And for myself—what has the Future in store for me?
O, for Rest! O, for Forgiveness! O, for a quiet Sleep beneath the graveyard sod!
And with that aspiration for Rest, Forgiveness, Peace, uttered with all the yearning of a heart sick to the core, of life and all that life can inflict or give, ended the manuscript of Frances Van Huyden, the Midnight Queen.
It is now our task to describe certain scenes which took place in New York, between Nightfall and Midnight, on this 23d of December, 1844. And at midnight we will enter The Temple where the death's head is hidden among voluptuous flowers.