But, indeed, the time had now arrived when the mystery of my wife's manner oppressed me like a spell. I could no longer bear the touch of her wan fingers, nor the low tone of her musical language, nor the lustre of her melancholy eyes. And she knew all this but did not upbraid. She seemed conscious of my weakness, or my folly--and, smiling, called it Fate. She seemed also conscious of a cause, to me unknown, for the gradual alienation of my regard; but she gave me no hint or token of its nature. Yet was she woman, and pined away daily. In time the crimson spot settled steadily upon the cheek, and the blue veins upon the pale forehead became prominent: and one instant my nature melted into pity, but in the next I met the glance of her meaning eyes, and my soul sickened and became giddy with the giddiness of one who gazes downward into some dreary and fathomless abyss. Shall I then say that I long'd with an earnest and consuming desire for the moment of Morella's decease? I did. But the fragile spirit clung to its tenement of clay for many days--for many weeks and irksome months--until my tortured nerves obtained the mastery over my mind, and I grew furious with delay, and with the heart of a fiend I cursed the days, and the hours, and the bitter moments which seemed to lengthen, and lengthen as her gentle life declined--like shadows in the dying of the day. But one autumnal evening, when the winds lay still in Heaven, Morella called me to her side. There was a dim mist over all the earth, and a warm glow upon the waters, and amid the rich October leaves of the forest a rainbow from the firmament had surely fallen. As I came, she was murmuring in a low under-tone, which trembled with fervor, the words of a Catholic hymn: Sancta Maria! turn thine eyes Upon the sinner's sacrifice Of fervent prayer, and humble love, From thy holy throne above. At morn, at noon, at twilight dim, Maria! thou hast heard my hymn. In joy and wo, in good and ill, Mother of God! be with me still. When my hours flew gently by, And no storms were in the sky, My soul, lest it should truant be, Thy love did guide to thine and thee. Now, when clouds of Fate o'ercast All my Present, and my Past, Let my Future radiant shine With sweet hopes of thee and thine. 'It is a day of days'--said Morella--'a day of all days either to live or die. It is a fair day for the sons of Earth and Life--ah! more fair for the daughters of Heaven and Death.' I turned towards her, and she continued. 'I am dying--yet shall I live. Therefore for me, Morella, thy wife, hath the charnel house no terrors--mark me!--not even the terrors of the _worm_. The days have never been when thou couldst love me; but her whom in life thou didst abhor, in death thou shalt adore.' 'Morella!'