Next morning she alone of all the reapers was absent; and she was found by the widow, who seemed the only one solicitous to know what had become of her, and who first entered her hovel to inquire after her, tossing in the delirium of fever. The poor woman, though shocked and terrified by her ravings and her agony, tended her till within half an hour of midnight, when she expired. At that late hour a solitary traveller was passing the road which winds along the southern shore of the bay. The moon, in her last quarter, had just risen over the hill on his right, and, half-veiled by three strips of cloud, rather resembled a heap of ignited charcoal seen through the bars of a grate, than the orb which only a few nights before had enabled the reaper to prosecute his employments until near morning. The blocks of granite scattered over the neighbouring beach, and bleached and polished by the waves, were relieved by the moonshine, and resembled flocks of sheep ruminating on a meadow; but not a single ray rested on the sea beyond, or the path or fields before;--the beam slided ineffectually along the level;--it was light looking at darkness. On a sudden, the traveller became conscious of that strange mysterious emotion which, according to the creed of the demonologist, indicates the presence or near approach of an evil spirit. He felt his whole frame as if creeping together, and his hair bristling on his head; and, filled with a strange horror, he heard, through the dead stillness of the night, a faint uncertain noise, like that of a sudden breeze rustling through a wood at the close of autumn. He blessed himself, and stood still. A tall figure, indistinct in the darkness, came gliding along the road from the east, and inquired of him in a voice hollow and agitated, as it floated past, whether it could not reach Kirk-Michael before midnight? “No living person could,” answered the traveller; and the appearance, groaning at the reply, was out of sight in a moment. The sounds still continued, as if a multitude of leaves were falling from the boughs of a forest, and striking with a pattering sound on the heaps congregated beneath, when another figure came up, taller, but even less distinct, than the former. It bore the appearance of a man on horseback. “Shall I reach Kirk-Michael before midnight?” was the query again put to the terrified traveller; but before he could reply, the appearance had vanished in the distance, and a shriek of torment and despair, which seemed re-echoed by the very firmament, roused him into a more intense feeling of horror. The moon shone out with supernatural brightness; the noise, which had ceased for a moment, returned, but the sounds were different--for they now seemed to be those of faint laughter, and low indistinct murmurings in the tone of ridicule; and the gigantic rider of a pale horse, with what appeared to be a female shape bent double before him, and accompanied