nd whole character, had such a power over me, altogether.
But I couldn't deny, what my father always said, that he was
continually in a most strangely excited condition. This I attributed to
causes which we knew nothing about, perhaps some deep impression made
upon his mind by something that had happened to him during the war,
which he had been serving in; though my father thought drink was the
cause of it. But I was right, as the event proved. One day he found me
alone, and exhibited a state of mind, which I at first took for an
outburst of the most passionate affection. But by-and-by, when he ran
away, trembling in every limb as with a frost, and uttering
unintelligible cries, I could only conclude it was insanity, and so it
was, poor fellow! He had once happened to mention his address, and I
remembered it. After we had seen nothing of him for some weeks, my
father sent there to make inquiries. The landlady--or rather, the
porter who waited on the lodgers--told our servant that he had gone mad
some time before, and been taken to the asylum. I suppose it must have
been lottery speculations which turned his head, for it seems he
thought he was king of the Ambe."'

"'Good gracious!' cried Marzell, 'that must have been Nettelmann.
Ambe--Amboyna.'

"'It may have been some confusion,' said Severin under his breath. 'I
seem to see daylight through it, but go on, please.'

"Alexander looked at Severin with a sad smile, and then continued:

"'My mind was now at ease, and soon the young lady and I were engaged,
and the wedding day fixed. I wanted to sell my house, for the ghostly
noises were still heard in it now and then. But my father-in-law
advised me not to do so, and so it came about that I told him the whole
story. He is a jovial sort of man, full of vital energy; but he grew
deeply thoughtful over this, and spoke about it in a way that I hadn't
expected.

"'"People used to have a pious simple faith," he said. "We believed in
another world, but we admitted the feebleness of our senses. Then came
'enlightenment,' and made everything so very clear and enlightened,
that we can see nothing for excess of light, and go banging our noses
against the first tree we come to in the wood. We insist, now-a-days,
on grasping the other world with stretched-out arms of flesh and bone.
Keep you the house, and leave the rest to me."

"'I was astonished when he settled that the marriage should take place
in the drawing-room of my hou