Page:Horrid Mysteries Volume 3.djvu/198

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192
THE HORRID MYSTERIES.

nightingale. Former scenes of joy, and the heart-expanding retrospect of the past events of my life, now represented themselves to my mind, and absorpt me in sweet reveries. I enjoyed neither the essence nor the external of those events, but only the sentiments and notions which they produced and nurtured in my soul.

The Count either was infected by me; or a different cause had, perhaps, produced the same effect. He spoke less, and was more frequently absorpt in serious reflections. Formerly he had now and then, and always with success, trusted to hazard; but now he consulted carefully with himself before he attempted any thing, and the consequence constantly turned out unfavourable. It was very natural that he was not disposed to ascribe the cause of this phenomenon to himself, for he found it without difficulty in the capricious humour of fickle Fortune. He was sullen and gloomy whenever he could find an excuse for being so; and my altered looksalways