Are you casuist enough to tell me, how it happens that we are generally disappointed in the grand expectations of our lives, and find our favourite wishes crossed? Never was there a more singular confirmation of this fact, than in the case of the Doctor. The fear of being buried alive, seems to have engrossed all his thoughts. The apprehensions which arose in his mind, both on his own account, and that of others, furnished him an inexhaustible fund for conversation, and gave frequent employment to his pen. The presentiment which had taken possession of him, was not to be suppressed. But, alas! how unavailing, from a combination of preventive circumstances, did it prove!—Let it serve as a document to us, not to fix our hearts with too much anxiety on any object that lies within the reach of the accidents of life, or to indulge too great apprehensions of any dreaded evils.
I was greatly affected at the melancholy accident which had just happened; but my mother was almost distracted at being obliged to break a promise she had so solemnly made, and which would have proved so consonant to the wishes of her old friend.
I have often wondered that humanity, exclusive of affection, does not prevent those, who have a regard for persons during their lives, from leaving them in their last moments, through a false tenderness, to the care of nurses and servants, who are usually insensible to every claim but those of their own ease or interest. Too susceptible of pain, from beholding the expiring pangs of a beloved object, they hasten from it; whereas, that ought to be the strongest motive for their stay, as these would stimulate them to unremitted assiduity in administering every needful assistance whilst life remains, and to a due attention to the body till its interment.
XVII.
The following Story is related by a Traveller, who translated the particulars from a foreign monument.
The heroine of this event was named Retchmuth Adoleh. She was the wife of a merchant of Cologne, and is said to have died of the plague, which destroyed the greatest part of that city in 1571. She was speedily interred, and a ring of great value was suffered to remain on her finger, which tempted the cupidity of the grave-digger. The night was the time he had planned for the plunder. On going to the grave, opening the same, and attempting to take the ring from off the finger of the lady, she came to herself and so terrified the sacrilegious thief, that he scampered away with speed, and left his lanthorn behind him. The lady took advantage of his fright, and, with the assistance of the lanthorn, found her way home, and lived afterwards to be the mother of three children. After her real decease, she was buried near the door of the same church, and a tomb was erected over her sepulchre, from whence this record is taken.
XVIII.
The following account of reanimation is extracted from the first volume of the Causes Célebres, and was the subject of a serious law suit in Paris.
Two men in trade, who lived in the street, St. Honoré, in Paris, nearly equal in circumstances, both following the same profession, and united in the closest friendship, had each of them a child, much about the same age. These children were brought up together, and conceived a mutual attachment, which ripening with years into a stronger and more lively sentiment, was approved by the parents on both sides. This young couple was upon the point of being made happy, by a more solid union, when a rich financier, conceiving a passion for the young maiden, unfortunately crossed their inclinations, by demanding her in marriage. The allurements of a more brilliant fortune, seduced her father and mother, notwithstanding their daughter’s repugnance to consent to the change. To their entreaties, however, she was obliged to yield, and sacrificed her affections, by becoming the wife of the financier. Like a woman of virtue, she forbad her earlier lover the house. A fit of melancholy, the consequence of this violence done to her inclinations, by entering into an engagement of interest, brought on her a malady, which so far benumbed her faculties, that she was thought by all her friends to be dead, and was accordingly consigned to the grave. The former lover conceiving, and hoping what he had heard of her death, might only prove a syncope, or fit of lethargy, (as she had been before subject to those complaints) bribed the grave-digger, to convey the body to his house in the night time. He then used every means recommended for restoring suspended animation; and at length was overjoyed at finding his efforts prove effectual.
It is not easy to conceive the surprise the young woman was in on her resuscitation, when she found herself in a strange house, and as it were in the arms of her lover, who informed her of what had taken place, and the risk he had run on her account. She then comprehended the extent of her obligation to her deliverer, and love, more pathetic than all his persuasions to unite their destinies, determined her, on her recovery to escape with him into England: where they lived for some years in the closest union.