having terror as a basis.  And it might have been for this reason only, that, when I again uplifted my eyes to the house itself, from its image in the pool, there grew in my mind a strange fancy — a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that I but mention it to show the vivid force of the sensations which oppressed me.  I had so worked upon my imagination as really to believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity — an atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the gray wall, and the silent tarn — a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.

Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building.  Its principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity.  The discoloration of ages had been great.  Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the eaves.  Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary dilapidation.  No portion of the masonry had fallen; and there appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect adaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of the individual stones.  In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.  Beyond this indication of extensive decay, however, the fabric gave little token of instability.  Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.

    Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the house. 
 A servant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the Gothic archway of the hall.  A valet, of stealthy step, thence conducted me, in silence, through many dark and intricate passages in my progress to the studio of his master.  Much that I encountered on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague sentiments of which I have already spoken.  While the objects around me — while the carvings of the ceilings, the sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors, and the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I strode, were but matters to which, or to such as which, I had been accustomed from my infancy — while I hesitated not to acknowledge how familiar was all this — I still wondered to find how unfamiliar were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring up.  On one of the staircases, I met the physician of the family.  His countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and perplexity.  He accosted me with trepidation and passed on.  The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence of his master.