een
lying in a state of half-hysterical apathy for some hours, all volition,
almost all vitality, suspended, under the influence of an exaggerated
credulity, when the letter was laid upon the table.

"What is that your maid has just left out of her hand?" asked the
doctor, in a tone of semi-imperiousness.

[Illustration: 318]

"A letter, a sealed letter," replied she, mystically waving her hand
before her half-closed eyes.

The doctor gave a look of triumph at the bystanders, and went on:

"Has the letter come from a distant country, or from a correspondent
near at hand?"

"Near!" said she, with a shudder.

"Where is the writer at this moment?" asked he.

"In the house," said she, with another and more violent shuddering.

"I now take the letter in my hand," said the doctor, "and what am I
looking at?"

"A seal with two griffins supporting a spur."

The doctor showed the letter on every side, with a proud and commanding
gesture. "There is a name written in the corner of the letter, beneath
the address. Do you know that name?"

A heavy, thick sob was the reply.

"There there be calm, be still," said he, majestically motioning
with both hands towards her; and she immediately became composed
and tranquil. "Are the contents of this letter such as will give you
pleasure?"

A shake of the head was the answer.

"Are they painful?"

"Very painful," said she, pressing her hand to her temples.

"Will these tidings be productive of grand consequences?"

"Yes, yes!" cried she, eagerly.

"What will you do, when you read them?"

"Act!" ejaculated she, solemnly.

"In compliance with the spirit, or in rejection?"

"Rejection!"

"Sleep on, sleep on," said the doctor, with a wave of his hand; and, as
he spoke, her head drooped, her arm fell listlessly down, and her
long and heavy breathing denoted deep slumber. "There are people, Miss
Dalton," said he to Kate, "who affect to see nothing in mesmerism but
deception and trick, whose philosophy teaches them to discredit all that
they cannot comprehend. I trust you may never be of this number."

"It is very wonderful, very strange," said she, thoughtfully.

"Like all the secrets of nature, its phenomena are above belief; yet, to
those who study them with patience and industry, how compatible do they
seem with the whole order and spirit of creation. The great system of
vitality being a grand scheme of actionary and reactionary influences,
the centrifugal bei