Page:The Necromancer, or, The Tale of the Black Forest Vol. 1.djvu/225

 manner, that one must have been an eyewitness of its ire, if one will form a just idea of our situation."

"Our impatience increased as the punch began to heat our blood, we took the candles from the table, unsheathed our swords, and began to search every corner of the house and the cellar without success. My friends looked gloomy, the clouds of dissatisfaction were hovering over their brows, and a storm was gathering, which perhaps would have ended in a serious quarrel, if it had not been for the Austrian's tale, which, as yet, had sheltered me against their boiling anger, and from the suspicion of being an impostor or a coward. They began ridiculing the landlord and myself on account of our self-created fright, as they called it, declaring, all we had heard and seen to be a mere phantom, the offspring of a deluded fancy; however they were soon convinced of the truth of our narration, in a most shocking manner."