The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 163: what you’re looking at

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

CHAPTER XVI THE PRINCE’S DREAM _?Twas deep midnight, and his Royal Highness, the heir apparent to the British throne, lay sleeping in his voluptuous couch. Wax candles were burning upon the toilet table, a lamp stood near the bed, and a fire blazed cheerfully in the grate. Mellow was the lustre thus diffused through the gorgeously furnished apartment. The atmosphere was warm and per- fumed, and the heavy drapery of the windows suffered not the slightest breath of the chill air without to penetrate into this chamber where royalty slept. The prince was lying upon his back; his countenance was flushed, the veins on his forehead were swollen, and his slumber was uneasy. The lamplight played upon his agita- ted features; and as his lips were parted and his eyelids not quite closed, the gleaming of the clenched teeth and the appearance of a portion of the whites of his eyes gave him a ghastly aspect, as if, although the body were locked in repose, the soul within was awake and enduring the pangs of hell. Had any one stood by his couch to contemplate him then, the effect would have been hideous and appalling on the mind of the observer; but no eye witnessed his uneasy slumbers, — none save that of God, from whose vigilance no mortal can escape. The prince was dreaming. It appeared to him that a faint, gauzy mist rose slowly but steadily around his couch, until the entire apartment was filled with a vapour which gradu- ally became more and more dense until it assumed an opaqueness and produced a stifling sensation as if he were enveloped in a thick cloud. Then a wail stole through the midnight air upon his ears, —a wail low, plaintive, and 141 6)(0)©) (Gi @) mG