dream; yet feeling to his inmost core all its
powerful grief and accusation, and quietly aghast at the sinister
consciousness it gave him. Still it swelled, gathering and sounding on
into yet mightier pathos, till all at once it darkened and spread wide
in wild despair, and aspiring again into a pealing agony of
supplication, quivered and died away in a low and funereal sigh.

The tears streamed suddenly upon his face; his soul lightened and turned
dark within him; and as one faints away, so consciousness swooned, and
he fell suddenly down a precipice of sleep. The music rose again, a
pensive and holy chant, and sounded on to its close, unaffected by the
action of his brain, for he slept and heard it no more. He lay
tranquilly, hardly seeming to breathe, in motionless repose. The room
was dim and silent, and the furniture took uncouth shapes around him.
The red glow upon the ceiling, from the screened fire, showed the misty
figure of the phantom kneeling by his side. All light had gone from the
spectral form. It knelt beside him, mutely, as in prayer. Once it gazed
at his quiet face with a mournful tenderness, and its shadowy hands
caressed his forehead. Then it resumed its former attitude, and the slow
hours crept by.

At last it rose and glided to the table, on which lay the open letter.
It seemed to try to lift the sheets with its misty hands--but vainly.
Next it essayed the lifting of a pen which lay there--but failed. It was
a piteous sight, to see its idle efforts on these shapes of grosser
matter, which appeared now to have to it but the existence of illusions.
Wandering about the shadowy room, it wrung its phantom hands as in
despair.

Presently it grew still. Then it passed quickly to his side, and stood
before him. He slept calmly. It placed one ghostly hand above his
forehead, and, with the other pointed to the open letter. In this
attitude its shape grew momentarily more distinct. It began to kindle
into brightness. The pale flame again flowed from its hand, streaming
downward to his brain. A look of trouble darkened the sleeping face.
Stronger--stronger; brighter--brighter; until, at last, it stood before
him, a glorious shape of light, with an awful look of commanding love in
its shining features--and the sleeper sprang to his feet with a cry!

The phantom had vanished. He saw nothing. His first impression was, not
that he had dreamed, but that, awaking in the familiar room, he had seen
the spirit of h