These books were the delight and occupation of her life; and when her eyes latterly began to grow dim with age, it was my task to read them aloud to her. At first, I revolted from this labor; it hung drearily upon me, and sickened me. Youth is naturally mutinous under confinement, and yearns for activity and freedom. But it was surprising how soon I fell into her tastes, and found myself kindling, as she used to do, over the horrors these terrible books unfolded. And now they took possession of me, I began to believe in them as she did; and with belief, or the awe which is so closely allied to it, my eagerness to penetrate further and further grew into an irresistible passion. Many a time in the bleak autumn nights, when the sharp winds snapped the leaves from the trees, and drifted their crisp spoils against the windows, have I sat gasping over some hideous tale, to which, by an involuntary association of ideas, the desolation of the season imparted additional terrors. I was wrought upon by that sort of fascination which resides in the eyes of the snake, when it fixes its gaze upon the face of a child. Children who have been brought up in a healthy collision with the world know nothing of the state of fear and mental slavery I am describing. A little judicious counsel would have dispelled these delusions; a little timely explanation would have shown me their absurdity. But where was I to seek it? In my isolation I had not a single adviser. I took all I read for granted. The book could not dissipate the chaos of doubts and importunities of struggling reason it generated; it was dumb, and could not answer my questions. If I appealed to my mother, she was chafed at the interruption and the heresy, and commanded me to read on. At last I doubted no longer. Wonder after wonder swept away my feeble judgment. I believed in a spiritual kingdom--in the return of the dead to the earth--in the power of prophecy and the agency of demons--in second sight and the elixir vitæ--in amulets and miraculous invocations; the crystal mirror of Cornelius Agrippa, the witches of the Brocken, the Flying Dutchman, the Wandering Jew, were all realities to me. The ignorant alone believe in such things; but in this ignorance consisted all the knowledge that was thrown open to me.