Page:Knight's Quarterly Magazine series 1 volume 1 (June–October 1823).djvu/368

 most courageous; and at present, the many stories of robbers, and cutters out of tongues, have made him so fearful, that all the inducements in the world would not tempt him out upon the road at night. The Silversteins are good sort of people; and, as they observed his terror, they offered him a bed in the mansion. Schroeder accepted it with the greatest joy, and retired, after making an apology for being obliged to disturb them early in the morning, as he would be compelled to depart at day-break—but the next morning there was no Schroeder to be seen or heard of. Hour after hour passed by, and yet he did not make his appearance. They knocked at his door, they called, they made the most outrageous noises, but nobody answered. At length the affair became so serious, that the door was, by Silverstein’s order, broken open. They soon discovered poor Schroeder, pale and senseless in his bed; and looking as if just about to breathe his last. With much difficulty they revived him, and he immediately began to relate the most frightful story of what he affirmed had happened to him during the night. He had retired to bed at an early hour, in order that he might be enabled to depart betimes in the morning. He was still in his first sleep when a knocking at his door awoke him. Poor Schroeder, whose brain was immediately filled with all the horrible tales he had ever heard, squeezed himself as close as he could to the wall, and pulled the bed-clothes tight over his head. He had hardly, however, began again to slumber, ere he was a second time alarmed by a hollow rustling noise close to his bed; and, on looking up, perceived a figure in white standing before a closet, which, till that moment, he had not even observed in the apartment, and in which there was a glitter as if it was full of gold, silver, and jewels. The spectre counted its riches, rattled the money, and, after locking the closet, gravely approached the bed. Schroeder then observed the small, pale face of a corpse, with an old-fashioned head-band bound round her black hair. He felt the air become ice-cold about him. Terrified to death, he turned himself round, shut his eyes as close as he could, and moved as far away from its vicinity as possible. At this moment it uttered a tremendous scream, and something fell down violently close to him, which finally deprived him of his senses. In this state he had remained until the morning, when, as I have already informed you, he was found half dead in his bed.

“You may easily imagine what an amazing disturbance this affair made in the house. The Silversteins, who, without this, were already complete visionaries, and were continually conjuring up goblins, began to talk of an old aunt, whose apparition had been seen gadding about in former times, and