"MY SON, BE OF GOOD CHEER!"
(A Torture by Hope.)
[A Torture by Hope.]
From the French of Villiers de l'isle-Adam.
[Count Villiers de l'isle-Adam, who lives at Paris, where he edits the Revue des Lettres et des Arts, is one of several living French writers who have made a special study of short stories. He is a highly original writer, and, although as yet quite unknown to English readers, an extremely powerful one. Many of his stories are such as could have been written by no one but himself; but probably he approaches more nearly to Edgar Allan Poe than to any other English author.]
Below the vaults of the Official of Saragossa one nightfall long ago, the venerable Pedro Arbuez d'Espila, sixth Prior of the Dominicans of Segovia, third Grand Inquisitor of Spain—followed by a fra redemptor (master-torturer), and preceded by two familiars of the Holy Office holding lanterns—descended towards a secret dungeon. The lock of a massive door creaked; they entered a stifling in pace, where the little light that came from above revealed an instrument of torture blackened with blood, a chafing-dish, and a pitcher. Fastened to the wall by heavy iron rings, on a mass of filthy straw, secured by fetters, an iron circlet about his neck, sat a man in rags: it was impossible to guess at his age.