"I tell you, the light increases here. Now, again--again! Oh, it is too much; it is intolerable!" added Jacques Ferrand, closing his eyes with an expression of increasing suffering. "You are mad--the room is scarcely lighted. I tell you, open your eyes and you will see." "Open my eyes! Why, I shall be blinded by torrents of burning light, with which this room is filled. Here! There! On all sides, there are rays of fire--millions of dazzling scintillations!" cried the notary, sitting up. And then again shrieking, he lifted both his hands to his eyes: "But I am blind; this burning fire is through my closed lids,--it burns--devours me! Ah, now my hands shield me a little! But put out the light, for it throws an infernal flame!" "It is beyond doubt now!" said Polidori. "His sight is struck with the same excess of sensitiveness as his hearing was; he is a dead man! To bleed him in this state would at once destroy him." A fresh cry ensued, sharp and terrible, from Jacques Ferrand, which resounded in the chamber. "Villain, put out that lamp! Its glaring beams penetrate through my hands, which they make transparent. I see the blood circulate in the net of my veins, and I try in vain to close my eyelids, for the burning lava will flow in. Oh, what torture! There are gushes as dazzling as if some one were thrusting a red-hot iron into my eyes. Help, help!" he shrieked, twisting himself on his bed, a prey to the horrible convulsions of his extreme agony. Polidori, alarmed at the excess of this fresh fit, suddenly extinguished the lamp, and they were both in perfect darkness. At this moment the noise of a carriage was heard at the door in the street. When the chamber had been rendered entirely dark in which Polidori and Ferrand were, the latter was somewhat relieved from his extreme pains. "Where are you going?" said Polidori, suddenly, when he heard Jacques Ferrand rise, for the deepest obscurity reigned in the apartment. "I am going to find Cecily!" "You shall not go; the sight of that room would kill you!" "Cecily awaits me up there!" "You shall not go--I will prevent you!" said Polidori, seizing the notary by the arm. Jacques Ferrand having reached the extremity of exhaustion, was unable to contend with Polidori, who grasped him with a powerful clutch. "What, would you prevent me from seeking Cecily?" "Yes; and besides, there is a lamp in the next room, and you know what an effect light so recently produced on your sight!" "Cecily is up above; she is waiting for me, and I would cross a red-hot furnace to rejoin her. Let me go! She called me her old tiger; mind you, then, for my claws are sharp!" "You shall not go! I will sooner tie you down to your bed like a furious madman!" "Listen, Polidori! I am not mad--I am perfectly in my senses. I know that Cecily is not really up there; but to me the phantoms of my imagination are equal to realities."