The phantom then, or whatever it was, fiercely took up the dagger, and dashed it horribly against the mirror I held, which it shivered into pieces. Then the bloody instrument fell upon the floor, and the spectre vanished: while I fell into a dreadful trance, which lasted for hours, and from which I grieve that ever I did waken to witness this most wretched night! While the phantom vanished, the heavens loudly thundered, and the vivid lightning illumed this fatal chamber. Oh, the crash of the mirror I never can forget, nor the ominous fall of the blood-stained dagger as it fearfully trundled upon the oaken floor!--these two ominous circumstances too surely manifested that this was _no dream_! Oh no, they pierced my heart to conviction! That dread and awful moment of my life I never can forget!--only to be equalled, and only to be outdone, by the agonies which now I so severely undergo in this unhappy hour! Oh, Sir David, in pity at once kill me, and end my sorrow and my suffering together!--you hold the bloody instrument, oh then strike!--strike, there's my bosom!--I fear not to die--oh kill me, I beseech thee!--in mercy, at once destroy me! But, oh, do not--do not look thus again!--It was thus the awful spectre looked, while thus the fire flashed from his visage!--Thus! it was _thus_ he frowned! and like thee he spoke! Oh--oh, I never saw thee look thus before!--never, never! _Ah!_ THOU!--_thou!_ THYSELF _wert_ THAT _spectre_!!" "No, no, Adelaide, no! I looked not thus; it was the infernal fiend, from the lowest depth of hell, that looked thus, and then assumed my shape and form! At that moment I was on ship-board, Dr. M'Kenzie was my fellow-voyager, who can vouch for the same; we had then left the Scottish shore, and the destination of the vessel was for Ireland. This weapon, which now I hold, I then flung into the hissing waves, when unearthly voices and unearthly music met mine ear, and smote my heart!--Oh, it was then that I suffered the deep-thrilling agonizing horrors of the damned. The arch-fiend, I felt, was working in my bosom; and strongly, desperately, was I tempted to fling myself into the same remorseless element into which I had flung this blood-besprent instrument--the damned testimony of my crime; and by so doing end at once my earthly misery! But even then I lifted up my humble supplication to heaven, although with crimsoned hands! I fell into a trance, and lay to all appearance lifeless upon the deck.---- You seem to doubt!" "Oh, yes, yes; I see it all!--that frown--that look! Oh, thou, thou, wert that horrible spectre!"