“Oh, neednʼt I, indeed, when you read such books as this! Oh, what will your poor father say? And you to have a class in the Sunday–school”!
Of all the grisly horrors produced to make the travellerʼs hair creep, one of the most repulsive and glaring was in Amyʼs delicate hand. A hideous ape, with an open razor, was about to cut a young ladyʼs throat. Chuckling, he drew her fair neck to the blade by her dishevelled hair. At her feet lay an elderly woman, dead; while a man with a red cap was gazing complacently in at the window. The back of the volume was relieved by a ghost, a deathʼs head, and a pair of cross–bones.
“Well”! said Miss Eudoxia. Her breath was gone for a long while, and she could say nothing more.
“I know the cover is ugly, aunt, but the inside is so beautiful. Oh, and so very wonderful! I canʼt think how any one ever could imagine such splendid horrible things. Oh, so clever, Aunt Doxy; and full of things that make me tingle, as if my brain were gone to sleep. And I want to ask papa particularly about galvanizing the mummy”.
“Indeed; yes, galvanizing! and pray does your father know of your having this horrible book”?
“No; but I mean to tell him, the moment I have got to the end of it”.
“Good child, and most dutiful! When you have swallowed the poison, youʼll tell us”.
“Poison indeed, Aunt Eudoxia! How dare you talk to me like that? Do you dare to suppose that I would read a thing that was unfit for me”?
“No, I donʼt think you would, knowingly. But you are not the proper judge. Why did you not ask your father or me, before you began this book”?
“Because I thought you wouldnʼt let me read it”.