|
|
|
|
-15-
I had conjured up, for a [?] -- and just adored! Saying over to myself Mrs Browning's lines "I oft had seen the dawn light run like red wineOnly once more I watched and was so scared I withdren [sic] from the ministering angels of that day, forever. It was a dreary setting, that last night of watch- ing. A large old fashioned kitchen with an enormous fireplace, and two small bed rooms opening off, was my arena. My charge was a very old woman slowly re- covering from a long illness, whom I had never seen before, who was comfortably fixed in one of the bed rooms. If one wants to make a sensitive computation of time, let him try my position only, from eight to twelve on a still Summer night in the country fifty years ago, -- when all human life gradually withdraws, and dies utterly away, and the tricks of darkness begin their antics. The steady talk of the [?] clock of time and eternity, -- the wild scramble of the rats in the X wall, -- the cracking and snapping of thee old house itself, the soft scurry in the grass outside the open window, of things I could not name but worse did imag- ine. And, in between, such stillness! Suddenly a series of curdling shrieks pierced the darkness and filled the house. It was murder of course, and frozen with terror I stiffened. But the sick woman faintly whispered -- "It is my daugh- ter. She is subject to nightmare. You must wake her quickly". -- There was only a thin partition between me and those hellish yells. I could not do it --- but I must! My reputation as a watcher was at stake. Shaking with fright, I grasped the iron candlestick, the tallow dripping over my fingers, -- and fled, to clutch the poor victim, who with wide staring eyes was fast in the grip of her horror. She blessed me for delivering her, -- but alas! nobody saved me from the most awful night of my life! I never watched again. What a far day from then to this present H bMS Am 1118.95, Box 9
|
|
|
|
Not to be reproduced in whole or in part without permission. Transcription and commentary copyright 1998 by Martha Nell Smith, Laura Elyn Lauth, and Lara Vetter, all rights reserved Maintained by Rebecca Mooney <rnmooney@umd.edu> Last updated on January 25, 2008 |
|