fect; so that, when the clergyman had opened his prayer-book, an
officer of the law, supported by some armed men, commanded him to be
silent. An insult which fired the whol assembly with indignation was
particularly and instantly resented by the only son of the deceased,
Edgar, popularly called the Master of Ravenswood, a youth of about
twenty years of age. He clapped his hand on his sword, and bidding
the official person to desist at his peril from farther interruption,
commanded the clergyman to proceed. The man attempted to enforce his
commission; but as an hundred swords at once glittered in the air, he
contented himself with protesting against the violence which had been
offered to him in the execution of his duty, and stood aloof, a sullen
adn moody spectator of the ceremonial, muttering as one who should say:
"You'll rue the day that clogs me with this answer."

The scene was worthy of an artist's pencil. Under the very arch of the
house of death, the clergyman, affrighted at the scene, and trembling
for his own safety, hastily and unwillingly rehearsed the solemn service
of the church, and spoke "dust to dust and ashes to ashes," over
ruined pride and decayed prosperity. Around stood the relations of the
deceased, their countenances more in anger than in sorrow, and the drawn
swords which they brandished forming a violent contrast with their deep
mourning habits. In the countenance of the young man alone, resentment
seemed for the moment overpowered by the deep agony with which he beheld
his nearest, and almost his only, friend consigned to the tomb of his
ancestry. A relative observed him turn deadly pale, when, all rites
being now duly observed, it became the duty of the chief mourner to
lower down into the charnel vault, where mouldering coffins showed their
tattered velvet and decayed plating, the head of the corpse which was
to be their partner in corruption. He stept to the youth and offered his
assistance, which, by a mute motion, Edgar Ravenswood rejected. Firmly,
and without a tear, he performed that last duty. The stone was laid
on the sepulchre, the door of the aisle was locked, and the youth took
possession of its massive key.

As the crowd left the chapel, he paused on the steps which led to its
Gothic chancel. "Gentlemen and friends," he said, "you have this day
done no common duty to the body of your deceased kinsman. The rites of
due observance, which, in other countries, are allowed as the due o