Page:The Necromancer, or, The Tale of the Black Forest Vol. 2.djvu/145

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NECROMANCER.
139

"Then I bade the inhuman mother assume a melancholy aspect, to treat her daughter with more kindness than ever, to mingle her tears with those of her child, to inveigh now and then against the caprice of the deceased, to inflame the girl, by degrees, with a desire of knowing the reason her father might have had to forbid, on his death-bed, her union with a man he had always seemed to be fond of; and, after these preparations, to mention, as if by accident, my name, and my skill in necromancy, yet to take care, not to betray her design of having conjured up her deceased husband."

"The cruel unnatural mother executed my orders with all possible dexterity and art, wept with her afflicted disconsolate child, and, by these means, beguiled the unsuspecting heart of her unhappy daughter. The poor victim of a mother's infernal cruelty listened eagerly to the deceitful speeches of her artful parent, and her curiosity was soon raised to sohigh