piritual agency, such as that which could at all predict the events,
combining in one mysterious effect, with the shadowy outline of those
very predictions. The power, that could have predicted, was as dim and
as hard to grasp as was the precise nature of the evil that had been
predicted.

An icy terror froze my blood at this moment when I looked at the
significant glances, too easily understood by me, that were exchanged
between the servants. My mouth had been for the last two hours growing
more and more parched, so that at present, from mere want of moisture, I
could not separate my lips to speak. One of the women saw the vain
efforts I was making, and hastily brought me a glass of water. With the
first recovery of speech, I asked them what little Francis had meant by
saying that he had seen his mother in her bedroom. Their reply was--that
they were as much at a loss to discover his meaning as I was; that he
had made the same assertion to them, and with so much earnestness, that
they had, all in succession, gone up-stairs to look for her, and with
the fullest expectation of finding her. This was a mystery which
remained such to the very last; there was no doubt whatsoever that the
child believed himself to have seen his mother; that he could not have
seen her in her human bodily presence, there is as little doubt as there
is, alas! that in this world he never _did_ see her again. The poor
child constantly adhered to his story, and with a circumstantiality far
beyond all power of invention that could be presumed in an artless
infant. Every attempt at puzzling him or entangling him in
contradictions by means of cross-examination was but labour thrown away;
though, indeed, it is true enough that for those attempts, as will soon
be seen, there was but a brief interval allowed.

Not dwelling upon this subject at present, I turned to Hannah--a woman
who held the nominal office of cook in our little establishment, but
whose real duties had been much more about her mistress's person--and
with a searching look of appeal I asked her whether, in this moment of
trial, when (as she might see) I was not so perfectly master of myself
as perhaps always to depend upon seeing what was best to be done, she
would consent to accompany me into the city, and take upon herself those
obvious considerations of policy or prudence which might but too easily
escape my mind, darkened, and likely to be darkened, as to its power of
discernment by t