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Gfie Sphinx U " AifgdcfarJUan Poe r Author of "Mesmeric Reyelation," "The Case of M, Valdemar," etc. jj|URING the dread reign of the cholera in New York, I had accepted the invita- tion of a relative to spend a fortnight with him in the retirement of hia cot- tage orne on the banks of the Hudson. We had here around us all the ordinary means of summer amusement; and what with rambling in the woods, sketching, boating, fishing, bathing, music and books, we should have passed the time pleasantly JuxHHHHMMH enough, but for the fearful in- telligence which reached us every morning from the popu- lous city. Not a day elapsed which did not bring us news of the decease of some acquaint- ance. Then, as the fatality in- creased, we learned to expect daily the loss of some friend. At length we trembled at the approach of every messenger. 'THIS little-kntmm classic by Edgar Allan Poe is chiefly interesting because it once more shows us how our senses are sometimes fooled and bow nature ofteti contrives to play some huge joke on vs. In this story Poe takes as his -uehicle the science of optics, and with his usual facile pen he manages to excite your interest to a high pitch. The denouement is as simple as it is startling. The very air from the South seemed to us redolent with death. That palsying thought, indeed, took en- tire possession of my sou!. I could neither speak, think, nor dream of anything else. My host was of a less excitable temperament, and, although greatly depressed in spirits, exerted himself to sustain my own. "His richly philosophical intellect was not at any time affected by unrealities. To the substances of terror he was sufficiently HMHMsniHHi a hve, but of its shadows he had — no apprehension. His endeavors to arouse me from the condition of abnormal gloom into which I had fallen were frustrated, in great meas- ure, by certain volumes which I had found in his iibrary. These were of a character to force into germination what- ever seeds of hereditary super- station lay latent in. my, bosom. 357
