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 THE DANCE OF DEATH. 25

scarcely had they attained their sixteenth year, when the unnatural brilliancy of their cheeks , and the almost supernatural lustre of their eyes , began to betray the internal hectic fire which was secretly wasting the strength of youth.

" Seldom at home, I had little idea of the evil which hung over our home . I had seen my eld- est sister in her beauty , and her wane ; and then I heard of her death . I was at the university when the second died . Shortly afterwards I visited my home . I found my third sister in the full bloom of youthful loveliness . I had been dabbling a little in painting , and felt anxious to attempt her portrait , but I had made no great progress when the time for my departure arrived . I was long absent ; when I next returned , it was on the occasion of her death . I was now no longer a heedless boy . I saw the melancholy of my father , and ascribed it to the shock of so many successive deaths . He was silent ; he left me in my happy ignorance , though even then the death- stillness and loneliness of the house weighed with an undefinable oppression on my heart . My sister Regina seemed to grow up even more lovely than her deceased sisters. I now found the sketch which I had begun so like her, that I resolved to make her sit to me in secret , that ] might finish the picture , and surprise my father with it before my departure. It was but half finished, however , when the period of my return to the capital arrived. I thought I would endea- vour to finish it from memory, but , strangely enough , I always confused myself with the re- collection of my dead sisters , whose features seemed to float before my eyes. In spite of all my efforts, the portrait would not become that of Regina. 1 recollected having heard my father say, that she , of all the rest , bore the greatest re- semblance to her mother ; so I took out a little picture of her , which she had left to me , and en- deavoured with this assistance , and what my fancy could supply , to finish the picture. At last it was finished, and appeared to possess a strange resemblance to all my sisters , without being an exact portrait of any.

" As I had intended it, however , for the por- trait of Regina in particular , I determined to take it with me on my next visit , and endeavour to correct its defects by a comparison with the original . I came , but the summer of her beauty was already past . When I drew out the picture to compare it with her features , I was shocked at the change which had taken place in her , though it had not yet manifested itself in symp- toms of disease . As I was packing up my draw- ing materials again , under some pretext or other , my father unexpectedly entered . He gave a glance at the picture , seemed deeply agitated , and then exclaimed- " Let it alone. "

" That evening, however , as , according to our old custom , we were sitting together in his study , after my sisters had gone to rest , our hearts reciprocally opened to each other.

" I now for the first time obtained a glimpse into my father's wounded heart . He related to me that dream as you have now heard it ; and

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his firm conviction that almost all his children, one by one , would be taken from him ; a convic- tion against which he had struggled , till fatal experience had begun too clearly to realize it. I now learned that he had brought up his daugh- ters in this strict and almost monastic seclusion, that no taste for the world or its pleasures might be awakened in the minds of those who were doomed to quit it so soon. They mingled in no gay assemblies, scarcely in a social party ; and even I , my friend , have since that time never thought of dancing without a shudder. Conceive what an impression this conversation, and that fearful prophetic dream , made upon my mind ! That I and my youngest sister seemed excepted from the doom of the rest, I could not pay much attention to ; for was not my mother , at my birth , suffering under that disease which she had be- queathed to her children ; and how , then , was it likely that I should be an exception ? My ima- gination was active enough to extend the sen- tence of death to us all. The interpretation which my father attempted to give to the dream, so as to preserve us to himself , might be but a delusive suggestion of paternal affection ; per- haps , self - deluded , he had forgotten , or given another turn to the conclusion of the dream. deep and wild despair seized upon me, for life to me was all in all ! In vain my father endeavour- ed to compose me ; and, finding his efforts un- successful , he contented himself with exacting from me the promise that this fatal secret of our house should be communicated to none.

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" It was at this time I became acquainted with you . The conflict which raged within my bosom between reason and superstition, between the struggles of courage and the suggestions of despair , could not be concealed from you , though you could form no idea of its source . I accom- panied you to Lubeck . The sight of the Dance of Death produced a remarkable effect upon my mind . 1 saw a representation of my mother's dream , and in that too , I thought I perceived also its origin . A film seemed to fall from my eyes ; it was the momentary triumph of sober reason . It struck me at once that the idea of this picture , which my mother had undoubtedly at one time seen , had been floating through her excited ima- gination , and had given rise to that dark vision , before whose fatal influence my father and I had prostrated ourselves so long , instead of ascribing the successive deaths of our family to their true source , in the infectious nature of that disease which my mother's insane love of dancing had infused into her own veins , and which had been the ominous inheritance of her offspring. The advances had already made in the study of medicine, confirmed these views. The confined and solitary life my sisters had led, the total want of any precaution in separating those who were still in health from those who had been already attacked by this malady , was in itself sufficient to account for all which had happened. Animated by this idea, I hurried home in spite of all your entreaties. I laboured to make my father participate in my views, to induce him to