all
my former terrors came thickening around me, more dreadful by far as
the stir and bustle in the room indicated they were about to close the
coffin.

'At this moment my dear friend B------ entered the room.

He had come many miles to see me once more, and they made way for him to
approach me as I lay. He placed his warm hand upon my breast, and oh
the throb it sent through my heart! Again, but almost unconsciously to
myself, the impulse rushed along my nerves; a bursting sensation
seized my chest, a tingling ran through my frame, a crashing, jarring
sensation, as if the tense nervous cords were vibrating to some
sudden and severe shock, took hold on me; and then, after one violent
convulsive throe which brought the blood from my mouth and eyes,
my heart swelled, at first slowly, then faster, and the nerves
reverberated, clank! clank! responsive to the stroke. At the same time
the chest expanded, the muscles strained like the cordage of a ship in a
heavy sea, and I breathed once more.

'While thus the faint impulse to returning life was given, the dread
thought flashed on me that it might not be real, and that to my own
imagination alone were referable the phenomena I experienced. At the
same instant the gloomy doubt crossed my mind it was dispelled; for I
heard a cry of horror through the room, and the words, "He is alive! he
still lives!" from a number of voices around me. The noise and confusion
increased.

I heard them say, "Carry out B------ before he sees him again; he has
fainted!" Directions and exclamations of wonder and dread followed one
upon another; and I can but call to mind the lifting me from the coffin,
and the feeling of returning warmth I experienced as I was placed before
a fire, and supported by the arms of my friend.

'I will only add that after some weeks of painful debility I was again
restored to health, having tasted the full bitterness of death.'

CHAPTER XXIX. THE STRANGE GUEST

The Eil Wagen, into whose bowels I had committed myself on leaving
Frankfort, rolled along for twenty-four hours before I could come to
any determination as to whither I should go; for so is it that perfect
liberty is sometimes rather an inconvenience, and a little despotism
is now and then no bad thing; and at this moment I could have given a
ten-gulden piece to any one who should have named my road, and settled
my destination.

'Where are we?' said I, at length, as we straggled, nine horses and all