well remember that suggestions arising from this ballad, led us intoa train of thought wherein there became manifest an opinion of Usher'swhich I mention not so much on account of its novelty, (for other men* have thought thus,) as on account of the pertinacity with whichhe maintained it. This opinion, in its general form, was that of thesentience of all vegetable things. But, in his disordered fancy, theidea had assumed a more daring character, and trespassed, under certainconditions, upon the kingdom of inorganization. I lack words to expressthe full extent, or the earnest _abandon_ of his persuasion. The belief,however, was connected (as I have previously hinted) with the graystones of the home of his forefathers. The conditions of the sentiencehad been here, he imagined, fulfilled in the method of collocation ofthese stones--in the order of their arrangement, as well as in that ofthe many _fungi_ which overspread them, and of the decayed trees whichstood around--above all, in the long undisturbed endurance of thisarrangement, and in its reduplication in the still waters of the tarn.Its evidence--the evidence of the sentience--was to be seen, hesaid, (and I here started as he spoke,) in the gradual yet certaincondensation of an atmosphere of their own about the waters and thewalls. The result was discoverable, he added, in that silent, yetimportunate and terrible influence which for centuries had moulded thedestinies of his family, and which made _him_ what I now saw him--whathe was. Such opinions need no comment, and I will make none.
* Watson, Dr. Percival, Spallanzani, and especially the Bishop ofLandaff.--See ”Chemical Essays,” vol v.
Our books--the books which, for years, had formed no small portion ofthe mental existence of the invalid--were, as might be supposed, instrict keeping with this character of phantasm. We pored together oversuch works as the Ververt et Chartreuse of Gresset; the Belphegor ofMachiavelli; the Heaven and Hell of Swedenborg; the Subterranean Voyageof Nicholas Klimm by Holberg; the Chiromancy of Robert Flud, of JeanD'Indagine, and of De la Chambre; the Journey into the Blue Distance ofTieck; and the City of the Sun of Campanella. One favorite volume wasa small octavo edition of the _Directorium Inquisitorium_, by theDominican Eymeric de Gironne; and there were passages in Pomponius Mela,about the old African Satyrs and OEgipans, over which Usher would sitdreaming for hours. His chief delight, however, was found in the perusalof an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic--the manual ofa forgotten church--the _Vigiliae Mortuorum secundum Chorum EcclesiaeMaguntinae_.
I could not help thinking of the wild ritual of this work, and of itsprobable influence upon the hypochondriac, when, one evening, havinginformed me abruptly that the lady Madeline was no more, he stated hisintention of preserving her corpse for a fortnight, (previously to itsfinal interment,) in one of the numerous vaults within the main wallsof the building. The worldly reason, however, assigned for this singularproceeding, was one which I did not feel at liberty to dispute. Thebrother had been led to his resolution (so he told me) by considerationof the unusual character of the malady of the deceased, of certainobtrusive and eager inquiries on the part of her medical men, and of theremote and exposed situation of the burial-ground of the family. I willnot deny that when I called to mind the sinister countenance of theperson whom I met upon the staircase, on the day of my arrival atthe house, I had no desire to oppose what I regarded as at best but aharmless, and by no means an unnatural, precaution.
At the request of Usher, I personally aided him in the arrangements forthe temporary entombment. The body having been encoffined, we two alonebore it to its rest. The vault in which we placed it (and which hadbeen so long unopened that our torches, half smothered in its oppressiveatmosphere, gave us little opportunity for investigation) was small,damp, and entirely without means of admission for light; lying, at greatdepth, immediately beneath that portion of the building in which was myown sleeping apartment. It had been used, apparently, in remote feudaltimes, for the worst purposes of a donjon-keep, and, in later days, as aplace of deposit for powder, or some other highly combustible substance,as a portion of its floor, and the whole interior of a long archwaythrough which we reached it, were carefully sheathed with copper. Thedoor, of massive iron, had been, also, similarly protected. Its immenseweight caused an unusually sharp grating sound, as it moved upon itshinges.
Having deposited our mournful burden upon tressels within this region ofhorror, we partially turned aside the yet unscrewed lid of the coffin,and looked upon the face of the tenant. A striking similitude betweenthe brother and sister now first arrested my attention; and Usher,divining, perhaps, my thoughts, murmured out some few words from whichI learned that the deceased and himself had been twins, and thatsympathies of a scarcely intelligible nature had always existed betweenthem. Our glances, however, rested not long upon the dead--for we couldnot regard her unawed. The disease which had thus entombed the lady inthe maturity of youth, had left, as usual in all maladies of a strictlycataleptical character, the mockery of a faint blush upon the bosom andthe face, and that suspiciously lingering smile upon the lip which isso terrible in death. We replaced and screwed down the lid, and, havingsecured the door of iron, made our way, with toil, into the scarcelyless gloomy apartments of the upper portion of the house.
And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observable changecame over the features of the mental disorder of my friend. Hisordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected orforgotten. He roamed from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, andobjectless step. The pallor of his countenance had assumed, if possible,a more ghastly hue--but the luminousness of his eye had utterly goneout. The once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and atremulous quaver, as if of extreme terror, habitually characterizedhis utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceasinglyagitated mind was laboring with some oppressive secret, to divulge whichhe struggled for the necessary courage. At times, again, I was obligedto resolve all into the mere inexplicable vagaries of madness, for Ibeheld him gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in an attitude of theprofoundest attention, as if listening to some imaginary sound. It wasno wonder that his condition terrified--that it infected me. I feltcreeping upon me, by slow yet certain degrees, the wild influences ofhis own fantastic yet impressive superstitions.
It was, especially, upon retiring to bed late in the night of theseventh or eighth day after the placing of the lady Madeline within thedonjon, that I experienced the full power of such feelings. Sleep camenot near my couch--while the hours waned and waned away. I struggled toreason off the nervousness which had dominion over me. I endeavored tobelieve that much, if not all of what I felt, was due to the bewilderinginfluence of the gloomy furniture of the room--of the dark and tattereddraperies, which, tortured into motion by the breath of a risingtempest, swayed fitfully to and fro upon the walls, and rustled uneasilyabout the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were fruitless. Anirrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame; and, at length, theresat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly causeless alarm. Shakingthis off with a gasp and a struggle, I uplifted myself upon the pillows,and, peering earnestly within the intense darkness of the chamber,harkened--I know not why, except that an instinctive spirit promptedme--to certain low and indefinite sounds which came, through the pausesof the storm, at long intervals, I knew not whence. Overpowered by anintense sentiment of horror, unaccountable yet unendurable, I threw onmy clothes with haste (for I felt that I should sleep no more during thenight), and endeavored to arouse myself from the pitiable condition intowhich I had fallen, by pacing rapidly to and fro through the apartment.
I had taken but few turns in this manner, when a light step on anadjoining staircase arrested my attention. I presently recognised it asthat of Usher. In an instant afterward he rapped, with a gentle touch,at my door, and entered, bearing a lamp. His countenance was, as usual,cadaverously wan--but, moreover, there was a species of mad hilarity inhis eyes--an evidently restrained _hysteria_ in his whole demeanor. Hisair appalled me--but anything was preferable to the solitude which I hadso long endured, and I even welcomed his presence as a relief.
”And you have not seen it?” he said abruptly, after having stared abouthim for some moments in silence--”you have not then seen it?--but, stay!you shall.” Thus speaking, and having carefully shaded his lamp, hehurried to one of the casements, and threw it freely open to the storm.
The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet.It was, indeed, a tempestuous yet sternly beautiful night, and onewildly singular in its terror and its beauty. A whirlwind had apparentlycollected its force in our vicinity; for there were frequent and violentalterations in the direction of the wind; and the exceeding density ofthe clouds (which hung so low as to press upon the turrets of the house)did not prevent our perceiving the life-like velocity with which theyflew careering from all points against each other, without passingaway into the distance. I say that even their exceeding density didnot prevent our perceiving this--yet we had no glimpse of the moon orstars--nor was there any flashing forth of the lightning. But theunder surfaces of the huge masses of agitated vapor, as well as allterrestrial objects immediately around us, were glowing in the unnaturallight of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible gaseous exhalationwhich hung about and enshrouded the mansion.
”You must not--you shall not behold this!” said I, shudderingly, toUsher, as I led him, with a gentle violence, from the window to a seat.”These appearances, which bewilder you, are merely electrical phenomenanot uncommon--or it may be that they have their ghastly origin inthe rank miasma of the tarn. Let us close this casement;--the air ischilling and dangerous to your frame. Here is one of your favoriteromances. I will read, and you shall listen;--and so we will pass awaythis terrible night together.”
The antique volume which I had taken up was the ”Mad Trist” of SirLauncelot Canning; but I had called it a favorite of Usher's more in sadjest than in earnest; for, in truth, there is little in its uncouth andunimaginative prolixity which could have had interest for the loftyand spiritual ideality of my friend. It was, however, the only bookimmediately at hand; and I indulged a vague hope that the excitementwhich now agitated the hypochondriac, might find relief (for the historyof mental disorder is full of similar anomalies) even in the extremenessof the folly which I should read. Could I have judged, indeed, by thewild overstrained air of vivacity with which he harkened, or apparentlyharkened, to the words of the tale, I might well have congratulatedmyself upon the success of my design.
I had arrived at that well-known portion of the story where Ethelred,the hero of the Trist, having sought in vain for peaceable admissioninto the dwelling of the hermit, proceeds to make good an entrance byforce. Here, it will be remembered, the words of the narrative run thus:
”And Ethelred, who was by nature of a doughty heart, and who was nowmighty withal, on account of the powerfulness of the wine which he haddrunken, waited no longer to hold parley with the hermit, who, in sooth,was of an obstinate and maliceful turn, but, feeling the rain upon hisshoulders, and fearing the rising of the tempest, uplifted his maceoutright, and, with blows, made quickly room in the plankings of thedoor for his gauntleted hand; and now pulling therewith sturdily, he socracked, and ripped, and tore all asunder, that the noise of the dry andhollow-sounding wood alarummed and reverberated throughout the forest.”
At the termination of this sentence I started, and for a moment, paused;for it appeared to me (although I at once concluded that my excitedfancy had deceived me)--it appeared to me that, from some very remoteportion of the mansion, there came, indistinctly, to my ears, what mighthave been, in its exact similarity of character, the echo (but a stifledand dull one certainly) of the very cracking and ripping sound whichSir Launcelot had so particularly described. It was, beyond doubt,the coincidence alone which had arrested my attention; for, amid therattling of the sashes of the casements, and the ordinary comminglednoises of the still increasing storm, the sound, in itself, had nothing,surely, which should have interested or disturbed me. I continued thestory:
”But the good champion Ethelred, now entering within the door, was soreenraged and amazed to perceive no signal of the maliceful hermit; but,in the stead thereof, a dragon of a scaly and prodigious demeanor, andof a fiery tongue, which sate in guard before a palace of gold, with afloor of silver; and upon the wall there hung a shield of shining brasswith this legend enwritten--
Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath bin; Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win;
And Ethelred uplifted his mace, and struck upon the head of the dragon,which fell before him, and gave up his pesty breath, with a shriek sohorrid and harsh, and withal so piercing, that Ethelred had fain toclose his ears with his hands against the dreadful noise of it, the likewhereof was never before heard.”
Here again I paused abruptly, and now with a feeling of wildamazement--for there could be no doubt whatever that, in this instance,I did actually hear (although from what direction it proceeded Ifound it impossible to say) a low and apparently distant, but harsh,protracted, and most unusual screaming or grating sound--the exactcounterpart of what my fancy had already conjured up for the dragon'sunnatural shriek as described by the romancer.
Oppressed, as I certainly was, upon the occurrence of this second andmost extraordinary coincidence, by a thousand conflicting sensations,in which wonder and extreme terror were predominant, I still retainedsufficient presence of mind to avoid exciting, by any observation, thesensitive nervousness of my companion. I was by no means certain thathe had noticed the sounds in question; although, assuredly, a strangealteration had, during the last few minutes, taken place in hisdemeanor. From a position fronting my own, he had gradually broughtround his chair, so as to sit with his face to the door of the chamber;and thus I could but partially perceive his features, although I sawthat his lips trembled as if he were murmuring inaudibly. His head haddropped upon his breast--yet I knew that he was not asleep, from thewide and rigid opening of the eye as I caught a glance of it in profile.The motion of his body, too, was at variance with this idea--for herocked from side to side with a gentle yet constant and uniform sway.Having rapidly taken notice of all this, I resumed the narrative of SirLauncelot, which thus proceeded:
”And now, the champion, having escaped from the terrible fury of thedragon, bethinking himself of the brazen shield, and of the breaking upof the enchantment which was upon it, removed the carcass from out ofthe way before him, and approached valorously over the silver pavementof the castle to where the shield was upon the wall; which in soothtarried not for his full coming, but feel down at his feet upon thesilver floor, with a mighty great and terrible ringing sound.”
No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than--as if a shieldof brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon a floor ofsilver--I became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic, and clangorous,yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely unnerved, I leaped tomy feet; but the measured rocking movement of Usher was undisturbed. Irushed to the chair in which he sat. His eyes were bent fixedlybefore him, and throughout his whole countenance there reigned a stonyrigidity. But, as I placed my hand upon his shoulder, there came astrong shudder over his whole person; a sickly smile quivered about hislips; and I saw that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering murmur,as if unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over him, I at lengthdrank in the hideous import of his words.
”Not hear it?--yes, I hear it, and _have_ heard it.Long--long--long--many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heardit--yet I dared not--oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!--I darednot--I _dared_ not speak! _We have put her living in the tomb!_ Said Inot that my senses were acute? I _now_ tell you that I heard her firstfeeble movements in the hollow coffin. I heard them--many,many days ago--yet I dared not--_I dared not speak!_ Andnow--to-night--Ethelred--ha! ha!--the breaking of the hermit's door,and the death-cry of the dragon, and the clangor of the shield!--say,rather, the rending of her coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges ofher prison, and her struggles within the coppered archway of the vault!Oh whither shall I fly? Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurryingto upbraid me for my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the stair?Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart?Madman!”--here he sprang furiously to his feet, and shrieked out hissyllables, as if in the effort he were giving up his soul--”_Madman!I tell you that she now stands without the door!_”
As if in the superhuman energy of his utterance there had been foundthe potency of a spell--the huge antique pannels to which the speakerpointed, threw slowly back, upon the instant, their ponderous and ebonyjaws. It was the work of the rushing gust--but then without those doorsthere _did_ stand the lofty and enshrouded figure of the lady Madelineof Usher. There was blood upon her white robes, and the evidence of somebitter struggle upon every portion of her emaciated frame. For a momentshe remained trembling and reeling to and fro upon the threshold--then,with a low moaning cry, fell heavily inward upon the person of herbrother, and in her violent and now final death-agonies, bore him to thefloor a corpse, and a victim to the terrors he had anticipated.
From that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast. The stormwas still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself crossing the oldcauseway. Suddenly there shot along the path a wild light, and I turnedto see whence a gleam so unusual could have issued; for the vast houseand its shadows were alone behind me. The radiance was that of the full,setting, and blood-red moon, which now shone vividly through that oncebarely-discernible fissure, of which I have before spoken as extendingfrom the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base. WhileI gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath ofthe whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon mysight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--therewas a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousandwaters--and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly andsilently over the fragments of the ”_House of Usher_.”