At one moment we behold him slumbering softly as an infant--"so
tranquil, helpless, stirless, and unmoved;" in the next, we remark with
surprise sundry violent twitches and contortions of the limbs, as though
the sleeper were under the operation of galvanism, or suffering from the
pangs of a guilty conscience. Of what hidden crime does the memory thus
agitate him--breaking in upon that rest which should steep the senses in
forgetfulness of the world and its cares? On a sudden he starts from his
couch with an appearance of frenzy!--his nostrils dilated, his eyes
gleaming with immoderate excitation--an incipient curse quivering on his
lips, and every vein swelling--every muscle tense with fearful and
passionate energy of purpose. Is he possessed with a devil, or does he
meditate suicide, that his manner is so wild and hurried? With impetuous
velocity he rushes to the window, and beneath his vehement but futile
strokes, aimed at a scarcely visible, and certainly impalpable object,
the fragile glass flies into fragments, the source of future colds and
curtain lectures without number. The immediate author of so much
mischief, it is true, is the diminutive vampire which is now making its
escape with cold-blooded indifference through a very considerable
fracture in one of the panes; but surely the person who saved from
destruction, and may thus be considered to have given existence to the
cause of all this loss of temper and of property, cannot conscientiously
affirm that _his_ withers are unwrung! Mercy and forbearance are very
great virtues when exercised with proper discretion; but man owes a
paramount duty to society, with which none of the weaknesses, however
amiable, of his nature should be allowed to interfere.
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