The weekly Shasta courier. [volume] (Shasta, Calif.) 1872-190?, 1873-07-19

LIST. Because the case approaches so
nearly to being what l suppose is usually
intended by the phrase double-conscious-
ness" Certainly the sleeping person was
as different from the person awake as can be
imagined under cover of the same integu-
ments-totally different in name, character
and rank in ancestral and personal history,
and in the relations consequent; in the
country inhabited, and even in the age of
the world in which the scene was cast. 1t
is difficult to imagine more perfect isola-
ton of one person from another, excepting
the fact that in both cases the same mind
did the thinking, and the same flesh and
blood did the acting.
2 Because it illustrates the fact that in
such cases the mind can ignore previous
knowledge as perfectly as though it had
never been possessed, and can cling with
such tenacious faith to mere imaginings as
to hold them in opposition to the clearest
reason, and even in defiance of the testimo-
ny of the senses.
| was then about seventeen or eighteen
years Of age. The village in which we lived
boosted of three physicians, one of whom, a
DIR. Jones, was our nearest neigbor on the
same side of the street. while nearer to us,
but on the opposite side, was the house in
which the scene occurred with Lorenzo and
the gunpowder. Of course, the neighbor-
hood, and the names and residences OF
our neighbors, were as familiar to me as A,
Il, g. My room was in the second story,
overlooking the street. at the end OF which
we lived.
My father had taken me as a companion
M, waoL-'S tour IF travail onb ua iuSt rpturD-
ed home. The last night of our travel We
had been the guests of DR.. H., physician
of note, and warm personal friend OF my
father, whose society he seemed greatly to
enjoy. DIR. H. was man of marked physi-
ognomy and of fine appearance, whose intel
ligent conversation | also should no doubt
have enjoyed, but for the fact that he so
perfectly ignored the presence of his young
er guest as to seem inhOspitabe. This was
only seeming, it is true, yet the effect was
to create for the time hearty dislike.
On reaching home, jaded with riding
rough gated horse, retired early to bed,
and to sleep. Had I then the experience
of after years. might have pretty certainly
predicted somnambulistic paroxysm, for
have often observed that after more than
usual irratation of the spinal column, especi-
ally by rough riding, if l tossed long and
restlessly on the bed before getting to sleep,
l would sleep the rest of the night in quiet
ness, the nervous irritability productive Of
sleep walking having spent itself in those
tossings but if, on the contrary, | went
quickly and quietly to sleep, with all that
irritability lurking in the system, woe to the
person who should that night share the
room
Midnight found me in a queer predica-
ment. A loud halloo at our street gate
reused me from sleep, and carried me in
stantly to the front window. No doubt
that halloo was the proximate cause of the
dream that ensued, although the sound ap-
peared to be ushered in by long and by
no means agreeable prologue.
The scene was Germany, somewhere
amid wild lonely mountains. The time was
centuries ago, when men, more generally than
than now, and with less conjunction, lived
like Rob Roy according to
"The good old rule-the simple plan
That they should take who have the power,
And they should keep who can
dreamed that had been sleeping upon
pallet, on a stone floor, and that l had
been walked by slap upon the side, and a
rough imperious voice commanding me to
rise. By the dim light of taper in the
hand of this person, could see that the
face bending over me was DIR. HIS, intensely
expressive of hatred and of deadly revenge.
Alas knew that my fate was sealed.
That man with the familiar face of DR.. H.,
was my ancestral enemy, baron, with an
unpronounceable name-HOchen-stra
stein, as near as | can recollect. lie had
long been wishing to extinguish my family
by my death, as | was the only representa-
tive remaining of an old and once numer-
Gus line. By what means l, Count UdoIpho
(but Udolpho what, my dream never reveal
ed), had been spirited into the gloomy cas-
tie of Baron Observation-Disclosures | did
not know; it must have been by magic.
But there | was, and / knew that death in
some shape was bound to follow.
On being reused from sleep, the baron or
dered me to follow him, and led the way,
taper in had. For a moment l medtated
resistance, but I was unarmed, and look
at the strong walls, and knowledge that
was perfectly in his power, caused me to
yield, and to follow him with all the grace
possible for captive knight, knowing that
he was led to the slaughter.
We passed through one long corridor af-
ter another, and down several flights of
stone steps, by which knew that we were
below the surface of the earth. All along
this dismal tramp | had noticed that the
doors opened voluntarily on his approach,
and closed after we had passed. But at last,
the door through which he went closed with
crash before 1 had time to pass it, and so
here l was, with my doom plainly declared,
alone-ly death by starvation, in a subter-
ranean prison.
!. OF course my first act was to explore, as
far as possible, the circumstances of nv dun
geon. The walls were very coarse, solid
and damp. Their touch made me shiver
Up to this period, the dream had been
wholly dream, but now it began to be
strangely mixed with fact) Scarcely had
nv survey begun, ere heard halloo. Nv
heart beat high with hope, for however deep
underground, | was not beyond the reach Of
human voices, and possibly of help.
The halloo was repeated. looked in the
direction of the sound, and saw that win
dow had been opened in the rough wall. and
that. somehow, dim starlight was strug
Cling through it. 1 went to the window.
raised the sash, looked ont and saw man
on horseback. close beside gate that look
ed verify like the street gate Of house that
was very familiar to me.
The confusion of mind, induced by this
sight, is wildly remembered, yet past de-
scription. 1t may be imagined by keeping
10 mind that was conscious of looking do,ca
from the sashed window of roode,s house,
while | was as perfectly convinced, as
though sense corroborated fancy, that l was
in a stony dungeon under ground.