I obeyed the call to Redcleugh, where I found the _res domi_ in a peculiar position. There were few inmates in the large old house. Besides the invalid herself, there was an old cook and a butler, by name Francis, who had been in the family for many years, and whose garrulity was supplied from an inexhaustible fountain--the fate and fortunes of the Bernards. My patient was a lovely woman in body--a maniac in mind. Her affliction had suddenly shot up into her brain, and left untouched the lineaments of her beauty, excepting the expression of the eye, which had become nervous and furtive, oscillating between the extreme of softness and the intensity of ferocity. Having been cautioned by Francis to make no allusion to her husband or to certain children, whom he named, or to the word "book," and many other things, I contented myself, in the first instance, with a general examination of her symptoms; and, as it was late before I arrived, I resolved upon remaining all night, which would enable me to see her again in the morning. I had supper served up to me by Francis, who brought me some wine which had been in the house for fifty years, and told me stories of the family, extending back twice that period. Sometimes these old legends would be interrupted for a moment by a shrill cry, coming from a source which we both knew. All else in this house was under the spell of Angerana, the genius of silence. There is something peculiar in the sound of a common voice in a large house, filled with memorials of those who had lived in it, and yet with no living sounds to break the dull heavy air, which seems to thicken by not being moved. It appeared as if I had been suddenly thrown into a region of romance, but my experiences were not pleasant. I wished to escape to my own professional thoughts again, and desired to go to bed.