The Mysteries of Udolpho

The midnight clock has toll'd; and hark, the bell

Of Death beats slow! heard ye the note profound?

It pauses now; and now, with rising knell,

Flings to the hollow gale its sullen sound.

MASON

When Montoni was informed of the death of his wife, and considered

that she had died without giving him the signature so necessary to

the accomplishment of his wishes, no sense of decency restrained the

expression of his resentment. Emily anxiously avoided his presence, and

watched, during two days and two nights, with little intermission, by

the corpse of her late aunt.

Her mind deeply impressed with the unhappy

fate of this object, she forgot all her faults, her unjust and imperious

conduct to herself; and, remembering only her sufferings, thought of

her only with tender compassion. Sometimes, however, she could not avoid

musing upon the strange infatuation that had proved so fatal to her

aunt, and had involved herself in a labyrinth of misfortune, from which

she saw no means of escaping,--the marriage with Montoni. But, when

she considered this circumstance, it was 'more in sorrow than in

anger,'--more for the purpose of indulging lamentation, than reproach.

In her pious cares she was not disturbed by Montoni, who not only

avoided the chamber, where the remains of his wife were laid, but that

part of the castle adjoining to it, as if he had apprehended a contagion

in death. He seemed to have given no orders respecting the funeral,

and Emily began to fear he meant to offer a new insult to the memory of

Madame Montoni; but from this apprehension she was relieved, when, on

the evening of the second day, Annette informed her, that the interment

was to take place that night.

She knew, that Montoni would not attend;

and it was so very grievous to her to think that the remains of her

unfortunate aunt would pass to the grave without one relative, or friend

to pay them the last decent rites, that she determined to be deterred

by no considerations for herself, from observing this duty. She would

otherwise have shrunk from the circumstance of following them to the

cold vault, to which they were to be carried by men, whose air and

countenances seemed to stamp them for murderers, at the midnight hour

of silence and privacy, which Montoni had chosen for committing, if

possible, to oblivion the reliques of a woman, whom his harsh conduct

had, at least, contributed to destroy.

Emily, shuddering with emotions of horror and grief, assisted by

Annette, prepared the corpse for interment; and, having wrapt it in

cerements, and covered it with a winding-sheet, they watched beside it,

till past midnight, when they heard the approaching footsteps of the

men, who were to lay it in its earthy bed. It was with difficulty, that

Emily overcame her emotion, when, the door of the chamber being thrown

open, their gloomy countenances were seen by the glare of the torch they

carried, and two of them, without speaking, lifted the body on their

shoulders, while the third preceding them with the light, descended

through the castle towards the grave, which was in the lower vault of

the chapel within the castle walls.