Cadavérico (Portuguese Edition)

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Now and then, the malady of some individual growing to a crisis, or taking a sudden turn of fury, we conveyed him to a secret cell, lest his disorder should infect the rest, and there kept him until we could dismiss him to his friends--for with the raging maniac we have nothing to do. He is usually removed to the public hospitals. The system had its disadvantages, and even its dangers. It is now, happily, exploded throughout all the Maisons de Sante of France.

Believe nothing you hear, and only onehalf that you see. Now about our Maisons de Sante, it is clear that some ignoramus has misled you. After dinner, however, when you have sufficiently recovered from the fatigue of your ride, I will be happy to take you over the house, and introduce to you a system which, in my opinion, and in that of every one who has witnessed its operation, is incomparably the most effectual as yet devised. To a sensitive mind there is always more or less of the shocking in such exhibitions; and I do not wish to spoil your appetite for dinner.

I can give you some veal a la Menehoult, with cauliflowers in veloute sauce--after that a glass of Clos de Vougeot—then your nerves will be sufficiently steadied. They were, apparently, people of rank-certainly of high breeding-although their habiliments, I thought, were extravagantly rich, partaking somewhat too much of the ostentatious finery of the vielle cour. I noticed that at least two-thirds of these guests were ladies; and some of the latter were by no means accoutred in what a Parisian would consider good taste at the present day. Many females, for example, whose age could not have been less than seventy were bedecked with a profusion of jewelry, such as rings, bracelets, and earrings, and wore their bosoms and arms shamefully bare.

I observed, too, that very few of the dresses were well made--or, at least, that very few of them fitted the wearers. In looking about, I discovered the interesting girl to whom Monsieur Maillard had presented me in the little parlor; but my surprise was great to see her wearing a hoop and farthingale, with high-heeled shoes, and a dirty cap of Brussels lace, so much too large for her that it gave her face a ridiculously diminutive expression.

When I had first seen her, she was attired, most becomingly, in deep mourning. Edgar Allan Poe 41 antiquated notions; and then, too, upon conversing with several members of the company, my apprehensions were immediately and fully dispelled. For example, the floor was uncarpeted; in France, however, a carpet is frequently dispensed with.

The windows, too, were without curtains; the shutters, being shut, were securely fastened with iron bars, applied diagonally, after the fashion of our ordinary shop-shutters. The apartment, I observed, formed, in itself, a wing of the chateau, and thus the windows were on three sides of the parallelogram, the door being at the other.

There were no less than ten windows in all. The table was superbly set out. It was loaded with plate, and more than loaded with delicacies. The profusion was absolutely barbaric. There were meats enough to have feasted the Anakim. Never, in all my life, had I witnessed so lavish, so wasteful an expenditure of the good things of life.

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There seemed very little taste, however, in the arrangements; and my eyes, accustomed to quiet lights, were sadly offended by the prodigious glare of a multitude of wax candles, which, in silver candelabra, were deposited upon the table, and all about the room, wherever it was possible to find a place. There were several active servants in attendance; and, upon a large table, at the farther end of the apartment, were seated seven or eight people with fiddles, fifes, trombones, and a drum.

These fellows annoyed me very much, at intervals, during the repast, by an infinite variety of noises, which were intended for music, and which appeared to afford much entertainment to all present, with the exception of myself. Upon the whole, I could not help thinking that there was much of the bizarre about every thing I saw--but then the world is made up of all kinds of persons, with all modes of thought, and all sorts of conventional customs.

I had travelled, too, so much, as to be quite an adept at the nil admirari; so I took my seat very coolly at the right hand of my host, and, having an excellent appetite, did justice to the good cheer set before me. The ladies, as usual, talked a great deal. I soon found that nearly all the company were well educated; and my host was a world of good-humored anecdote in himself.

He seemed quite willing to speak of his position as superintendent of a Maison de Sante; and, indeed, the topic of lunacy was, much to my surprise, a favorite one with all present. A great many amusing stories were told, having reference to the whims of the patients. There is scarcely an insane asylum in France which cannot supply a human teapot. Our gentleman was a Britannia--ware tea-pot, and was careful to polish himself every morning with buckskin and whiting. He was a troublesome patient; and we had much ado to keep him within bounds.

For a long time he would eat nothing but thistles; but of this idea we soon cured him by insisting upon his eating nothing else. I will thank you to behave yourself! You have spoiled my brocade! Is it necessary, pray, to illustrate a remark in so practical a style? Our friend here can surely comprehend you without all this. Upon my word, you are nearly as great a donkey as the poor unfortunate imagined himself.

Your acting is very natural, as I live. I had no intention of offending. Menhoult--you will find it particularly fine. I will change my plate, however, and try some of the rabbit. I will just help myself to some of the ham. I will have none of their rabbit au-chat--and, for the matter of that, none of their cat-au-rabbit either. I mean the man who took himself for a bottle of champagne, and always went off with a pop and a fizz, in this fashion. This behavior, I saw plainly, was not very pleasing to Monsieur Maillard; but that gentleman said nothing, and the conversation was resumed by a very lean little man in a big wig.

Sir, if that man was not a frog, I can only observe that it is a pity he was not. He persecuted the cook to make him up into pies--a thing which the cook indignantly refused to do. For my part, I am by no means sure that a pumpkin pie a la Desoulieres would not have been very capital eating indeed! You must not be astonished, mon ami; our friend here is a wit--a drole--you must not understand him to the letter.

He grew deranged through love, and fancied himself possessed of two heads. It is not impossible that he was wrong; but he would have convinced you of his being in the right; for he was a man of great eloquence. He had an absolute passion for oratory, and could not refrain from display. I call him the tee-totum because, in fact, he was seized with the droll but not altogether irrational crotchet, that he had been converted into a tee-totum. You would have roared with laughter to see him spin.

Auto de exame cadavérico

He would turn round upon one heel by the hour, in this manner--soHere the friend whom he had just interrupted by a whisper, performed an exactly similar office for himself. The thing is absurd. Madame Joyeuse was a more sensible person, as you know. She had a crotchet, but it was instinct with common sense, and gave pleasure to all who had the honor of her acquaintance. She found, upon mature deliberation, that, by some accident, she had been turned into a chicken-cock; but, as such, she behaved with propriety.

She hung down her head, and said not a syllable in reply. But another and younger lady resumed the theme. It was my beautiful girl of the little parlor. She was a very beautiful and painfully modest young lady, who thought the ordinary mode of habiliment indecent, and wished to dress herself, always, by getting outside instead of inside of her clothes. It is a thing very easily done, after all.

My nerves were very much affected, indeed, by these yells; but the rest of the company I really pitied. I never saw any set of reasonable people so thoroughly frightened in my life. They all grew as pale as so many corpses, and, shrinking within their seats, sat quivering and gibbering with terror, and listening for a repetition of the sound. It came again--louder and seemingly nearer--and then a third time very loud, and then a fourth time with a vigor evidently diminished. I now ventured to inquire the cause of the disturbance.

The lunatics, every now and then, get up a howl in concert; one starting another, as is sometimes the case with a bevy of dogs at night. It occasionally happens, however, that the concerto yells are succeeded by a simultaneous effort at breaking loose, when, of course, some little danger is to be apprehended. I have always understood that the majority of lunatics were of the gentler sex. Some time ago, there were about twentyseven patients here; and, of that number, no less than eighteen were women; but, lately, matters have changed very much, as you see. Whereupon the whole company maintained a dead silence for nearly a minute.

As for one lady, she obeyed Monsieur Maillard to the letter, and thrusting out her tongue, which was an excessively long one, held it very resignedly, with both hands, until the end of the entertainment. This lady, my particular old friend Madame Joyeuse, is as absolutely sane as myself. She has her little eccentricities, to be sure--but then, you know, all old women--all very old women--are more or less eccentric! They behave a little odd, eh?

By the bye, Monsieur, did I understand you to say that the system you have adopted, in place of the celebrated soothing system, was one of very rigorous severity? Our confinement is necessarily close; but the treatment--the medical treatment, I mean--is rather agreeable to the patients than otherwise. Some portions of it are referable to Professor Tarr, of whom you have, necessarily, heard; and, again, there are modifications in my plan which I am happy to acknowledge as belonging of right to the celebrated Fether, with whom, if I mistake not, you have the honor of an intimate acquaintance.

You did not intend to say, eh? Nevertheless, I feel humbled to the dust, not to be acquainted with the works of these, no doubt, extraordinary men. I will seek out their writings forthwith, and peruse them with deliberate care. Monsieur Maillard, you have really--I must confess it--you have really--made me ashamed of myself! The company followed our example without stint.

They chatted-they jested--they laughed--they perpetrated a thousand absurdities--the fiddles shrieked--the drum row-de-dowed--the trombones bellowed like so many brazen bulls of Phalaris--and the whole scene, growing gradually worse and worse, as the wines gained the ascendancy, became at length a sort of Brazilian Portuguese agreeable: In the meantime, Monsieur Maillard and myself, with some bottles of Sauterne and Vougeot between us, continued our conversation at the top of the voice.

A word spoken in an ordinary key stood no more chance of being heard than the voice of a fish from the bottom of Niagra Falls. There is no accounting for the caprices of madmen; and, in my opinion as well as in that of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether, it is never safe to permit them to run at large unattended.

His cunning, too, is proverbial and great. If he has a project in view, he conceals his design with a marvellous wisdom; and the dexterity with which he counterfeits sanity, presents, to the metaphysician, one of the most singular problems in the study of mind. When a madman appears thoroughly sane, indeed, it is high time to put him in a straitjacket. They behaved remarkably well-especially so, any one of sense might have known that some devilish scheme was brewing from that particular fact, that the fellows behaved so remarkably well.

And, sure enough, one fine morning the keepers found themselves pinioned hand and foot, and thrown into the cells, where they were attended, as if they were the lunatics, by the lunatics themselves, who had usurped the offices of the keepers.

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I never heard of any thing so absurd in my life! He wished to give his invention a trial, I suppose, and so he persuaded the rest of the patients to join him in a conspiracy for the overthrow of the reigning powers. The keepers and kept were soon made to exchange places. Not that exactly either--for the madmen had been free, but the keepers were shut up in cells forthwith, and treated, I am sorry to say, in a very cavalier manner.

This condition of things could not have long existed. The country people in the neighborhoodvisitors coming to see the establishment--would have given the alarm. The head rebel was too cunning for that. He admitted no visitors at all--with the exception, one day, of a very stupid-looking young gentleman of whom he had no reason to be afraid. He let him in to see the place-just by way of variety,--to have a little fun with him.

As soon as he had gammoned him sufficiently, he let him out, and sent him about his business. In the meantime, the lunatics had a jolly season of it--that you may swear. They doffed their own shabby clothes, and made free with the family wardrobe and jewels. The cellars of the chateau were well stocked with wine; and these madmen are just the devils that know how to drink it. They lived well, I can tell you. This time, however, they seemed to proceed from persons rapidly approaching.

He had scarcely finished the sentence, before loud shouts and imprecations were heard beneath the windows; and, immediately afterward, it became evident that some persons outside were endeavoring to gain entrance into the room. The door was beaten with what appeared to be a sledge-hammer, and the shutters were wrenched and shaken with prodigious violence. Monsieur Maillard, to my excessive astonishment threw himself under the side-board. I had expected more resolution at his hands. Meantime, upon the main dining-table, among the bottles and glasses, leaped the gentleman who, with such difficulty, had been restrained from leaping there before.

As soon as he fairly settled himself, he commenced an oration, which, no doubt, was a very capital one, if it could only have been heard. At the same moment, the man with the teetotum predilection, set himself to spinning around the apartment, with immense energy, and with arms outstretched at right angles with his body; so that he had all the air of a tee-totum in fact, and knocked everybody down that happened to get in his way. And now, too, hearing an incredible popping and fizzing of champagne, I discovered at length, that it proceeded from the person who performed the bottle of that delicate drink Brazilian Portuguese accord: Edgar Allan Poe 53 during dinner.

And then, again, the frog-man croaked away as if the salvation of his soul depended upon every note that he uttered. And, in the midst of all this, the continuous braying of a donkey arose over all. As for my old friend, Madame Joyeuse, I really could have wept for the poor lady, she appeared so terribly perplexed. As no resistance, beyond whooping and yelling and cock-a-doodling, was offered to the encroachments of the party without, the ten windows were very speedily, and almost simultaneously, broken in. But I shall never forget the emotions of wonder and horror with which I gazed, when, leaping through these windows, and down among us pele-mele, fighting, stamping, scratching, and howling, there rushed a perfect army of what I took to be Chimpanzees, Ourang-Outangs, or big black baboons of the Cape of Good Hope.

After lying there some fifteen minutes, during which time I listened with all my ears to what was going on in the room, I came to same satisfactory denouement of this tragedy. Monsieur Maillard, it appeared, in giving me the account of the lunatic who had excited his fellows to rebellion, had been merely relating his own exploits.

This gentleman had, indeed, some two or three years before, been the superintendent of the establishment, but grew crazy himself, and so became a patient. This fact was unknown to the travelling companion who introduced me. The keepers, ten in number, having been suddenly overpowered, were first well tarred, then--carefully feathered, and then shut up in underground cells. The latter was pumped on them daily. At length, one escaping through a sewer, gave freedom to all the rest. My name is the Signora Psyche Zenobia.

This I know to be a fact. Nobody but my enemies ever calls me Suky Snobbs. Miss Tabitha Turnip propagated that report through sheer envy. Oh the little wretch! But what can we expect from a turnip? I have been assured that Snobbs is a mere corruption of Zenobia, and that Zenobia was a queen-- So am I. Nobody but Tabitha Turnip calls me Suky Snobbs. I am the Signora Psyche Zenobia. Moneypenny made the title for us, and says he chose it because it sounded big like an empty rumpuncheon. We all sign the initials of the society after our names, in the fashion of the R.

Moneypenny says that S. Moneypenny is such a queer man that I am never sure when he is telling me the truth. At any rate we always add to our names the initials P. Notwithstanding the good offices of the Doctor, and the strenuous exertions of the association to get itself into notice, it met with no very great success until I joined it. The truth is, the members indulged in too flippant a tone of discussion. The papers read every Saturday evening were characterized less by depth than buffoonery.

They were all whipped syllabub. There was no investigation of first causes, first principles. There was no investigation of any thing at all. It was all low--very! No profundity, no reading, no metaphysics--nothing which the learned call spirituality, and which the Brazilian Portuguese causes: We get up as good papers now in the P. I say, Blackwood, because I have been assured that the finest writing, upon every subject, is to be discovered in the pages of that justly celebrated Magazine. We now take it for our model upon all themes, and are getting into rapid notice accordingly.

Everybody knows how they are managed, since Dr. Moneypenny calls the bizarreries whatever that may mean and what everybody else calls the intensities. This is a species of writing which I have long known how to appreciate, although it is only since my late visit to Mr. Blackwood deputed by the society that I have been made aware of the exact method of composition. This method is very simple, but not so much so as the politics. Upon my calling at Mr. The matter stands thus: In the Brazilian Portuguese accordingly: And, mark me, Miss Psyche Zenobia!

Herein, madam, lies the secret, the soul, of intensity. I assume upon myself to say, that no individual, of however great genius ever wrote with a good pen--understand me,--a good article. You may take, it for granted, that when manuscript can be read it is never worth reading. This is a leading principle in our faith, to which if you cannot readily assent, our conference is at an end.

But, of course, as I had no wish to put an end to the conference, I assented to a proposition so very obvious, and one, too, of whose truth I had all along been sufficiently aware. He seemed pleased, and went on with his instructions. You would have sworn that the writer had been born and brought up in a coffin.

That was a nice bit of flummery, and went down the throats of the people delightfully. They would have it that Coleridge wrote the paper--but not so. Blackwood, who assured me of it. Edgar Allan Poe 59 paper by-the-by, Miss Zenobia, which I cannot sufficiently recommend to your attention. It is the history of a young person who goes to sleep under the clapper of a church bell, and is awakened by its tolling for a funeral. The sound drives him mad, and, accordingly, pulling out his tablets, he gives a record of his sensations.

Sensations are the great things after all. Should you ever be drowned or hung, be sure and make a note of your sensations--they will be worth to you ten guineas a sheet. If you wish to write forcibly, Miss Zenobia, pay minute attention to the sensations. But I must put you au fait to the details necessary in composing what may be denominated a genuine Blackwood article of the sensation stamp--the kind which you will understand me to say I consider the best for all purposes.

The oven, for instance,--that was a good hit. But if you have no oven or big bell, at hand, and if you cannot conveniently tumble out of a balloon, or be swallowed up in an earthquake, or get stuck fast in a chimney, you will have to be contented with simply imagining some similar misadventure.

I should prefer, however, that you have the actual fact to bear you out.

Fenomenologia cadavérica

Nothing so well assists the fancy, as an experimental knowledge of the matter in hand. Perhaps you might do better. However, my instructions will apply equally well to any variety of misadventure, and in your way home you may easily get knocked in the head, or run over by an omnibus, or bitten by a mad dog, or drowned in a gutter. There is the tone didactic, the tone enthusiastic, the tone natural--all common--place enough. But then there is the tone laconic, or curt, which has lately come much into use. It consists in short sentences. Always a full stop.

And never a paragraph. Some of our best novelists patronize this tone. The words must be all in a whirl, like a humming-top, and make a noise very similar, which answers remarkably well instead of meaning. This is the best of all possible styles where the writer is in too great a hurry to think. If you know any big words this is your chance for them. Say something about objectivity and subjectivity.

Be sure and abuse a man named Locke. In the former the merit consists in seeing into the nature of affairs a very great deal farther than anybody else. This second sight is very efficient when properly managed. Eschew, in this case, big words; get them as small as possible, and write them upside down. Above all, study innuendo. Edgar Allan Poe 61 butter. He kissed me and continued: The most important portion--in fact, the soul of the whole business, is yet to be attended to--I allude to the filling up.

It is not to be supposed that a lady, or gentleman either, has been leading the life of a book worm. And yet above all things it is necessary that your article have an air of erudition, or at least afford evidence of extensive general reading. You might as well note down a few while I read them to you. I shall make two divisions: You see it is not generally known, and looks recherche. You must be careful and give the thing with a downright improviso air.

Turn it about a little, and it will do wonders. The natives suspend it by a cord from the ceiling, and enjoy its fragrance for years. That will do for the similes. Now for the Piquant Expressions. By introducing these few words with dexterity you will evince your intimate acquaintance with the language and literature of the Chinese. With the aid of this you may either get along without either Arabic, or Sanscrit, or Chickasaw. I must look you out a little specimen of each. Any scrap will answer, because you must depend upon your own ingenuity to make it fit into your article.

Alludes to the frequent repetition of the phrase, la tendre Zaire, in the French tragedy of that name. Properly introduced, will show not only your knowledge of the language, but your general reading and wit. You can say, for instance, that the chicken you were eating write an article about being choked to death by a chicken-bone was not altogether aussi tendre que Zaire. Edgar Allan Poe 63 appearance should unfortunately bring me back again to life.

It means that a great hero, in the heat of combat, not perceiving that he had been fairly killed, continued to fight valiantly, dead as he was. The application of this to your own case is obvious--for I trust, Miss Psyche, that you will not neglect to kick for at least an hour and a half after you have been choked to death by that chicken-bone.

He has committed an ignoratio elenchi--that is to say, he has understood the words of your proposition, but not the idea. The man was a fool, you see. Throw the ignoratio elenchi in his teeth, and, at once, you have him annihilated. If he dares to reply, you can tell him from Lucan here it is that speeches are mere anemonae verborum, anemone words. The anemone, with great brilliancy, has no smell. This will be sure and cut him to the heart. He can do nothing but roll over and die. Will you be kind enough to write? The very letters have an air of profundity about them.

Only observe, madam, the astute look of that Epsilon! That Phi ought certainly to be a bishop! Was ever there a smarter fellow than that Omicron? Just twig that Tau! In short, there is nothing like Greek for a genuine sensation-paper.

In the present case your application is the most obvious thing in the world. I was, at length, able to write a genuine Blackwood article, and determined to do it forthwith. In taking leave of me, Mr. Notwithstanding this niggardly spirit, however, the gentleman showed his consideration for me in all other respects, and indeed treated me with the greatest civility. His parting words made a deep impression upon my heart, and I hope I shall always remember them with gratitude. It is just possible that you may not be able, so soon as convenient, to-to--get yourself drowned, or--choked with a chicken-bone, or--or hung,--or-bitten by a--but stay!

Blackwood, to get into some immediate difficulty, pursuant to his advice, and with this view I spent the greater part of the day in wandering about Edinburgh, seeking for desperate adventures--adventures adequate to the intensity of my feelings, and adapted to the vast character of the article I intended to write. In this excursion I was attended by one negro--servant, Pompey, and my little lap-dog Diana, whom I had brought with me from Philadelphia. It was not, however, until late in the afternoon that I fully succeeded in my arduous undertaking.

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An important event then happened of which the following Blackwood article, in the tone heterogeneous, is the substance and result. The confusion and bustle in the streets were terrible. Could it then be possible? Alas, thought I, my dancing days are over! Thus it is ever. What a host of gloomy recollections will ever and anon be awakened in the mind of genius and imaginative contemplation, especially of a genius doomed to the everlasting and eternal, and continual, and, as one might say, the--continued--yes, the continued and continuous, bitter, harassing, disturbing, and, if I may be allowed the expression, the very disturbing influence of the serene, and godlike, and heavenly, and exalted, and elevated, and purifying effect of what may be rightly termed the most enviable, the most truly enviable--nay!

In such a mind, I repeat, what a host of Brazilian Portuguese anon: Edgar Allan Poe 67 recollections are stirred up by a trifle! They capered--I sobbed aloud. She had a quantity of hair over her one eye, and a blue ribband tied fashionably around her neck. Diana was not more than five inches in height, but her head was somewhat bigger than her body, and her tail being cut off exceedingly close, gave an air of injured innocence to the interesting animal which rendered her a favorite with all.

And Pompey, my negro! He was three feet in height I like to be particular and about seventy, or perhaps eighty, years of age. He had bow-legs and was corpulent. His mouth should not be called small, nor his ears short. His teeth, however, were like pearl, and his large full eyes were deliciously white. Nature had endowed him with no neck, and had placed his ankles as usual with that race in the middle of the upper portion of the feet.

He was clad with a striking simplicity. His sole garments were a stock of nine inches in height, and a nearly-new drab overcoat which had formerly been in the service of the tall, stately, and illustrious Dr. It was a good overcoat. It was well cut. It was well made. The coat was nearly new.

Pompey held it up out of the dirt with both hands. There were three persons in our party, and two of them have already been the subject of remark. There was a third--that person was myself. I am not Suky Snobbs. My appearance is commanding. On the memorable occasion of which I speak I was habited in a crimson satin dress, with a sky-blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress had trimmings of green agraffas, and seven graceful flounces of the orange-colored auricula. I thus formed the third of the party.

There was the poodle. There Brazilian Portuguese admirable: On a sudden, there presented itself to view a church--a Gothic cathedral--vast, venerable, and with a tall steeple, which towered into the sky. What madness now possessed me? Why did I rush upon my fate? I was seized with an uncontrollable desire to ascend the giddy pinnacle, and then survey the immense extent of the city. The door of the cathedral stood invitingly open. I entered the ominous archway.

Where then was my guardian angel? I entered the ominous archway! I entered; and, without injury to my orange-colored auriculas, I passed beneath the portal, and emerged within the vestibule. Thus it is said the immense river Alfred passed, unscathed, and unwetted, beneath the sea. I thought the staircase would never have an end.

Yes, they went round and up, and round and up and round and up, until I could not help surmising, with the sagacious Pompey, upon whose supporting arm I leaned in all the confidence of early affection--I could not help surmising that the upper end of the continuous spiral ladder had been accidentally, or perhaps designedly, removed. I paused for breath; and, in the meantime, an accident occurred of too momentous a nature in a moral, and also in a metaphysical point of view, to be passed over without notice.

It appeared to me--indeed I was quite confident of the fact--I could not be mistaken--no! I had, for some moments, carefully and anxiously observed the motions of my Diana--I say that I could not be mistaken--Diana smelt a rat! There was then no longer any reasonable room for doubt. The rat had been smelled--and by Diana.