Angelina: Or, The Mystery of St. Mark's Abbey — page 163: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

# y # 2 160 ANGELINA $ OR, - Left in this awfal place, no language could do adequate justice to the severity of our heroine’s emotions ; she wrung her hands, and beat her breast in despair, and made the place re-echo with her cries of anguish. The dun- geon was deadly cold, and its black and flinty walls seemed to frown dismally upon her, as, when her agitation had become less violent, she prayed for the interposition of Omnipotence. Her idea of being confined all night in that horrible place, made her blood freeze in her veins, and her brain was racked to distraction. It now seemed certain to her that her assassination was deter- mined, and here the dreadful crime could be perpetrated without even the slightest chance of its being frustrated. But to reflect on a fate so shocking, and which now appeared also to be so inevitable, in one so young, was parti- cularly awful, and as she did so, her despair almost amounted to madness, At length, completely worn out with her cries and lamentations, she become more calm, and sinking on a seat, she covered her face with her hands, as if to shut out the terror of the place, and rocked herself to aud fro, in a state of great mental agony. Suddenly, however, she started from ler seat, and gazed around her with a mixture of alarm and astonishment, asa deep groan which seemed to proceed from no great distance smote her eara. With breathless attention she listened, while a great feeling of dread came over her, which the horrors of the place were quite sufficient to inspire inde- pendant of every thing else; but for a short time all again became silent as the grave, and Angelina actually feared almost to look around, lest her eyes should enceunter some terrific object or the other. Again, the deep moaning of a person, apparently in great pain, smote her ears, and was followed by a sound, resembling the clanking of heavy fetters, and it now appeared so near that she could almost have imagined it was in the dungeon in which she was confined. Her terrors increased, and her curiosity was excited to an almost insupportable degree, to know from whom the sounds proceeded. Were they ‘the solemn wailings of some restless spirit, or were they the cries of anguish emanating from the bosom of some poor suffering being, who, like herself, was held a prisoner in these awful dungeons? She was unable to come to apy satis- factory conclusion; and in a minute or two afterwards the sounds were re- peated, followed by some words which she could not, at first, catch. At last, however, placing her ear close to the wall, she plainly overheard thése expres- sions, uttered in accents of the most poignant agony,— “Holy Father! look down with pity upon me, and in mercy put an end to my sufferings;—this state of perpetual horror and anguish is worse than ten thousand deaths !”’ Our heroine was now convinced that it was some poor suffering fellow creatare, and she felt also certain that she was confined in the adjoining dun geon. Her voice, too, was perfectly familiar to her, but she tried in vain, to Tecollect where she had heard it before. Although this circumstance afforded her a melancholy satisfaction to think that she should have one near her to whom she could communicate her thoughts, and who would, doubtless, sympathise with her in the misery she seemed fated to endure; the idea that there was another being as wretched as herself, and the dreadfal state to which she seemed to be reduced, (for the voice was that of ‘a female,) ‘filled her bosom we sincere pein 3 and even amidst all her dig- te COMIC OOOKS. ECO @