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The well and the pendulum
Impia
tortorum
longos
hic
turba
furores
Sanguinis
innocui
,
non
satiata
,
aluit
.
Sospite
nunc
patria
,
fracto
nunc
funeris
antro
,
Mors
ubi
dira
fuit
vita
salusque
patent
.
(
Quatrain
composed
for
the
gates
of
a
market
to
be
erected
upon
the
site
of
the
Jacobin
Club
House
at
Paris
.
)
I
was
sick
--
sick
unto
death
with
that
long
agony
;
and
when
they
at
length
unbound
me
,
and
I
was
permitted
to
sit
,
I
felt
that
my
senses
were
leaving
me
.
The
sentence
--
the
dread
sentence
of
death
--
was
the
last
of
distinct
accentuation
which
reached
my
ears
.
After
that
,
the
sound
of
the
inquisitorial
voices
seemed
merged
in
one
dreamy
indeterminate
hum
.
It
conveyed
to
my
soul
the
idea
of
revolution
--
perhaps
from
its
association
in
fancy
with
the
burr
of
a
mill
wheel
.
This
only
for
a
brief
period
;
for
presently
I
heard
no
more
.
Yet
,
for
a
while
,
I
saw
;
but
with
how
terrible
an
exaggeration
!
I
saw
the
lips
of
the
black-robed
judges
.
They
appeared
to
me
white
--
whiter
than
the
sheet
upon
which
I
trace
these
words
--
and
thin
even
to
grotesqueness
;
thin
with
the
intensity
of
their
expression
of
firmness
--
of
immoveable
resolution
--
of
stern
contempt
of
human
torture
.
I
saw
that
the
decrees
of
what
to
me
was
Fate
,
were
still
issuing
from
those
lips
.
I
saw
them
writhe
with
a
deadly
locution
.
I
saw
them
fashion
the
syllables
of
my
name
;
and
I
shuddered
because
no
sound
succeeded
.
I
saw
,
too
,
for
a
few
moments
of
delirious
horror
,
the
soft
and
nearly
imperceptible
waving
of
the
sable
draperies
which
enwrapped
the
walls
of
the
apartment
.
And
then
my
vision
fell
upon
the
seven
tall
candles
upon
the
table
.
At
first
they
wore
the
aspect
of
charity
,
and
seemed
white
and
slender
angels
who
would
save
me
;
but
then
,
all
at
once
,
there
came
a
most
deadly
nausea
over
my
spirit
,
and
I
felt
every
fibre
in
my
frame
thrill
as
if
I
had
touched
the
wire
of
a
galvanic
battery
,
while
the
angel
forms
became
meaningless
spectres
,
with
heads
of
flame
,
and
I
saw
that
from
them
there
would
be
no
help
.
And
then
there
stole
into
my
fancy
,
like
a
rich
musical
note
,
the
thought
of
what
sweet
rest
there
must
be
in
the
grave
.
The
thought
came
gently
and
stealthily
,
and
it
seemed
long
before
it
attained
full
appreciation
;
but
just
as
my
spirit
came
at
length
properly
to
feel
and
entertain
it
,
the
figures
of
the
judges
vanished
,
as
if
magically
,
from
before
me
;
the
tall
candles
sank
into
nothingness
;
their
flames
went
out
utterly
;
the
blackness
of
darkness
supervened
;
all
sensations
appeared
swallowed
up
in
a
mad
rushing
descent
as
of
the
soul
into
Hades
.
Then
silence
,
and
stillness
,
night
were
the
universe
.
I
had
swooned
;
but
still
will
not
say
that
all
of
consciousness
was
lost
.
What
of
it
there
remained
I
will
not
attempt
to
define
,
or
even
to
describe
;
yet
all
was
not
lost
.
In
the
deepest
slumber
--
no
!
In
delirium
--
no
!
In
a
swoon
--
no
!
In
death
--
no
!
even
in
the
grave
all
is
not
lost
.
Else
there
is
no
immortality
for
man
.
Arousing
from
the
most
profound
of
slumbers
,
we
break
the
gossamer
web
of
some
dream
.
Yet
in
a
second
afterward
,
(
so
frail
may
that
web
have
been
)
we
remember
not
that
we
have
dreamed
.
In
the
return
to
life
from
the
swoon
there
are
two
stages
;
first
,
that
of
the
sense
of
mental
or
spiritual
;
secondly
,
that
of
the
sense
of
physical
,
existence
.
It
seems
probable
that
if
,
upon
reaching
the
second
stage
,
we
could
recall
the
impressions
of
the
first
,
we
should
find
these
impressions
eloquent
in
memories
of
the
gulf
beyond
.
And
that
gulf
is
--
what
?
How
at
least
shall
we
distinguish
its
shadows
from
those
of
the
tomb
?
But
if
the
impressions
of
what
I
have
termed
the
first
stage
,
are
not
,
at
will
,
recalled
,
yet
,
after
long
interval
,
do
they
not
come
unbidden
,
while
we
marvel
whence
they
come
?
He
who
has
never
swooned
,
is
not
he
who
finds
strange
palaces
and
wildly
familiar
faces
in
coals
that
glow
;
is
not
he
who
beholds
floating
in
mid-air
the
sad
visions
that
the
many
may
not
view
;
is
not
he
who
ponders
over
the
perfume
of
some
novel
flower
--
is
not
he
whose
brain
grows
bewildered
with
the
meaning
of
some
musical
cadence
which
has
never
before
arrested
his
attention
.
Amid
frequent
and
thoughtful
endeavors
to
remember
;
amid
earnest
struggles
to
regather
some
token
of
the
state
of
seeming
nothingness
into
which
my
soul
had
lapsed
,
there
have
been
moments
when
I
have
dreamed
of
success
;
there
have
been
brief
,
very
brief
periods
when
I
have
conjured
up
remembrances
which
the
lucid
reason
of
a
later
epoch
assures
me
could
have
had
reference
only
to
that
condition
of
seeming
unconsciousness
.
These
shadows
of
memory
tell
,
indistinctly
,
of
tall
figures
that
lifted
and
bore
me
in
silence
down
--
down
--
still
down
--
till
a
hideous
dizziness
oppressed
me
at
the
mere
idea
of
the
interminableness
of
the
descent
.
They
tell
also
of
a
vague
horror
at
my
heart
,
on
account
of
that
heart
's
unnatural
stillness
.
Then
comes
a
sense
of
sudden
motionlessness
throughout
all
things
;
as
if
those
who
bore
me
(
a
ghastly
train
!
)
had
outrun
,
in
their
descent
,
the
limits
of
the
limitless
,
and
paused
from
the
wearisomeness
of
their
toil
.
After
this
I
call
to
mind
flatness
and
dampness
;
and
then
all
is
madness
--
the
madness
of
a
memory
which
busies
itself
among
forbidden
things
.
