"It is not a vision."
"Mind, mind! Just now, you know, you imagined you heard this woman's love-songs, and your hearing was suddenly smitten with horrible agony. Mind, I say!"
"Leave me,—leave me! What is the use of hearing but to hear, of seeing but to see?"
"But the tortures which follow, miserable wretch!"
"I will brave them all for a deceit, as I have braved death for a reality; and to me this burning image is reality. Ah, Cecily, you are beautiful! Yet why torture me thus? Would you kill me? Ah, execrable fury, cease,—cease, or I will strangle thee!" cried the notary, in delirium.
"You kill yourself, unhappy man!" exclaimed Polidori, shaking the notary violently, in order to rouse him from his excitement. In vain; Jacques continued:
"Oh, beloved queen, demon of delight, never did I see—" The notary could not finish; he uttered a sudden cry of pain and threw himself back.
"What is it?" inquired Polidori, with astonishment.
"Put out that candle—it shines too brightly. I cannot endure it—it blinds me!"
"What!" said Polidori, more and more surprised. "There is but one lamp covered with its shade, and that shines very feebly."