| Son cœur est un luth suspendu; Sitôt qu’on le touche il résonne. |
De Béranger.
DURING the whole of a dull, dark, andsoundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hungoppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, onhorseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and atlength found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, withinview of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how itwas—but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense ofinsufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; forthe feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable,because poetic, sentiment, with which the mind usually receiveseven the sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. Ilooked upon the scene before me—upon the mere house, andthe simple landscape features of the domain—upon the bleakwalls—upon the vacant eye-like windows—upon a fewrank sedges—and upon a few white trunks of decayedtrees—with an utter depression of soul which I can compareto no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream ofthe reveller upon opium—the bitter lapse into every-daylife—the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was aniciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart—an unredeemeddreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination couldtorture into aught of the sublime. What was it—I paused tothink—what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplationof the House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor couldI grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as Ipondered. I was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactoryconclusion, that while, beyond doubt, there arecombinations of very simple natural objects which have the powerof thus affecting us, still the analysis of this power lies amongconsiderations beyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected,that a mere different arrangement of the particulars of thescene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient tomodify, or perhaps to annihilate its capacity for sorrowfulimpression; and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse to theprecipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffledlustre by the dwelling, and gazed down—but with a shuddereven more thrilling than before—upon the remodelled andinverted images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems,and the vacant and eye-like windows.
Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed tomyself a sojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick Usher,had been one of my boon companions in boyhood; but many years hadelapsed since our last meeting. A letter, however, had latelyreached me in a distant part of the country—a letter fromhim—which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admittedof no other than a personal reply. The MS. gave evidence ofnervous agitation. The writer spoke of acute bodilyillness—of a mental disorder which oppressed him—andof an earnest desire to see me, as his best and indeed his onlypersonal friend, with a view of attempting, by the cheerfulnessof my society, some alleviation of his malady. It was the mannerin which all this, and much more, was said—it was theapparent heart that went with his request—whichallowed me no room for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyedforthwith what I still considered a very singular summons.