are dead but one
man--it is you! But years, though so slowly they come, have then scathed
you. There is the coming of age on your brow, and the will is relaxed
in the cells of the brain. Still that will, though enfeebled, exceeds
all that man knew before you, through the will you live on, gnawed with
famine; and nature no longer obeys you in that death-spreading region;
the sky is a sky of iron, and the air has iron clamps, and the ice-rocks
wedge in the ship. Hark how it cracks and groans. Ice will imbed it as
amber imbeds a straw. And a man has gone forth, living yet, from the
ship and its dead; and he has clambered up the spikes of an iceberg, and
the two moons gaze down on his form. That man is yourself; and terror is
on you--terror; and terror has swallowed your will. And I see swarming
up the steep ice-rock, grey grisly things. The bears of the north have
scented their quarry--they come near you and nearer, shambling and
rolling their bulk. And in that day every moment shall seem to you
longer than the centuries through which you have passed. And heed
this--after life, moments continued make the bliss or the hell of
eternity."

"Hush," said the whisper; "but the day, you assure me, is far off--very
far! I go back to the almond and rose of Damascus!--sleep!"

The room swam before my eyes. I became insensible. When I recovered, I
found G---- holding my hand and smiling. He said, "You who have always
declared yourself proof against mesmerism have succumbed at last to my
friend Richards."

"Where is Mr Richards?"

"Gone, when you passed into a trance--saying quietly to me, 'Your friend
will not wake for an hour.'"

I asked, as collectedly as I could, where Mr Richards lodged.

"At the Trafalgar Hotel."

"Give me your arm," said I to G----; "let us call on him; I have
something to say."

When we arrived at the hotel, we were told that Mr Richards had
returned twenty minutes before, paid his bill, left directions with his
servant (a Greek) to pack his effects and proceed to Malta by the
steamer that should leave Southampton the next day. Mr Richards had
merely said of his own movements that he had visits to pay in the
neighbourhood of London, and it was uncertain whether he should be able
to reach Southampton in time for that steamer; if not, he should follow
in the next one.

The waiter asked me my name. On my informing him, he gave me a note that
Mr Richards had left for me, in case I called.

The note