Page:The Necromancer, or, The Tale of the Black Forest Vol. 1.djvu/201

 provoke the lurking tempest of woe, that had thus cruelly crushed the earthly happiness of the wretched villagers, I hastily inquired for the next village, they shewed us the way, and we bade them farewell with a bleeding heart, riding away in full speed.

But, alas! I could not escape the hideous spectre of self reproach, pursuing me with icy fangs: The scene of misery which my eyes had witnessed hovered constantly before my gloomy fancy, the groans of woe which I had heard still vibrated in my ears, the haggard looks of these unhappy people, undone by my heedlessness, stared me in the face ever and anon, and I struggled in vain to shake off the grisly spectre pursuing me with unrelent-unrelenting [sic] resentment. "How comfortless and miserable is the man," said I to myself, "whom conscience accuses of having plunged into the gaping gulph of misery a fellow creature!"

The Austrian saw the painful workings of my soul, kindly striving to dispel the gloomy