"'Not long after the death of an illustrious poet, who had
filled, while living, a great station in the eyes of the public,
a literary friend, to whom the deceased had been well known, was
engaged during the darkening twilight of an autumn evening, in
perusing one of the publications which professed to detail the
habits and opinions of the distinguished individual who was now
no more. As the reader had enjoyed the intimacy of the deceased
to a considerable degree, he was deeply interested in the
publication, which contained some particulars relating to himself
and other friends. A visitor was sitting in the apartment, who
was also engaged in reading. Their sitting-room opened into an
entrance hall, rather fantastically fitted up with articles of
armor, skins of wild animals, and the like. It was when laying
down his book, and passing into this hall, through which the moon
was beginning to shine, that the individual of whom I speak saw
right before him, in a standing posture, the exact representation
of his departed friend, whose recollection had been so strongly
brought to his imagination. He stopped for a single moment, so as
to notice the wonderful accuracy with which fancy had impressed
upon the bodily eye the peculiarities of dress and position of
the illustrious poet. Sensible, however, of the delusion, he felt
no sentiment save that of wonder at the extraordinary accuracy of
the resemblance, and stepped onward to the figure, which resolved
itself as he approached into the various materials of which it
was composed. These were merely a screen occupied by great coats,
shawls, plaids, and such other articles as are usually found in a
country entrance hall. The spectator returned to the spot from
which he had seen the illusion, and endeavored with all his power
to recall the image which had been so singularly vivid. But this
he was unable to do. And the person who had witnessed the
apparition, or, more properly, whose excited state had been the
means of raising it, had only to return to the apartment, and
tell his young friend under what a striking hallucination he had
for a moment labored.'"
Here I was constrained to call the Professor to a halt. "Your stories
are very interesting," I said, "but I fail to perceive any analogy in
either the conditions or the incidents, to my experience. I was fully
awake and conscious at the time, and the man I saw appeared and moved
about in the full glare of the gaslight,--"
"Perhaps not," he answered; "I am simply giving you some general
illustrations of the subject. But here is a case more to the point."
Again he read:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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