557 – The Prophetic Pictures

0:00Best thing that's ever happened to you financially, go. Easy! Sold by car on Carvana! Amazing offer! Really? I hit 200 on the scratcher. Did the scratcher come to your house and hand you a check? No. How many scratchers did you hit to get that? I hit a button on Carvana.com once. Okay, that's fair. It's like the lottery except you always win. Not like the lottery at all, actually. Exactly! inexplicably good. Offers worth bragging about. Sell your car today on Carvana. Think I'm these may apply. Hey. So, if you're listening to Sleepy, I know that you love podcasts that help you go to bed and get a great night's rest. Well, if you're looking for even more snoozy content, I highly encourage you to check out the podcast, Nothing Much Happens. By a sleep-co-conspirator of mine, named Catherine Nikolai, she shares these original, mindfully crafted, conflict-free literature designed to lull you into a restful slumber. For over six years, Catherine has been helping listeners find peace and rest through

1:01her soothing stories. The show has over 150 million downloads, and it basically is a grown-up version of Mr. Rogers' neighborhood filled with interconnected stories that soothe and calm you. It is a fantastic show, and she puts so much work into making stories that are specifically crafted to put you to bed. So definitely go check out her show, Nothing Much Happens. You can find nothing much happens anywhere you get your podcasts, sweet dreams. Hey, my name's Otis Gray, and you're listening to Sleepy. A podcast where I read old books to help you get to sleep. Well, good evening. Tonight we'll be reading a really lovely Nathaniel Hawthorne story.

2:03And if you've listened to the show for a while, you know that I really love Nathaniel Hawthorne, and this is a really exquisite short story, The Hero. And before we get to this really snoozy bedtime reading, I would just like to thank all of our brand new patrons on Patreon.com, which is a website where you can pledge a couple bucks for an ad-free version of the show. So this week's incredible new patrons, Chandler Dungan, Cinnamon, Jenny Tibo, Mel Hines, Megan Walker, Lisa Seah, Karen Pellarin, Tonya Travis, and Sam Raspberry. Thank you all so, so much for being a part of making this show. It really means a lot, and I really hope that I pronounce your name right.

3:07If I didn't send me a message. Thank you so much for being a part of making this show. I cannot tell you how much it means to me. And if you're listening to this, and you have no idea what I'm talking about, these new patrons are direct supporters of the show on Patreon, which is a site that allows you to directly be a part of making the things they like. So if you like sleepy and you want to be a part of making an exchange for cool perks, make an ad-free version of the show, or at $5, access to our poetry feed with all kinds of episodes you've never heard before, including a lot of a Hawthorne poetry. Then you can do that by going to patreon.com slash sleepy radio. Thank you. And as always, the music you're hearing is by my good friend James Leopcowski, and the

4:09cover I've for sleepy is by Gracie Canaan. Ah, it's September. Those first chills are in the air, and I hope that is bringing on some really lovely sleep to your routine. If it wasn't already part of your routine already. So I feel like Nathaniel Hawthorne's story, I think is writing as appropriate for any time of the year. But this one in particular, I think is a great end of summer, bedtime reading to go to sleep to. And I think you're really going to like it. So without further ado, I hope you can sleep so soundly to this Nathaniel Hawthorne's story, the prophetic pictures.

5:12And now is the time for you to fluff up your pillow, just how you like it. Feel yourself, mel, into your bed. Get real comfortable. Close your eyes. And let me read to you. The prophetic pictures. But this painter cried Walter Ludlow with animation. He not only excels in his peculiar art, but possesses vast requirements in all other learning and science. He talks Hebrew with Dr. Madher and gives lectures in anatomy to Dr. Boylston. And where he will meet the best instructed man among us on his own ground.

6:14Moreover he is a polished gentleman, a citizen of the world. Yeah, a true cosmopolite. For he will speak like a native of each climbing country of the globe except our own forest, wither he is now going. Here is all this what I must admire in him. Indeed said Eleanor, who had listened with a woman's interest to the description of such a man. Yeah, this is admirable now. Surely it is, reply or lover, before or last so, that his natural gift of adapting himself to every variety of character in so much that all men and all women too, Eleanor shall find a mirror of themselves in this wonderful painter. But the greatest wonder is yet to be told. Nay, if you have more wonderful attributes than these said Eleanor laughing, Boston is a

7:20perilous abode for the poor gentleman. Where are you telling me of a painter or a wizard? In truth answered he. That question might be asked much more seriously than you suppose. They say that he paints not merely a man's features but his mind and heart. He catches the secret sentiments and passions and throws them upon the canvas like sunshine or perhaps in the portraits of dark-sold men like a gleam of inferno fire. It is an awful get, added Walter, lowering his voice from its tone of enthusiasm. That shall be almost afraid to sit to him. Walter, are you an earnest exclaimed Eleanor? Never haven't say, dearest Eleanor, do not let him paint the look which you now wear, set our lover smiling, though rather perplexed.

8:22There, it is passing away now. When you spoke you seemed frightened to death and very bad beside. What were you thinking of? Nothing, nothing answered Eleanor hastily. You paint my face with your own fantasy. Well, come for me tomorrow and we will visit this wonderful artist. But when the young man had departed, it cannot be denied that a remarkable expression was again visible on the fair and youthful face of his mistress. It was a sad, then anxious lurk, little and accorded, so I had what should have been the feelings of a maiden on the eve of Wadla. The a Walter Ludlow was the chosen of her heart. A look, said Eleanor to herself. Don't wonder that it startled him, if it expressed what I sometimes feel.

9:26I know by my experience how frightful a look may be, but it was all fancy. I thought nothing of it at the time. I've seen nothing of it since. I did, but dream it. And she visited herself about the embroidery of a rock in which she meant that her portrait should be taken. The painter of whom they had been speaking was now one of those native artists who, that a later period of the nests, borrowed their colors from the Indians, and manufactured their pencils of the furs of wild beasts. Perhaps, if he could have revoked his life and pre-arranged his destiny, he might have chosen to belong to that school without a master, in the hope of being at least original, since there were no works of art to imitate nor rules to follow.

10:27But he had been born and educated in Europe. He also said that he had studied the grandeur, her beauty of conception, in every touch of the master hand, in all the most famous pictures, in cabinets and galleries, and on the walls of churches, till there was nothing more for his powerful mind to learn. Or could add nothing to its lessons, but nature might. He had therefore visited a world where their none of his professional brethren had preceded him. The feast his eyes on visible images that were noble in picture-esque, yet had never been transferred to canvas. America was too poor to afford other temptations to an artist of eminence, though many of the colonial gentry on the painter's arrival, that expressed a wish to transmit their linemons to austerity by means of his skill.

11:32Whenever such proposals were made, he fixed his piercing eyes on the applicant, and seemed to look him through and through. If he be hell, only asleep and comfortable visit, though there were a gold lace coat to adorn the picture and golden guineas to pay for it, he civilly rejected the task, then the reward. But if the face were the index of anything uncommon, in thought, sentiment, or experience, or if he met a beggar in the street, with a white beard and a furrowed brow, or sometimes a child happened to look up and smile, he would exhaust all the art on them that he denied to well. Still skill, being so rare in the colonies, the painter became an object of general curiosity. In few or not could appreciate the technical merit of his productions, yet there were

12:37points in regard to which the opinion of the crowd was as valuable as the refined judgment of the amateur. They watched the effect that each picture produced on such untooed ered beholders, and derived profit from their remarks, while they would assume have thought of instructing nature or so as him who seemed to rival her. Their admiration, they must be own, was tinctured with the prejudices of the age and country. Some deemed it an offense against the mosaic law, and even a presumptuous mockery of the creator to bring into existence such lively images of his creatures. Others frightened at the art which could raise phantoms at will, and keep the form of the dead among the living, were inclined to consider the painter as a magician, or perhaps

13:39a famous witch doctor, a witch of old times, plotting mischief in a new guise. These foolish fancies were more than half believed among the mob. Even superior circles as character was invested with a vague awe, partly rising like smoke reeds when the popular superstitions, the chiefly caused by the varied knowledge and talents which he made subservient to his profession. Being on the eve of marriage, Walter Ludlow and Eleanor were eager to obtain their portraits, as the first of why they doubtless hope would be a long series of family pictures. The day after the conversation abought a record, they visited the painter's rooms. The servant ushered them into an apartment, where, though the artist himself was not visible,

14:39there were personages whom they could hardly forebear greening with reverence. They knew, indeed, that the whole assembly were but pictures. They have felt it impossible to separate the idea of life and intellect from such striking counterfeits. Several of the portraits were known to them, either as distinguished characters of the day, or their private acquaintances. There was Governor Brna, looking as if he had just received an undudiful communication from the House of Representatives, and were inditing a most sharp response. Mr. Cook hung beside the ruler whom he opposed, sturdy, and somewhat puritanical, as befitted a popular leader. The ancient lady of Sir William Fipps eyed them from the wall in a rough and far-thing gal, an imperious old name, not unsuspectative witchcraft.

15:43John Winslow, then a very young man, wore the expression of war-like enterprise, which long afterwards made him a distinguished general. Their personal friends were recognized at a glance. In most of the pictures, the whole mind and character were brought out on the countenance and concentrated into a single look, so that, to speak paradoxically, the originals hardly resembled themselves so strikingly as the portraits did. Among these modern worthies there were two all-bearded saints who had almost vanished into the darkening canvas. There was also a pale, but unfaded Madonna, who had perhaps been worshipped and wrong, and now regarded the lovers with such a mild and holy look that they longed to worship too.

16:44How singular a thaw observed water laddow, that this beautiful face has been beautiful for above 200 years. Oh, if all beauty would endure so well, do you not envy her, Eleanor? The earth were heaven, and my sheer plan, but were all things fathom miserable to be the one that could not fade. This dark old saint Peter as a fierce and ugly scow, sank though he be continued water, retroubles me, but the virgin looks kindly at us. Yes, but very sorrowfully, me think, Siddelenar. The easel stood beneath these three old pictures, sustaining one that had been recently commenced. After a little inspection, they began to recognize the features of their own minister, the

17:48different doctor, colon, growing into shape and life as it were out of a cloud. Kind old man exclaimed Eleanor, he gaze at me as if you were about to utter a word of paternal advice, and at me said Walter as if you were about to shake his head and her buch me for some suspected iniquity. What so does the original, I should never feel quite comfortable under his eye until he stand before him to be married. They now heard a footstep on the floor, and turning beheld the painter who had been some moments in the room, had listened to a few of their remarks. He was a middle-aged man, with countenance well worthy of his own pencil.

18:48Indeed, by the picturesque, though careless arrangement of his rich dress, perhaps because his soul dwelt always among painted shapes, he looked somewhat like a portrait himself. His visitors were sensible of a kindred between the artist and his works, and felt as if one of the pictures had stepped on a canvas to salute them. Walter Ludlow, who was slightly known to the painter, explained the object of their visit. While he spoke, the sunbeam was falling at for his figure and Eleanor, but so happy in effect that they also seemed living pictures of youth and beauty, gladdened by bright fortune. The artist was evidently strong. My easel is occupied for several ensuing days, and my stay in Boston must be breathed that he thoughtfully.

19:50Then, after an observant glance, he had it, but your wishes shall be gratified. Though I disapoint the chief justice and mademoliver, I must not lose this opportunity for the sake of painting a few elves of Brawler, the Brigade. The painter expressed a desire to introduce both their portraits into one picture, and represent them engaged in some appropriate action. This plan would have delighted the lover, but was necessarily rejected, because so large a space of canvas would have been unfit for the room which it was intended to decorate. Two and a half-length portraits were there for a fixed upon. After they had taken leave, Walter Ludlow asked Eleanor with a smile, whether she knew what an influence over their fate the painter was about to acquire.

20:55The old women of Boston have furr continued he, that after he has once got possession of a person's face and figure, he may paint him in any act or situation whatever, and the picture will be prophetic. Do you believe it? Not quite, said Eleanor, smiley. Yeah, if he has such magic, there is something so gentle in this manner that I am sure he will use it well. It was the painter's choice to proceed with both the portraits at the same time, assigning as a reason and a mystical language which he sometimes used that the faces through light upon each other. Accordingly, he gave now a touch to Walter and now to Eleanor, and the features of one and the other, again to star forth so vividly, that it appeared as if his triumphant or

21:56would actually disengage them from the canvas. I made the rich life in deep shade, they beheld their phantom cells, but though the likeness promised to be perfect, they were not quite so satisfied with the expression, it seemed more vague than most of the painter's works. Me however was satisfied with the prospect of success, and being much interested in the lovers, employed his leisure moments, unknown to them, and making a crant sketch of their two figures. During their sittings, he engaged them in conversation and kindled out their faces with characteristic traits, which though continually varying, there was his purpose to combine and fix. A length he announced that at their next visit both the porches would be ready for delivery.

22:59If my pencil will be but true to my conception, then last few touches which I met at day observed he, these two pictures will be my very best performance, seldom indeed as an artist such subject. While speaking, he still bent his penetrative eye upon them, nor withdrew it till they had reached the bottom of the stairs. Nothing in the whole circle of human vanities take stronger hold of the imagination than this affair of having a portrait painted. Yet why should it be so? The looking glass, the polished globes of the andyrens, the mirror like water, and all other reflecting surfaces continually present us with portraits, or rather ghosts of ourselves, which we glance at and straight away forget them.

24:03But we forget them only because they vanish. It is the idea of duration of earthly immortality that gives such a mysterious interest to our own portraits. Walter and Alonore were not insensible to this feeling and hastened to the painter's room, punctually at the appointed hour to meet those pictured shapes which were to be their representatives with a vast irony. The sunshine flashed after them into the apartment, but left it somewhat gloomy as they closed the door. Their eyes were immediately attracted to their portraits which rested against the farthest wall of the room. At the first glance through the dim light and the distance, seeing themselves in precisely their natural attitudes and with all the air that they recognized so well, they uttered

25:07a simultaneous exclamation of delight. There we stand, cried Walter enthusiastically, fixed and sunshine forever. No dark passions can gather on our faces. No, said Alonore, more calmly. No dreary change can set anus. This was sad while they were approaching and yet gained only an imperfect view of the pictures. The painter, after saluting them, busyed himself at the table in completing a crann sketch, leaving his visitors to form their own judgment as to his perfected labours. At intervals they sent a glance from beneath his deep eyebrows, watching their countenances and profile with his pencil suspended over the sketch.

26:08They had now stood some moments, each in front of the other's picture contemplating it with entranced attention but without uttering a word. A lane, Walter is step four, then back, viewing Alonore's portrait in various lights and finally spoke. Is there not a change, said he, been a doubtful and meditative tone? Yes, the perception of it grows more vivid the longer I look and certainly the same picture that I saw yesterday, the dress, the features, all are the same and yet something is altered. Is then the picture less like than it was yesterday, inquire the painter, now drawing near with irrepressible entrance. The features are perfect, Alonore, answered Walter.

27:10In the first glance the expression seemed also heard, but I could fancy that the portrait has changed countenance while I have been looking at it. The eyes are fixed on mine, the strangely sad and anxious expression. Nay, it is grief and terror. Is this like Alonore? Compare the living face with the pictured one, said the painter. Walter glance side-long, it is mistress and started, motionless and absorbed, fascinated as it were, in contemplation of Walter's portrait. Alonore's faith had assumed precisely the expression of which he had just been complaining. When she practiced for a whole hour before a mirror, she could not have caught the look so successfully. Now the picture itself been a mirror, it could not have thrown back her present aspect

28:15with stronger and more melancholy truth. She have eared quite unconscious of the dialogue between the artist and her lover. Alonore exclaimed Walter, in amazement, what changes come over you. She did not hear him nor de cyst from her fixed gaze until he seized her hand and thus attracted her notice. Then with a sudden tremor she looked from the picture to the face of the original. Do you see no change in your portrait as she? In mine, none replied Walter, examining it. But let me see. Yes, there is a slight change in improvement, I think, in the picture, though none in the likeness. It has a lively or expression than yesterday, as if some bright thought were flashing from

29:16the eyes and about to be uttered from the lips. Now that I have caught a look, it becomes very deciding. While he was intent on these observations, Alonore turned to the painter. She regarded him with grief and awe and felt that he repaid her with sympathy and commiseration, though therefore she could not vaguely guess. I looked with spreadsheet and shutter. How came it there? Madam said the painter, sadly, taking her hand and leading her apart, in both these pictures, I have painted what I saw. The artist, the true artist, must look beneath the exterior. It is his gift, his proudest but often a melancholy one, to see the inn most soul. One by a power indefinable even to himself, to make a glow or darkened upon the canvas,

30:22in glances that express the thought and sentiment of years. Would that I might convince myself of error in the present instant? There now approach the table, on which we're heads and chalk, hands almost as expressive as ordinary faces. I've eat church towers, datched cottages, old thunders stricken trees, oriental, and antique costume, and all such picturesque vagaries of the artist's vital moments. Turning them over was seeming carelessness, a crant sketch of two figures was disclosed. If I fail, continue he, if your heart does not see itself reflected in your own portrait, you have no secret cause to trust my delineation of the other. It is not yet too late to alter them.

31:24I might change the action of these figures too, but would it influence the event? He directed her notice to the sketch. A thrill ran through Eleanor's frame. A shriek was upon her lips, but she stifled it, with the self-command that becomes habitual to all who hide thoughts of fear and anguish within their bosoms. Turning from the table, she perceived that Walter had advanced near enough to have seen the sketch. Though she could not determine whether it had caught his eye. We will not have the pictures altered, said she hastily. If mine is sad, my shall but look, the gare for the contrast. Be it so, answer the painter, bowing, may your griefs be such fans for ones that only your picture may mourn for them.

32:24For your joys may they be true and deep, and paint themselves upon this lovely face, they they'll equate belive my art. After the marriage of Walter and Eleanor, the pictures formed the two most splendid ornaments of their abode. They hung side by side, separated by a narrow panel, appearing to eye each other constantly, yet always returning the gaze of the spectator. Old gentleman, who professed a knowledge of such subjects, reckoned these among the most admirable specimens of modern portraiture, while common observers compare them with the originals, feature by feature, and were rapturous in praise of the likeness. But it was on the third class, neither travel connoisseurs nor common observers, but people

33:27of natural sensibility that the picture has wrought their strongest effect. Such persons might gaze carelessly at first, but becoming interested would return day after day and study these painted faces like the pages of a mystic volume. Walter Ludlow's portrait attracted their earliest notice, and the absence of himself and his bride, they sometimes disputed as the expression was the painter had intended to throw upon the features, all agreeing that there was a look of earnest import, though no two explained it alike. There was less diversity of opinion in regard to Eleanor's picture. They differed indeed, and there attempts to estimate the nature and depth of the gloom that dwelt upon her face, but agree that it was gloom and alien from the natural temperament

34:29of their youthful friend. A certain fanciful person announced, as the result of much scrutiny, that both these pictures were parts of one design, and that the melancholy strength of feeling in Eleanor's presence, more different to the more vivid emotion, though her as he turned to the wild passion than that of Walter. Though unskilled in the art, he even began a sketch in which the action of the two figures was to correspond with their mutual expression. It was whispered among friends, that day by day Eleanor's face was assuming a deeper shade of pensiveness, which threatened soon to render her to a true counterpart of her melancholy picture. Walter, on the other hand, instead of acquiring the vivid look which the painter had given

35:32him on the canvas, became reserved and downcast, with no outward flashes of emotion. However, it might be smoldering within. In course of time, Eleanor hung a gorgeous curtain of purple silk, raw with flowers and fringe with heavy golden tassels before the pictures, under the pretence that the dust would tarnish their hues or the light dim them. There was enough, her visitors fell, that the massive folds of the silk must never be withdrawn, nor the portraits mentioned in her presence. Time wore on, and the painter came again. He had been far enough to the north to see the silver cascade of the crystal hills, and to look over the vast round of cloud and forest from the summit of New England's loftiest

36:35mountain. But he did not profane that scene by the mockery of his art. He had also lain in a canoe, and the bosom of Lake George, making his soul the mirror of its loveliness and grandeur, till not a picture in the Vatican was more vivid than his recollection. He had gone with the Indian hunters to Niagara, then there again had flung his hopeless pencil down the precipice, feeling that he could have soon paint the roar as odd else that goes to make up the wondrous cataract. In truth, there was seldom as impulse to copy natural scenery, except as a framework for the delineations of the human form and face, instinct with thought, passion, or suffering. With store of such his adventurous ramble had enriched him, the stern dignity of Indian

37:38chiefs, the dusky of loveliness of Indian girls, the domestic life of wigwams, the stealthy march, the battle beneath gloomy pine trees, the frontier fortress with its garrison, the anomaly of the old French partisan, bread and courts, but grown grey and shaggy deserts, such were the scenes and portraits that he had sketched. The glow of perilous moments, flashes of wild feeling, struggles of fierce power, love, hay, grief, frenzy, and a word all the worn-out heart of the old earth have been revealed to him under a new form. As portfolio was filled with graphic illustrations of the volume of his memory, much genius would transmute into its own substance and imbue with immortality.

38:41He felt that the deep wisdom in his arm, which he has saw so far was found. Unamid, stern, or lovely nature, in the perils of the forest, for its overwhelming peacefulness, still there been two phantoms, the companions of his wife. Like all other men, around whom an engrossing purpose reads itself, he was insulated from the mass of humankind. He had no aim, no pleasure, no sympathies, but what were ultimately connected with his arm, low gentle in manner and upright in intent and action, beat in appazazz kindly feelings. His heart was cold, no living creature could be brought near enough to keep him warm. For these two beings, however, he had felt, and its greatest intensity, the

39:42sort of interest which always allied him to the subjects of his pencil. He had pride into their souls with his keenest insight and pictured the result upon their features with his utmost skill, so as barely to fall short of that standard which no genius ever reached, his own severe conception. He had caught on the duskiness of the future, at least, so he fancied a fearful secret, and it obscuredly revealed it on the portrait. So much of himself, of his imagination and all other powers, had been lavished on the study of water and Eleanor, that he had almost regarded them as creations of his own, like the thousands with which he had people in the realms of picture. Therefore, did they fled through the twilight of the woods, hover on the mist of the

40:43waterfalls, look forth from the mirror of the lake, nor melt away in the noon tide-sun. They haunted his pictorial fancy, not as mockery as of life, nor pale goblins of the dead, and the guise of portraits, each with an alterable expression which is magic, cut of oak from the caverns of the soul. He could not recross the Atlantic till he had again beheld the originals of those airy pictures. A hooglorious art thus mues the enthusiastic painter, as he traw the street, the how heart the image of the creators of the innumerable forms, had wandered in nothingness, starting to be at thy back. The dead live again, that recalls them to their old scenes, and give us their grey shadows,

41:45the lustre of a better life, that once earthly in a mortal. Those snatches back the fleeting moments of history, with thee there is no past for hath I touched, all that is great becomes forever present, when illustrious men live through long ages, and the visible performance of the very deeds which made them what they were. O potent art, as thou bringest the faintly revealed past, to stand in that narrow strip of sunlight, which we call now, canst thou summon the shrouded future to meet her there. Hath I not achieved it, am I not thy prophet? Thus, with a proud, we have melancholy forever, that he almost cry aloud, as he passed through the Toilsom street, among people, that knew not of his reveries, nor could understand,

42:50nor care for them. It is not good for man to cherish the solitary ambition, unless there be those around him, by whose example he may regulate himself, his thoughts, desires and hopes, will become extravagant, when he the semblance, perhaps the reality of a madman. Reading other bosoms with an acuteness almost preternatural, the painter failed to see the disorder of his own. Then this should be the house, said he, looking up and down the front, before he knocked. Heaven helped my brains. The picture we think so will never vanish. Whether I look at the windows of the door, there it is, framed within them, painted strongly, and glowing in the richest tints, the faces of the portraits, the figures and action of

43:54the sketch. He knocked. The portraits are there within, inquired he of the domestic, then recollecting himself, your master and mistress, or their home. They are, sir, to the servant, adding, as he noticed, that picture aspect of which the painter could never divest himself, and the portraits too. The guest was admitted into a parlor, communicating by a central door within an interior room of the same size. As the first of Armin was empty, he passed to an entrance of the second, within which his eyes were greeted by those living personages, as well as their picture of representatives, who had long been the objects of so singular and interest. He involuntarily paused on the threshold.

44:56They had not perceived his approach. After an Eleanor were standing before the portraits, once the former had just flung back the rich and voluminous fold to the silken curtain, holding its golden tassel with one hand, while the other grasped that of his bride. The pictures concealed for months, gleamed forth again, in undiminished splendor, appearing to throw a somber light across the room. Rather than to be disclosed by a borrowed radiance. The Eleanor had been almost prophetic. Abensiveness annexed a gentle sorrow that successfully developed upon her countenance, deepening with the lapse of time into a quiet anguish. A mixture of a fright would now have made it the very expression of the portrait.

46:00Walter's face was moody and dull, or animated only by a fit full flashes which left a heavier darkness for their momentary elimination. He looked from Eleanor to her portrait, and then stood to his own, in the contemplation of which he finally stood, absorbed. The painter seemed to hear the step of destiny approaching behind him, on its progress towards its victims. The strange thought darted into his mind, was now his own, the form in which the destiny had embodied its own, and he achieved agent of the coming evil which he had foreshadowed. Still, Walter remained silent before the picture, commuting with it, as with his own heart, and abandoning himself to the spell of evil influence that the painter had cast upon

47:00the features. Gradually his eyes kindled, while as Eleanor watched the increasing wildness of his face, her own assumed the look of terror. Then when at last he turned upon her, the resemblance of both to their portraits was complete. Her fate is upon us, held Walter, die. Drawing a night, he sustained her, as she was sinking to the ground, and named her bosom. In the action, and in the look and attitude of each, the painter beheld the figures of his sketch. The picture, with all its tremendous coloring, was finished. Madman cried he sternly. He had advanced from the door, and interposed himself between the wretched beings, with the

48:01same sense of power to regulate their destiny, as to alter a scene upon the canvas. He stood like a magician, controlling the phantom which he had evoked. What, mothered Walter Ludlow, as he relapsed from fierce excitement into silent gloom, does fate impede its own degree? Richard lady said the painter, did I not warn you? You did reply to Eleanor calmly, as her terror gave place to the quiet grief which had disturbed her. But, I love him. Is there not a deep more on this tale? Could the result of one, or all of our deeds be shadowed forth and said before us? Someone call a fate, and hurry onward.

49:01Brothers be swept along by their passionate desires, and not be turned aside by the prophetic pictures. Thank you for listening to Sleepy. Good night.