ountry youth, evidently the boots, was beating a mat outside the door.

"Is the Baron within?" I asked.

"Wal, he b'ain't up yet, zur," replied the youth.

"Oh, never mind," I said, "I will wait, and as soon as he is up tell him
a gentleman is waiting to see him."

"Very well, zur."

"Would you like to wait here in the parlour, sir?" said the buxom
landlady, who had overheard our dialogue. "The Baron can't be long; he
is generally up by this time, or if you will follow me, sir, I will
knock at his door, and you can wait in his sitting-room till he comes
out."

"Thank you," I said, as I followed the landlady upstairs, and was led
into the sitting-room. The landlady knocked at the Baron's door. No
answer.

"Don't awake him, pray," said I, "if he's asleep."

"Oh, but the Baron told me to call him early, sir."

She knocked again. Again no answer. The landlady paused a few moments to
listen if he was getting up, then tapped again louder, louder still, but
all was silent. The hostess ventured to open the door ajar. The Baron
was in bed. She entered the room. A pause, a slight scream, and the
landlady came running out to me, pale and terrified.

"Oh, sir," she said, in a faint voice, "the Baron--the
Baron--is--_dead_!"

"_Dead!_" I exclaimed. "When? how?"

"It is true, sir. Come and see."

I entered the Baron's chamber. There he lay, sure enough, to all
appearance dead. I touched him; he was as cold as ice. I was much struck
with the singular resemblance of the defunct Baron before me to the
portrait of Baron Ralph that hung over the mantelpiece in my chamber. It
is true that the Baron before me was a younger man, that he wore a
shaven face instead of a moustache and peaked beard, that the livid
colour of the corpse was unlike the florid complexion of Baron Ralph;
but the features were exact, the shape of the head, the colour of the
hair and the way it grew; the same tufted red eyebrows, the right one
considerably higher than the left; the same bent flat nose and tightly
compressed lips, with cruel lines at the corners; the chin, the jaw, the
deep line between the brows, in fact, the whole man seemed the exact
counterpart of the old Baron.

A horrible recollection passed through my mind. I remembered having seen
the criminal before alluded to after his execution. What a startling
likeness between the features of the executed criminal and those of the
Baron's corpse before me. I shuddered. A portion of the pha