The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and PoliticsVarious
General
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
"I think," said the authoress, "they must be numbers. Will the spirits,"
she said, "be good enough to aid us? Shall we use the alphabet?"
"Yes," was rapped very quickly.
"Are these numbers?"
"Yes," again.
"I will write them," she added, and, doing so, took up the card and
tapped the letters. The spelling was pretty rapid, and ran thus as she
tapped in turn, first the letters, and last the numbers she had already
set down:--
"UNITED STATES ARMY MEDICAL MUSEUM, NOS. 3486, 3487."
The medium looked up with a puzzled expression.
"Good gracious!" said I, "they are _my legs! my legs!_"
What followed, I ask no one to believe except those who, like myself,
have communed with the beings of another sphere. Suddenly I felt a
strange return of my self-consciousness. I was re-individualized, so to
speak. A strange wonder filled me, and, to the amazement of every one, I
arose, and, staggering a little, walked across the room on limbs
invisible to them or me. It was no wonder I staggered, for, as I briefly
reflected, my legs had been nine months in the strongest alcohol. At
this instant all my new friends crowded around me in astonishment.
Presently, however, I felt myself sinking slowly. My legs were going,
and in a moment I was resting feebly on my two stumps upon the floor. It
was too much. All that was left of me fainted and rolled over senseless.
I have little to add. I am now at home in the West, surrounded by every
form of kindness, and every possible comfort; but, alas! I have so
little surety of being myself, that I doubt my own honesty in drawing my
pension, and feel absolved from gratitude to those who are kind to a
being who is uncertain of being enough himself to be conscientiously
responsible. It is needless to add, that I am not a happy fraction of a
man; and that I am eager for the day when I shall rejoin the lost
members of my corporeal family in another and a happier world.
ON TRANSLATING THE DIVINA COMMEDIA.
SECOND SONNET.
I enter, and see thee in the gloom
Of the long aisles, O poet saturnine!
And strive to make my steps keep pace with thine.
The air is filled with some unknown perfume;
The congregation of the dead make room
For thee to pass; the votive tapers shine;
Like rooks that haunt Ravenna's groves of pine
The hovering echoes fly from tomb to tomb.
From the confessionals I hear arise
Rehearsals of forgotten tragedies,
And lamentations from the crypts below;
And then a voice celestial that begins
With the pathetic words, "Although your sins
As scarlet be," and ends with "as the snow."
THE GREAT DOCTOR.
A STORY IN TWO PARTS.
PART I.
"Hello! hello! which way now, Mrs. Walker? It'll rain afore you git
there, if you've got fur to go. Hadn't you better stop an' come in till
this thunder-shower passes over?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account