The Argosy — page 335: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

314 A Dream from Heaven. guishing batons ; the decorated heads of the stately horses; the velvet trappings sweeping the ground ; the majestic plumes rising over the death-carriage ; the train of attendants, carriages and feathers and trap- pings, carriages and feathers and trappings still again, a long line of them ; a coffin emblazoned with enough silver to tempt the cupidity of the living, whilst what it contains, that for which the show is made, is more loathsome than anything above the earth or below it, But where is the spimt? Following, as his was. The curate read the service for the dead: little fear that any higher dignitary would attend to bury such as he. “ Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of His great mercy to take unto Himself the soul of our dear brother here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground ; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust: in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life ¥ He tore about the church in dire anguish—we cannot picture such 5 he would have screamed aloud, but that sound was denied him; he would have dashed himself with frantic violence against the gravestones ; allin vain. Until the Day of Judgment his punishment was confined to mental torture : afterwards In his convulsive throes he swept by Algernon, and the boy shuddered and sobbed : was he conscious that some blighting influence had passed him ? Oh, that he could undo his work !—that he could undo his work ! He had talked of “‘ tasting the quiet of the grave.” There was no grave. The shell he had cast off lay in the grave, not the spirit. The space around was of awful immensity, beyond human compre- hension ; its colour a dull, gloomy lead. On its confines appeared a glimmering of shining light, telling of the realms he had lost, and of Him who made their brightness": and whenever his vision encountered that spot, a dreadful fear shattered him, such as we can only experience in adream. The living God was there ; the God whom he had rejected ; and he knew that he must yet be brought before Him for judgment. But not yet ; not, as it seemed, for ages ; and, until then, he was doomed to whirl unceasingly about, his horrible remorse tearing at his heart- strings. But it appeared that some power was impelling him towards that bright spot now. He struggled to resist; to bear back; no! nearer and nearer it urged him. ‘“Itis not time,” he screamed; “it isnot time!” And with a yell, as of madness, he—awoke. He awoke. These horrors, which had visited Adam Grainger, were but a dream. When he had leaned his head back in his chair to feign sleep, hoping so to get rid of the presence of his wife, sleep had indeed mercifully overtaken him. The large drops of agony stood upon his brow. He shook, as with an ague, from head to foot. He was still in uncertainty: was ail that real, or had he indeed not lost Heaven? Mrs. Grainger, who had been watching him in his sleep, came forward. Eomicbooks.com