The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Volume 01Smollett, T. (Tobias)
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The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Volume 01
Smollett, T. (Tobias)
Adventure stories; Gothic fiction
Some years ago, a twelve-stringed instrument was contrived by a very
ingenious musician, by whom it was aptly entitled the "Harp of Aeolus,"
because, being properly applied to a stream of air, it produces a wild
irregular variety of harmonious sounds, that seem to be the effect of
enchantment, and wonderfully dispose the mind for the most romantic
situations. Fathom, who was really a virtuoso in music, had brought one
of those new-fashioned guitars into the country, and as the effect of it
was still unknown in the family, he that night converted it to the
purposes of his amour, by fixing it in the casement of a window belonging
to the gallery, exposed to the west wind, which then blew in a gentle
breeze. The strings no sooner felt the impression of the balmy zephyr,
than they began to pour forth a stream of melody more ravishingly
delightful than the song of Philomel, the warbling brook, and all the
concert of the wood. The soft and tender notes of peace and love were
swelled up with the most delicate and insensible transition into a loud
hymn of triumph and exultation, joined by the deep-toned organ, and a
full choir of voices, which gradually decayed upon the ear, until it died
away in distant sound, as if a flight of angels had raised the song in
their ascent to heaven. Yet the chords hardly ceased to vibrate after
the expiration of this overture, which ushered in a composition in the
same pathetic style; and this again was succeeded by a third, almost
without pause or intermission, as if the artist's hand had been
indefatigable, and the theme never to be exhausted.
His heart must be quite callous, and his ear lost to all distinction, who
could hear such harmony without emotion; how deeply, then, must it have
affected the delicate Celinda, whose sensations, naturally acute, were
whetted to a most painful keenness by her apprehension; who could have no
previous idea of such entertainment, and was credulous enough to believe
the most improbable tale of superstition! She was overwhelmed with awful
terror, and, never doubting that the sounds were more than mortal,
recommended herself to the care of Providence in a succession of pious
ejaculations.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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