Chapter III

Great noise there shall be heard, Great Shouts and Cries,
And Seas shall Thunder louder than the Skies;
Then shall three Lions fight with three, and bring,
Joy to a People, Honour to their King.

Mother Shipton, the authoress of these Prophecies, continued for years esteemed as the Sybil or Oracle of her time; and though she was generally believed to be a Witch, yet all persons that either saw or heard of her, held her in great esteem, and her memory is much honoured by those of her own country, especially in Yorkshire. A long time before her death, she foretold the day and hour she was to take her departure; and the time approaching which she had Prophecied, and which was in the year 1561; she took solemn leave of her friends, who were all greatly attached to her, laid down on her bed, and died, at the good old age of 75 years. Many more “_Prophecies_” are current in Yorkshire as of her utterance, but the Publisher being unable to find them either properly authenticated, or in any old works, they have been omitted, being desirous of not adding anything which might tend to destroy her sterling reputation.

A stone was erected to her memory near Clifton, about a mile from the city of York, upon which was the following inscription:

Here lyes she who never ly’d
Whose skill often has been try’d;
Her prophecies shall still survive,
And ever keep her name alive.

PROPHECIES OF MARTHA, THE GIPSY.

London may appear an unbefitting scene for a story so romantic as that which I have here set down: but, strange and wild as is the tale I have to tell, _it is true_; and, therefore, the scene of action shall not be changed; nor will I alter or vary from the truth, save that the names of the personages, in my domestic drama shall be fictitious.

To say that I am superstitious would be, in the minds of many wise personages, to write myself down an ass; but to say that I do not believe _that_ which follows, as I am sure it was believed by _him_ who related it to me, would be to discredit the testimony of a friend, as honourable and as brave as ever trod the earth. He has been snatched from the world, of which he was a bright ornament, and has left more than his sweet suffering widow and his orphan children affectionately to deplore his loss.

It is, I find, right and judicious most carefully and publicly to disavow a belief in supernatural visitings: but it will be long before I become either so wise or so bold as to make any such unqualified declaration. I am not weak enough to imagine myself surrounded by spirits and phantoms, or jostling through a crowd of spectres, as I walk the streets; neither do I give credence to all the idle tales of ancient dames, or frightened children, touching such matters: but when I breathe the air, and see the grass grow under my feet, I cannot but feel that HE who gives me ability to inhale the one, and stand erect upon the other, has also the power to use for special purposes such means and agency, as in his wisdom he may see fit; and which, in point of fact, are not more incomprehensible to us than the very simplest effects which we every day witness, arising from unknown causes.

Philosophers may pore, and in the might of their littleness, and the erudition of their ignorance develope and disclose, argue and discuss; but when the sage, who sneers at the possibility of ghosts, will explain to me the doctrine of attraction and gravitation, or tell me why the wind blows, why the tides ebb and flow, or why the light shines—effects perceptible to all men—then will I admit the justice of his incredulity—then will I join the ranks of the incredulous. However, a truce with my views and reflections: proceed we to the narrative.

In the vicinity of Bedford-square lived a respectable and honest man, whose name the reader will be pleased to consider Harding. He married early: his wife was an exemplary woman, and his son and daughter were grown to that companionable age, at which children repay, with their society and accomplishments, the tender cares which parents bestow upon their offspring in their early infancy.

Mr. Harding held a responsible and respectable situation under the government, in Somerset House. His income was adequate to his wants and wishes; his family a family of love: and, perhaps, taking into consideration the limited desires of what may be fairly called middle life, no man was ever more contented, or better satisfied with his lot than he.

Maria Harding, his daughter, was a modest, unassuming, and interesting girl, full of feeling and gentleness. She was timid and retiring; but the modesty which cast down her fine black eyes could not veil the intellect which beamed in them. Her health was by no means strong; and the paleness of her cheek—too frequently, alas! lighted by the hectic flush of our indigenous complaint—gave a deep interest to her countenance. She was watched and reared by her tender mother, with all the care and attention which a being so delicate and so ill-suited to the perils and troubles of this world demanded.

George, her brother, was a bold and intelligent lad, full of rude health, and fearless independence. His character was frequently the subject of his father’s contemplation; and he saw in his disposition, his mind, his pursuits, and propensities, the promise of future success in active life.

With these children, possessing as they did the most enviable characteristics of their respective sexes, Mr. and Mrs. Harding, with thankfulness to Providence, acknowledged their happiness, and their perfect satisfaction with the portion assigned to them in this transitory world.

Maria was about nineteen, and had, as was natural, attracted the regards, and thence gradually chained the affections, of a distant relative, whose ample fortune, added to his personal and mental good qualities, rendered him a most acceptable suitor to her parents, which Maria’s heart silently acknowledged he would have been to _her_, had he been poor and penniless.

The father of this intended husband of Maria was a man of importance, possessing much personal interest, through which George, the brother of his intended daughter-in-law, was to be placed in that diplomatic seminary in Downing-street, whence, in due time, he was to rise through all the grades of office, (which, with his peculiar talents, his friends, and especially his mother, was convinced he would so ably fill,) and at last turn out an ambassador.

The parents, however, of young Langdale and of Maria Harding were agreed, that there was no necessity for hastening the alliance between their families, seeing that the united ages of the couple did not exceed thirty-nine years: and seeing, moreover, still, that Mrs. Langdale, who was little more than six-and-thirty years of age herself, had reasons, which she also meant to be private, for seeking to delay as much as possible a ceremony, the result of which, in all probability, would confer upon her, somewhat too early in life to be agreeable to a lady of her habits and propensities, the formidable title of grand-mamma.

How curious it is, when one takes up a _little bit_ of society (as a geologist crumbles and twists a bit of earth in his hand, to ascertain its character and quality,) to look into the motives and manœuvrings of all the persons connected with it; the various workings, the indefatigable labours, which all their little minds are undergoing to bring about divers and sundry little points, perfectly unconnected with the great end in view; but which for private and hidden objects, each of them is toiling to carry. Nobody, but those who really understood Mrs. Langdale, understood why she so readily acquiesced in the desire of her husband to postpone the marriage for another twelvemonth. A stranger would have seen only the dutiful wife according with the sensible husband; but I knew her, and knew that there must be something more than met the eye, or the ear, in that sympathy of feeling between her and Mr. Langdale, which was not upon ordinary occasions so evidently displayed.

Like the Waterman who pulls one way and looks another, Mrs. Langdale aided the entreaties and seconded the commands of her loving spouse, touching the seasonable delay of which I am speaking; and it was agreed, that immediately after the coming of age of Frederick Langdale, and not before, he was to lead to the hymeneal altar the delicate and timid Maria Harding.

The affair got whispered about; George’s fortune in life was highly extolled—Maria’s excessive happiness prophesied by everybody of their acquaintance; and already had sundry younger ladies, daughters and nieces of those who discussed these matters in divan after dinner, began to look upon Miss Harding with envy and maliciousness, and wonder what Mr. Frederick Langdale could see in her: she was proclaimed to be insipid, inanimate, shy, bashful, and awkward: nay, some of her female friends went so far as to discover that she was absolutely awry.

Still, however, Frederick and Maria went loving on; and their hearts grew as one; so truly, so fondly were they attached to each other. George, who was somewhat of a plague to the pair of lovers, was luckily at Oxford, reading away till his head ached, to qualify himself for a degree, and the distant duties of the office whence he was to cull the bunches of diplomatic laurels, and whence were to issue rank and title, and ribbons and crosses innumerable.

Things were in this prosperous state, the bark of life rolling gaily along before the breeze, when as Mr. Harding was one day proceeding from his residence, to his office in Somerset-place, through Charlotte-street, Bloomsbury, he was accosted by one of those female gypsies who are found begging in the metropolis, and especially in the particular part of it in question: ‘Pray remember poor Martha, the gipsy,’ said the woman: ‘give me a halfpenny for charity, sir, pray do.’

Mr. Harding was a subscriber to the Mendicity Society, an institution which proposes to check begging by the novel mode of giving nothing to the poor: moreover, he was a magistrate—moreover, he had no change; and he somewhat sternly desired the woman to go about her business.

All availed him nothing; she still followed him, and reiterated the piteous cry, ‘Pray remember poor Martha, the gipsy.’

At length, irritated by the perseverance of the woman—for even subordinates in government hate to be solicited importunately—Mr. Harding, contrary to his usual custom, and contrary to the customary usages of modern society, turned hastily round, and fulminated an oath against the supplicating vagrant.

‘Curse!’ said Martha; ‘have I lived to this? Hark ye, man—poor, weak, haughty man! Mark me, sir—look at me!’

He did look at her; and beheld a countenance on fire with rage. A pair of eyes blacker than jet, and brighter than diamonds, glared like stars upon him; her black hair dishevelled, hung over her olive cheeks; and a row of teeth whiter than the driven snow displaying themselves from between a pair of coral lips, in a dreadful smile, a ghastly sneer of contempt which mingled in her passion. Harding was riveted to the spot; and, affected partly by the powerful fascination of her superhuman countenance, and partly by the dread of a disturbance in the street, he paused to listen to her.

‘Mark me, sir,’ said Martha; ‘you and I shall meet again. Thrice shall you see me before you die. My visitings will be dreadful; but the third will be the last!’

There was a solemnity in this declaration which struck to his very heart, coming too as it did only from a vagrant outcast. Passengers were approaching; and wishing, he knew not why, to soothe the ire of the angry woman, he mechanically drew from his pocket some silver, which he tendered to her.

‘There, my good woman—there,’ said he, stretching forth his hand.

‘Good woman!’ retorted the hag, ‘Money now? I—I that have been cursed! ’tis all too late, proud gentleman—the deed is done, the curse be now on you.’ Saying which, she huddled her ragged red cloak about her shoulders, and hurried from his sight, into the deep and dreary recesses of St. Giles’s.

Harding experienced, as she vanished from his eye, a most extraordinary sensation: he felt grieved that he had spoken so harshly to the poor creature, and returned his shillings to his pocket with regret. Of course, fear of the fulfilment of her predictions did not mingle with any of his feelings on the occasion; and he proceeded to his office in Somerset-place, and performed all the arduous official duties of reading the opposition newspapers, discussing the leading politics of the day with the head of another department, and signing his name three times, before four o’clock.

Martha the gipsy, however, although he had ‘poophoohed’ her out of his memory, would ever and anon flash across his mind; her figure was indelibly stamped upon his recollection; and though, of course, as I before said, a man of his firmness and intellect could care nothing, one way or another, for the maledictions of an ignorant, illiterate gipsy, still his feelings—whence arising I know not—prompted him to call a hackney-coach, and proceed _en voiture_ to his house rather than run the risk of again encountering the metropolitan sibyl, under whose forcible denunciation he was actually labouring.

There is a period in each day of the lives of married people, at which, I am given to understand, a more than ordinarily unreserved communication of facts and feelings takes place; when all the world is shut out, and the two beings, who are in truth ‘but only one,’ commune together freely and fully upon the occurrences of the past day. At this period, the else sacred secrets of the drawing-room coterie, and the _tellable_ jokes of the after-dinner convivialist, are mutually interchanged by the fond pair, who, by the barbarous customs of uncivilized Britain, have been separated during part of the preceding evening.

Then it is, that the husband informs his anxious consort how he has forwarded his worldly views with such a man—how he has carried his point in such a quarter—what he thinks of the talents of one, of the character of another; while the communicative wife gives _her_ views of the same subjects, founded upon what she has gathered from the individuals composing the female cabinet, and explains why she thinks he must have been deceived upon this point, or misled upon that. And thus, in recounting, in arguing, in discussing, and descanting, the blended interests of the happy pair are strengthened, their best hopes nourished, and perhaps eventually realized.

A few friends at dinner, and some refreshers in the evening, had prevented Harding from saying a word to his beloved Eliza about the gipsy; and perhaps, till the ‘witching time’ which I have attempted to define, he would not have mentioned the circumstance, even had they been alone. Most certainly he did not think the less of the horrible vision; and when the company had dispersed, and the affectionate couple had retired to rest, he stated the circumstance exactly as it had occurred, and received from his fair lady just such an answer as a prudent, intelligent, and discreet woman of sense would give to such a communication. She vindicated his original determination not to be imposed upon—wondered at his subsequent willingness to give to such an undeserving object, particularly while he had three or four soup tickets in his pocket—was somewhat surprised that he had not consigned the bold intruder to the hands of the beadle—and, ridiculing the impression which the hag’s appearance seemed to have made upon her husband’s mind, narrated a tour performed by herself and some friends to Norwood, when she was a girl, and when one of those very women had told her fortune, not one word of which ever came true—and, in a discussion of some length, animadverting strongly upon the weakness and impiety of putting faith in the sayings of such idle creatures, she fell fast asleep.

Not so Harding: he was restless and worried, and felt that he would give the world to be able to recall the curse which he had rashly uttered against the poor woman. Helpless as she was and in distress, why did his passion conquer his judgment? Why did he add to the bitterness of refusal the sting of malediction? However, it was useless to regret that which was past—and, wearied and mortified with his reflection, he at length followed his better half into that profound slumber, which the length and subject of his harangue had so comfortably ensured her.

The morning came, and brightly beamed the sun—that is, as brightly as it ever beams in London. The office-hour arrived; and Mr. Harding proceeded, _not_ by Charlotte-street, to Somerset-house, such was his dread of seeing the ominous woman. It is impossible to describe the effect produced upon him by the apprehension of encountering her: if he heard a female voice behind him in the street, he trembled, and feared to look round, lest he should behold Martha. In turning a corner he proceeded carefully and cautiously, lest he should come upon her unexpectedly; in short, wherever he went, whatever he did, his actions, his movements, his very words, were controlled and constrained by the horror of beholding her again.

The malediction she had uttered rang incessantly in his ears; nay, such possession had it taken of him, that he had written the words down, and sealed the document which contained them. ‘Thrice you shall see me before you die. My visitings will be dreadful, but the third will be the last.’

‘Calais’ was not more deeply imprinted on our Queen’s heart, than these lines upon that of Mr. Harding; but he was ashamed of the strength of his feelings, and placed the paper wherein he had recorded them at the very bottom of his desk.

Meanwhile Frederick Langdale was unremitting in his attentions to Maria; but, as is too often the case, the bright sunshine of their loves was clouded. Her health, always delicate, now appeared more so, and at times her anxious parents felt a solicitude upon her account, new to them; for decided symptoms of consumption had shown themselves, which the faculty, although they spoke of them lightly to the fond mother and to the gentle patient, treated with such care and caution, as gave alarm to those who could see the progress of the fatal disease, which was unnoticed by Maria herself, who anticipated parties, and pleasure, and gaieties, in the coming spring, which the doctors thought it but too probable she might never enjoy.

That Mr. Langdale’s ‘punctilio,’ or Mrs. Langdale’s excessive desire for apparent juvenility, should have induced the postponement of Maria’s marriage, was, indeed, a melancholy circumstance. The agitation, the surprise, the hope deferred, which weighed upon the sweet girl’s mind, and that doubting dread of something unexpected, which lovers always feel, bore down her spirits, and injured her health; whereas, had the marriage been celebrated, the relief she would have experienced from all her apprehensions, added to the tour of France and Italy, which the happy couple were to make immediately after their union, would have restored her health, while it ensured her happiness. This, however, was not to be.

It was now three months since poor Mr. Harding’s rencontre with Martha; and habit, and time, and constant avocation, had conspired to free his mind from the dread she at first inspired. Again he smiled and joked, again he enjoyed society, and again dared to take the nearest road to Somerset House; nay, he had so far recovered from the unaccountable terror he had originally felt, that he went to his desk, and selecting the paper wherein he had set down the awful denunciation of the hag, deliberately tore it into bits, and witnessed its destruction in the fire, with something like real satisfaction, and a determination never more to think upon so silly an affair.

Frederick Langdale was, as usual, with his betrothed, and Mrs. Harding enjoying the egotism of the lovers, (for, as I said before, lovers think their conversation the most charming in the world, because they talk of nothing but themselves) when his curricle was driven to the door to convey him to Tattersall’s, where his father had commissioned him to look at a horse, or horses, which he intended to purchase; for Frederick was, of all things in the world, the best possible judge of a horse.

To this sweeping dictum, pronounced by the young gentleman himself, Mr. Harding, however, was not willing to assent; and therefore, in order to have the full advantage of two heads, which, as the proverb says, are better than one, the worthy father-in-law elect, proposed accompanying the youth to the auctioneer’s yard at Hyde-Park Corner, it being one of those few privileged days when the labourers in our public offices make holiday. The proposal was hailed with delight by the young man, who, in order to show due deference to Mr. Harding, gave him the reins, and bowing their adieus to the ladies at the window, away they went, the splendid cattle of Mr. Langdale prancing and curvetting, fire flaming from their eyes, and smoke breathing from their nostrils.

The charioteer, however, soon found that the horses were somewhat beyond his strength, even putting his skill wholly out of the question, and in turning into Russell-street, proposed surrendering the reins to Frederick. By some misunderstanding of words in the alarm which Harding felt, Frederick did not take the reins which he (perfectly confounded) tendered to him in great agitation. They slipped over the dashing iron between the horse, who thus freed from restraint, reared wildly in the air, and plunging forward, dashed the vehicle against a post, and precipitated Frederick and Harding on the curbstone; the off-horse kicked desperately as the carriage became entangled and impeded, and struck Frederick a desperate blow on the head. Harding, whose right arm and collar-bone were broken, raised himself on his left hand, and saw Frederick weltering in his blood, apparently lifeless before him. The infuriated animals again plunged forward with the shattered remnant of the carriage, and as this object was removed from his sight, the wretched father-in-law beheld, looking upon the scene with a fixed and unruffled countenance—MARTHA, THE GIPSY.

It was doubtful whether the appearance of this horrible vision, coupled as it was with the verification of her prophecy, had not a more dreadful effect upon Mr. Harding, than the sad reality before him. He trembled, sickened, fainted, and fell senseless on the ground.

Assistance was promptly procured, and the wounded sufferers were carefully removed to their respective dwellings. Frederick Langdale’s sufferings were much greater than those of his companion, and, in addition to severe fractures of two of his limbs, the wound upon his head presented a most terrible appearance, and excited the greatest alarm in his medical attendants.

Mr. Harding, whose temperate course of life was greatly advantageous to his case, had suffered comparatively little: a simple fracture of the arm, and dislocation of the collar-bone (which was the extent of his misfortune,) were, by skilful treatment and implicit obedience to professional commands, soon pronounced in a state of improvement; but a wound had been inflicted which no doctor could heal. The conviction that the woman, whose anger he had incurred, had, if not the power of producing evil, at least the power to foretell it, and that he had twice again to see her before the fulfilment of her prophecy, struck deep into his mind; and although he felt himself more at ease when he had communicated to Mrs. Harding the fact of having seen the gipsy at the moment of the accident, it was impossible for him to rally from the shock which his nerves had received. It was in vain he had tried to shake off the perpetual apprehension of again beholding her.

Frederick Langdale remained for some time in a very precarious state. All visitors were excluded from his room, and a wretched space of two months passed, during which his affectionate Maria had never been allowed to see him, nor to write to, nor to hear from him. While her constitution was gradually giving way to the constant operation of solicitude and sorrow.

Mr. Harding meanwhile recovered rapidly, but his spirits did not keep pace with his mending health; the dread he felt of quitting his house, the tremor excited in his breast by a knocking at the door, or the approach of a footstep, lest the intruder should be the basilisk Martha, were not to be described; and the appearance of his poor Maria did not tend to cheer the gloom which hung over him.

When at length Frederick was sufficiently recovered to receive visitors, Maria was not sufficiently well to visit him: she was too rapidly sinking into an early grave, and even the physician himself appeared desirous of preparing her parents for the worst, while she, full of the symptomatic prospectiveness of disease, still talked anticipatingly of future happiness, when Frederick would be sufficiently re-established to visit her.

At length, however, the doctors suggested a change of air—a suggestion instantly attended to, but, alas! too late; the weakness of the poor girl was such, that upon a trial of her strength it was found inexpedient to attempt her removal.

In this terrible state, separated from him whose all she was, did the exemplary patient linger, and life seemed flickering in her flushing cheek; and her eye was sunken, and her parched lip quivered with pain.

It was at length agreed, that on the following day Frederick Langdale might be permitted to visit her;—his varied fractures were reduced, and the wound on the head had assumed a favourable appearance. The carriage was ordered to convey him to the Hardings at one, and the physicians advised by all means that Maria should be apprized of and prepared for the meeting the day previous to its taking place. Those who are parents, and those alone, will be able to understand the tender solicitude, the wary caution with which both her father and mother proceeded in a disclosure, so important as the medical men thought to her recovery—so careful that the coming joy should be imparted gradually to their suffering child, and that all the mischiefs resulting from an abrupt announcement should be avoided.

They sat down by her—spoke of Frederick—Maria joined in the conversation—raised herself in her bed—by degrees, hope was excited that she might soon again see him—this hope was gradually improved into certainty—the period at which it might occur spoken of—that period again progressively diminished: the anxious girl caught the whole truth—she knew it—she was conscious that she would behold him on the morrow—she burst into a flood of tears and sank down upon her pillow.

At that moment the bright sun, which was shining in all its splendour, beamed into the room, and fell strongly upon her flushed countenance.

‘Draw down the blind, my love,’ said Mrs. Harding to her husband. Harding rose and proceeded to the window.

A shriek of horror burst from him—‘She is there!’ exclaimed the agitated man.

‘Who?’ cried his astonished wife.

‘She—she—the horrid she!’

Mrs. Harding ran to the window and beheld, standing on the opposite side of the street, with her eyes fixed attentively on the house—MARTHA, THE GIPSY.

‘Draw down the blind, my love, and come away; pray come away,’ said Mrs. Harding.

Harding drew down the blind.

‘What evil is at hand? What misery is impending?’ sobbed Harding.

A loud scream from his wife, who had returned to the bedside, was the horrid answer to his painful question.

Maria was dead!

Twice of the thrice he had seen this dreadful fiend in human shape; each visitation was (as she had foretold) to surpass the preceding ones in its importance of horror.—What could surpass this?

There, before the afflicted parents, lay their innocent child stretched in the still sleep of death; neither of them believed it true—it seemed like a dreadful dream. Harding was bewildered, and turned from the corpse of his beloved to the window he had just left.—Martha was gone—and he heard her singing a wild and joyous air at the other end of the street.

The servants were summoned—medical aid was called in—but it was all too late! and the wretched parents were doomed to mourn their loved, their lost Maria! George, her fond and affectionate brother, who was at Oxford, hastened from all the academic honours which were awaiting him, to follow to the grave his beloved sister.

The effect upon Frederick Langdale was most dreadful: it was supposed he would never recover from a shock so great, and at the moment so unexpected; for, although the delicacy of her constitution was a perpetual source of uneasiness and solicitude, still the immediate symptoms had taken rather a favourable turn during the last few days of her life, and had re-invigorated the hopes which those who so dearly loved her entertained of her eventual recovery. Of this distressed young man I never indeed heard anything, till about three years after, when I saw it announced in the papers that he was just married to the only daughter of a rich west-country baronet, which event, if wanted to work another proverb here, would afford me a most admirable opportunity of doing so.

The death of poor Maria, and the dread which her father entertained of the third visitation of Martha, made a complete change in the affairs of the family. By the exertion of powerful interest, he obtained an appointment for his son to act as his deputy in the office which he held, and having achieved this desired object, resolved on leaving England for a time, and quitting a neighbourhood in which he must be perpetually exposed to the danger which he was now perfectly convinced was inseparable from his next interview with the weird woman.

George, of course, thus checked in his classical pursuits, left Oxford, and at the early age of nineteen commenced active official life, not certainly in the particular department which his mother had selected for his _debût_; and it was somewhat observable, that the Langdales, after the death of Maria, not only abstained from frequent intercourse with the Hardings during their stay in England, but that the mighty professions of the purse-proud citizen dwindled by degrees into an absolute forgetfulness of any promise, even conditional, to exert an interest for their son.

Seeing this, Mr. Harding felt that he should act prudentially, by endeavouring to place his son where in the course of time, he might perhaps attain to that situation, from whose honourable revenue he could live like a gentleman, and ‘settle comfortably.’

All the arrangements which the kind father had proposed, being made, the mourning couple proceeded on a lengthened tour of the continent; and it was evident that his spirits mended rapidly, when he felt conscious that his liability to encounter Martha had decreased. The sorrow of mourning was soothed and softened in the common course of nature, and the quiet domesticated couple sat themselves down at Lausanne, ‘the world forgetting, by the world forgot,’ except by their excellent and exemplary son, whose good qualities, it seems, had captivated a remarkable pretty girl, a neighbour of his, whose mother seemed to be equally charmed with the goodness of his income.

There appeared, strange to say, in this love affair, no difficulties to be surmounted, no obstacles to be overcome; and the consent of the Hardings (requested in a letter, which also begged them to be present at the ceremony, if they were willing it should take place,) was presently obtained by George; and at the close of the second year, which had passed since their departure, the parents and son were again assembled in that house, the sight of which recalled to their recollection their unhappy daughter, and her melancholy fate, and which was still associated most painfully in the mind of Mr. Harding with the hated Gipsy.

The charm, however, had, no doubt, been broken. In the two past years, Martha was probably either dead or gone from the neighbourhood. Gypsies were a wandering tribe—and why should she be an exception to a general rule?—and thus Mrs. Harding checked the rising apprehensions and renewed uneasiness of her husband; and so well did she succeed, that when the wedding-day came, and the bells rang, and the favours fluttered in the air, his countenance was lighted up with smiles, and he kissed the glowing cheek of his new daughter-in-law with warmth, and something like happiness.

The wedding took place at that season of the year when friends and families meet jovially and harmoniously, when all little bickerings are forgotten, and when, by a general feeling founded upon religion, and perpetuated by the memory of the blessings granted to the world by the Almighty, an universal amnesty is proclaimed; when the cheerful fire, and teeming board, announce that Christmas is come, and mirth and gratulation are the order of the day.

It unfortunately happened, however, that to the account of Miss Wilkinson’s marriage with George Harding, I am not permitted, in truth, to add, that they left town in a travelling carriage and four, to spend the honeymoon. Three or four days permitted absence from his office, alone, were devoted to the celebration of the nuptials, and it was agreed that the whole party, together with the younger branches of the Wilkinson’s, their cousins and second cousins, etc., should meet on twelfth-night to celebrate, in a juvenile party, the return of the bride and bridegroom to their home.

When the night came, it was delightful to see the happy faces of the smiling youngsters: it was a pleasure to behold them pleased—a participation in which, since the highest amongst us, and the most accomplished prince in Europe, annually evinces the gratification he feels in such sights, I am by no means disposed to disclaim. And merry was the jest, and gaily did the evening pass; and Mr. Harding, surrounded by his youthful guests, smiled, and for a season forgot his care; yet, as he glanced around the room, he could not suppress a sigh, when he recollected, that in that very room his darling Maria had entertained her little parties on the anniversary of the same day in former years.

Supper was announced early, and the gay throng bounded down stairs to the parlour, where an abundance of the luxuries of middle life crowded the board. In the centre appeared the great object of the feast—a huge twelfth-cake; and gilded kings and queens stood lingering over circles of scarlet sweet-meats, and hearts of sugar lay enshrined with warlike trophies of the same material.

Many and deep were the wounds the mighty heap received, and every guest watched with a deep anxiety the coming portion, relatively to the glittering splendour with which its frosted surface was adorned. Character cards, illustrated with pithy mottoes, and smart sayings, were distributed; and by one of those little frauds which, in such societies, are always tolerated, Mr. Harding was announced as king, and the new bride as queen; and there was such charming joking, and such harmless merriment abounding, that he looked to his wife with an expression of content, which she had often, but vainly, sought to find upon his countenance, since the death of his dear child.

Supper concluded, the clock struck twelve, and the elders looked as if it were time for the young ones to depart. One half-hour’s grace was begged for by the ‘King,’ and granted; and Mrs. George Harding on this night was to sing them a song about ‘poor old maidens’—an ancient quaintness, which, by custom and usage ever since she was a little child, she had annually ‘performed’ upon this anniversary; and, accordingly, the promise being claimed, silence was obtained, and she, with all that show of tucker-heaving diffidence which is so becoming in a pretty plump downy-cheeked girl, prepared to commence the venerable chaunt, when a noise resembling that produceable by the falling of an eight-and-forty pound shot, echoed through the house. It appeared to descend from the very top of the building, down each flight of stairs rapidly and violently. It passed the room in which they were sitting, and rolled its impetuous course downwards to the basement. As it seemed to leave the hall, the parlour door was forced open, as if by a rude gust of wind, and stood ajar.

All the children were in a moment on their feet, huddled close to their respective mothers in groups. Mrs. Harding rose and rang the bell to inquire the meaning of the uproar. Her daughter-in-law, pale as ashes, looked at George; but there was one of the party who moved not, who stirred not; it was the elder Harding, whose eyes first fixed steadfastly on the half-opened door, slowly followed the course of the wall of the apartment to the fire-place;—there they rested.

When the servants came, they said they had heard the noise, but thought it proceeded from above. Harding looked at his wife; and then turning to the servant, observed carelessly, that it must have been some noise in the street, and desiring him to withdraw, entreated the bride to pursue her song. She did; but the children had been too much alarmed to enjoy it, and the noise had in its character something so strange and so unearthly, that even the elders of the party, although bound not to admit anything like apprehension before their offspring, felt extremely well pleased when they found themselves at home.

When the guests were gone, and George’s wife lighted her candle to retire to rest, her father-in-law kissed her affectionately, and prayed God to bless her. He then took a kind leave of his son, and putting up a fervent prayer for his happiness, pressed him to his heart, and bade him adieu with an earnestness which, under the common-place circumstance of a temporary separation, was inexplicable to the young man.

When Harding reached his bed-room, he spoke to his wife, and entreated her to prepare her mind for some great calamity.

‘What it is to be,’ said Harding, ‘where the blow is to fall I know not; but it is over us this night!’

‘My life!’ exclaimed Mrs. Harding, ‘what new fancy is this?’

‘Eliza, love!’ answered her husband, in a tone of unspeakable agony, ‘I have seen her for the third and last time.’

‘Who?’

‘MARTHA, THE GIPSY.’

‘Impossible,’ said Mrs. Harding, ‘you have not left the house to-day.’

‘True, my beloved,’ replied the husband; ‘but I have seen her. When that tremendous noise was heard at supper, as the door was supernaturally opened, I saw her. She fixed those dreadful eyes of her’s upon me; she proceeded to the fire-place, and stood in the midst of the children, and there she remained till the servant came in.’

‘My dearest husband,’ said Mrs. Harding, ‘this is but a disorder of the imagination!’

‘Be it what it may,’ said he, ‘I have seen her. Human or superhuman—natural or supernatural—there she was. I shall not strive to argue upon a point where I am likely to meet with little credit: all I ask is, pray fervently, have faith, and we will hope the misfortune, whatever it is, may be averted.’

He kissed his wife’s cheek tenderly, and after a fitful feverish hour or two fell into a slumber.

From that slumber never awoke he more.—He was found dead in his bed in the morning.

‘Whether the force of imagination, coupled with the unexpected noise, produced such an alarm as to rob him of life, I know not,’ said my communicant; ‘but he was dead.’

The story was told me by my friend Ellis in walking from the City to Harley-street late one evening; and when we came to this part of the history we were in Bedford-square, at the dark and dreary corner of it where Caroline-street joins it.

‘And there,’ said Ellis, pointing downward, ‘is the street where the circumstance occurred.’

‘Come, come,’ said I, ‘you tell the story well, but I suppose you do not expect it to be received as gospel.’

‘Faith,’ said he, ‘I know so much of it that I was one of the twelfth-night party, and heard the noise.’

‘But you did not see the spectre?’ cried I.

‘No,’ replied Ellis, ‘I certainly did not.’

‘Nor anybody else,’ said I, ‘I’ll be sworn.’—A quick footstep was just then heard behind us.—I turned half round to let the person pass, and saw a woman enveloped in a red cloak, whose sparkling black eyes, shone upon by the dim lustre of a lamp above her head, dazzled me.—I was startled—‘Pray remember old MARTHA, THE GIPSY,’ said the hag.

It was like a thunder-stroke.—I instantly slipped my hand into my pocket, and hastily gave her three from a five-shilling piece.

‘Thanks, my bonny one,’ said the woman, and setting up a shout of contemptuous laughter she bounded down Caroline-street towards Russell-street, singing, or rather yelling a wild air.

Ellis did not speak during this scene—he pressed my arm tightly, and we quickened our pace. We said nothing to each other till we turned into Bedford-street, and the lights and passengers of Tottenham-court-road re-assured us.

‘What do you think of _that_?’ said Ellis to me.

‘_Seeing is believing_,’ was my reply.

I have never passed that dark corner of Bedford-square in the evening since.

REMARKABLE FULFILMENT OF A PREDICTION.

A certain German author relates the following:

In my younger days, there was a dinner given in the _Florenburg Westphalen_, where I was born, on the occasion of a baptism to which a clergyman was invited. During dinner, the conversation turned upon the gravedigger of the place, who was well known on account of his second-sight; for, as often as he saw a corpse, he was always telling that there would be a funeral from such and such a house. Now, as the event invariably took place, the inhabitants of the house he indicated were placed by the man’s tale in the greatest anxiety.

This man’s prophecying was an abomination to the clergyman. He therefore forbade him, but all to no purpose; for the poor dolt, although he was a drunkard, and a man of low and vulgar sentiments, believed firmly that it was a prophetic gift of God, and that he must make it known, in order that the people might still repent. At length the clergyman gave him notice that, if he announced one funeral more, he should be deprived of his place, and expelled from the village. This availed—the gravedigger was silent from that time forward. Half a year afterward, in the autumn of 1745, the gravedigger came to the clergyman, and said to him: ‘Sir, you have forbidden me to announce any more funerals, and I have not done so since, nor will I do it any more; but I must tell you something that is particularly remarkable, that you may see that my second sight is really true. In a few weeks a corpse will be brought up the meadow, which will be drawn on a sledge by an ox.’ The clergyman seemingly paid no attention to this, but listened to it with indifference, and replied: ‘Only go about your business, and leave off such superstitious follies. It is sinful to have anything to do with them.’

Some weeks after a strong body of Austrian troops passed through the village on their way to the Netherlands. While resting there a day, the snow fell nearly three feet deep. At the same time, a woman died in another village of the same parish. The military took away all the horses out of the country to drag the waggons. Meanwhile the corpse lay there, no horses came back; the body began to putrify; they were, therefore, compelled to make a virtue of necessity—to place the corpse upon a sledge, and harness an ox to it.

In the meantime the clergyman, and the teacher with his scholars, proceeded to the village to meet the corpse; and, as the funeral came along the meadow in this array, the gravedigger came up to the clergyman, pulled him by the gown, pointed with his finger toward the sledge, and said not a word.

Such was the tale as related by the clergyman. I was well acquainted with the good man, and he was incapable of telling an untruth, much less in a matter which contradicted all his principles.

PROVIDENTIAL FOREBODING.

IN the ‘Museum of Wonders,’ Vol. II., page 153, there is a striking presentiment related, which Madame de Beaumont received from the lips of a credible person. This individual had a friend in the country, who, being unmarried, committed his domestic concerns to the care of an housekeeper who had been with him for many years. When his birthday arrived, he made many preparations for celebrating it, and told his housekeeper in the morning to clean out a certain arbour in the garden, which he named, because, as the weather was fine, he intended to pass the day in it with his guests. She seeming quite amazed at this, told and entreated him to receive his guests in a room, for she had last night in her dream a presentiment that the arbour would that day be struck by lightning. He laughed at the assertion, as there was no appearance of a storm coming on that day, and he told her not to mind her foolish dream, and to prepare the arbour for the reception of his guests. She did as she was ordered, the guests arrived, and as the day was fine, made themselves merry. But in the meantime clouds gathered in the distant horizon and were at last powerfully driven to that place by the wind. The company were so intent on their entertainment that they did not in the least observe it: but scarcely was the housekeeper aware that the storm was approaching, than she begged her master to leave the arbour with his company, for she could not divest herself at all of the idea of the lightning striking it. At first they would not listen, but at last, when she continued her entreaties and the thunder commenced to approach with great violence, they suffered themselves to be induced to leave the arbour. Hardly had they reached the room when they heard a heavy crash of thunder, and the quick following lightning struck the arbour and dashed everything that had been left in it to pieces.

WONDERFUL PRESENTIMENT.

Madame Beaumont relates the following:

My whole family still remember an accident from which my father was preserved by a presentiment of danger. On one occasion, he agreed with a party to sail to Port St. Osmer. When it was time to go on board, an aunt of my father’s, who was deaf and dumb, uttered a kind of howl, placed herself at the door, blocked up the way with her arms, struck her hands together, and gave him, by signs, to understand that she conjured him to stay at home. My father, who had promised himself much pleasure from this excursion, only laughed at her entreaties; but the lady fell at his feet, and manifested such signs of poignant grief, that he at length determined to yield to her entreaties, and postponed his excursion to Port St. Osmer until some other day.

He therefore endeavoured to detain the rest also; but they laughed at him for being so easily persuaded, and set sail. Scarcely had the vessel proceeded half the distance, before those on board of it had the greatest reason to repent that they had not followed his advice. Some serious accidents happened to the vessel, so that it broke to pieces; several lost their lives, and those who saved themselves by swimming were so much terrified at their narrow escape, that they, with difficulty, got the better of it.

By some written statements the dumb afterwards made, it was shown that, in the night preceding, she had an awful and life-like dream, in which it seemed that the excursion-boat, which would set sail on the following day for Port St. Osmer, would be wrecked; and that most of the persons on board would either get drowned or barely escape. The warning angel found that he could influence no one more effectually than the deaf and dumb aunt; he therefore selected her for the execution of his commission. My father, all his life, was profoundly thankful, both to her and the guardian angel, for this providential warning and foreboding.

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PRINTED FOR THE BOOKSELLERS.

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NOTES.

{7} Or acknowledgment, which, by the tenure of some estates, is given to every new lord of a manor.

{10} The term used in this country for a lane.

{16} A few years ago, (since the above was written) Mr. E of O—, was killed by a fall from his horse, at his own gate, as he was returning from hunting.

{32a} The Duke of Buckingham (favourite of James and Charles I. who was beheaded) assassinated by J. Felton.

{32b} The Scots, who sold their King, Charles I. for a large sum of money, to the English rebels.

{32c} Supposed to have been the Marquis of Montrose.

{33a} Supposed to have been Oliver Cromwell, at whose death the greatest storm of wind happened that had been known in England.

{33b} The plague and fire of London were here plainly foretold.

{33c} The Great Yellow Fruit, supposed to have been the Prince of Orange, King William III.

{34} This was said in the book whence the PREDICTIONS were extracted, to mean oppression of the poor.

{43} It is reported that there is a room in this house the door and windows of which are kept closely fastened, and no one is ever permitted to enter the same except the next heir, when he attains his twenty-first year, at which time he goes in alone and when he returns it is shut up as before.

{51} The original prophecy says, “Richard the son of Richard.”

{184} Sir Walter Raleigh.

{185a} Tobacco.

{185b} The Potatoe.