riously shattered. She informed me, further, that each attack
was succeeded by great exhaustion, and that she felt herself growing
feebler, from year to year. The immediate result, I suspected, was a
disease of the heart, which might give her the blessing of death sooner
than she hoped. Before taking leave of her, I succeeded in procuring
from her a promise that she would write to Eber Nicholson, giving him
that free forgiveness which would at least ease his conscience, and make
his burden somewhat lighter to bear. Then, feeling that it was not in my
power to do more, I rose to depart. Taking her hand, which lay cold and
passive in mine,--so much like a dead hand that it required a strong
effort in me to repress a nervous shudder,--I said, "Farewell, Rachel
Emmons, and remember that they who seek peace in the right spirit will
always find it at last."

"It won't be many years before I find it", she replied, calmly; and the
weird, supernatural light of her eyes shone upon me for the last time.

I reached New York in due time, and did not fail, sitting around the
broiled oysters and celery, with my partners, to repeat the story of the
Haunted Shanty. I knew, beforehand, how they would receive it; but the
circumstances had taken such hold of my mind,--so _burned_ me, like a
boy's money, to keep buttoned up in the pocket,--that I could no more
help telling the tale than the man I remember reading about, a great
while ago, in a poem called "The Ancient Mariner". Beeson, who, I
suspect, don't believe much of anything, is always apt to carry
his raillery too far; and thenceforth, whenever the drum of a
target-company, marching down Broadway, passed the head of our street,
he would whisper to me, "There comes Rachel Emmons!" until I finally
became angry, and insisted that the subject should never again be
mentioned.

But I none the less recalled it to my mind, from time to time, with
a singular interest. It was the one supernatural, or, at least,
inexplicable experience of my life, and I continued to feel a profound
curiosity with regard to the two principal characters. My slight
endeavor to assist them by such counsel as had suggested itself to me
was actuated by the purest human sympathy, and upon further reflection
I could discover no other means of help. A spiritual disease could be
cured only by spiritual medicine,--unless, indeed, the secret of Rachel
Emmons's mysterious condition lay in some permanent dislocation of th