When Mor (Morice) Perczel was sent as deputy to Presburg, he was obliged to pass a night at Vacz, where he heard so much of this marvellous somnambulist that he determined not to leave the place without seeing her, and accordingly he got an acquaintance to escort him in the evening to her lodging.
On entering the apartment, he beheld, by the dim light of a lamp, a very young girl, whose extreme paleness gave her an almost supernatural appearance; her face was thin, and her skin transparent; her eyes, which were very large, and of a pure blue, were half closed, and her lips and hands trembled exceedingly.
She was lying motionless in a large arm-chair; and her physician had just entered. He had recommended the use of magnetism for the cure of spasms at the heart, and it was now the sixth week that she had been under the magnetic influence. She was seldom awake, but still seldomer asleep; her usual state being something between the two—a constant unconscious reverie, accompanied by acute sensibility to the pleasure or pain of others, and a total absence of personal feeling. As her physician approached, and she came within the magnetic influence, she slowly opened her eyes, and fixed them steadfastly on his face without moving her eyelids. When he took her hand, a cold, faint smile passed over her countenance, and the trembling ceased; her physician then began to stroke her face, arms, and breast, with the tips of his fingers, at first slowly, but quickening the motion by degrees, while he kept his eyes steadily fixed upon his patient.
The girl continued motionless; her eyelids alone seemed to contend with the irresistible power which always gained upon her, closing by degrees and then opening wide again, while the pupils were unusually dilated.
Her whole countenance gradually underwent a wonderful change: her features assumed a character inexpressibly sweet and sad; she sighed and wept, her lips parted, while a calm smile settled on them. At last, her head sank on the cushion of her chair, and she fell asleep.
The physician now motioned to Mor Perczel to approach within the magnetic circle. Suddenly the girl's countenance assumed an expression of surprise and uneasiness.
"Who is this?" asked the physician, in a low, familiar tone.
The girl answered slowly, and with hesitation, "One of—our future—greatest leaders!"
Perczel smiled. "Perhaps in the camp of the Diet," he thought to himself.
"No, not in the Diet," replied the girl, to whom he had not communicated his thoughts; "on the field of battle!"