University of Virginia Library

12. CHAPTER XII.
THE VOICE IN THE WILDERNESS.

Clayton was quietly sitting in his law-office, looking over
and arranging some papers necessary to closing his business.
A colored boy brought in letters from the mail. He
looked them over rapidly; and, selecting one, read it with
great agitation and impatience. Immediately he started,
with the open letter crushed in his hand, seized his hat,
and rushed to the nearest livery-stable.

“Give me the fastest horse you have — one that can
travel night and day!” he said. “I must ride for life or
death!”

And half an hour more saw Clayton in full speed on the
road. By the slow, uncertain, and ill-managed mail-route,
it would have taken three days to reach Canema. Clayton
hoped, by straining every nerve, to reach there in twenty-four
hours. He pushed forward, keeping the animal at the
top of his speed; and, at the first stage-stand, changed him
for a fresh one. And thus proceeding along, he found himself,
at three o'clock of the next morning, in the woods
about fifteen miles from Canema. The strong tension of the
nervous system, which had upheld him insensible to fatigue
until this point, was beginning slightly to subside. All
night he had ridden through the loneliness of pine-forests,
with no eye looking down on him save the twinkling, mysterious
stars. At the last place where he had sought to
obtain horses, everything had been horror and confusion.
Three were lying dead in the house, and another was dying.
All along upon the route, at every stopping-place, the air

had seemed to be filled with flying rumors and exaggerated
reports of fear and death. As soon as he began to perceive
that he was approaching the plantation, he became sensible
of that shuddering dread which all of us may remember to
have had, in slight degrees, in returning home after a long
absence, under a vague expectation of misfortune, to which
the mind can set no definite limits. When it was yet
scarcely light enough to see, he passed by the cottage of
Old Tiff. A strange impulse prompted him to stop and
make some inquiries there, before he pushed on to the
plantation. But, as he rode up, he saw the gate standing
ajar, the door of the house left open; and, after repeated
callings, receiving no answer, he alighted, and, leading his
horse behind him, looked into the door. The gloaming starlight
was just sufficient to show him that all was desolate.
Somehow this seemed to him like an evil omen. As he was
mounting his horse, preparing to ride away, a grand and
powerful voice rose from the obscurity of the woods before
him, singing, in a majestic, minor-keyed tune, these words:

Wearied with his night ride, his nervous system strained
to the last point of tension by the fearful images which
filled his mind, it is not surprising that these sounds should
have thrilled through the hearer with even a superstitious
power. And Clayton felt a singular excitement, as, under
the dim arcade of the pine-trees, he saw a dark figure approaching.
He seemed to be marching with a regular tread,
keeping time to the mournful music which he sung.

“Who are you?” called Clayton, making an effort to
recall his manhood.

“I?” replied the figure, “I am the voice of one crying
in the wilderness! I am a sign unto this people of the
judgment of the Lord!”

Our readers must remember the strange dimness of the
hour, the wildness of the place and circumstances, and the
singular quality of the tone in which the figure spoke.
Clayton hesitated a moment, and the speaker went on:

“I saw the Lord coming with ten thousand of his saints!
Before him went the pestilence, and burning coals went
forth at his feet! Thy bow is made quite naked, O God,
according to the oaths of the tribes! I saw the tents of
Cushan in affliction, and the curtains of the land of Midian
did tremble!”

Pondering in his mind what this wild style of address
might mean, Clayton rode slowly onward. And the man,
for such he appeared to be, came out of the shadows of the
wood and stood directly in his path, raising his hand with a
commanding gesture.

“I know whom you seek,” he said; “but it shall not
be given you; for the star, which is called wormwood, hath
fallen, and the time of the dead is come, that they shall
be judged! Behold, there sitteth on the white cloud one
like the Son of Man, having on his head a golden crown,
and in his hand a sharp sickle!”

Then, waving his hand above his head, with a gesture of
wild excitement, he shouted:

“Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of
the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe! Behold,
the wine-press shall be trodden without the city, and there
shall be blood even to the horses' bridles! Woe, woe,
woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the
trumpets of the other angels, which are yet to sound!”

The fearful words pealed through the dim aisles of the
forest like the curse of some destroying angel. After a
pause, the speaker resumed, in a lower and more plaintive
tone:

“Weep ye not for the dead! neither bewail her! Behold,
the Lamb standeth on Mount Zion, and with him a
hundred and forty and four thousand, having his Father's
name written on their foreheads. These are they which

follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth; and in their mouth
is found no guile, for they are without fault before the
throne of God. Behold the angel having the seal of God is
gone forth, and she shall be sealed in her forehead unto the
Lamb.”

The figure turned away slowly, singing, as he made his
way through the forest, in the same weird and funereal
accents; but this time the song was a wild, plaintive
sound, like the tolling of a heavy bell:

Clayton, as he slowly wound his way along the unfrequented
path, felt a dim, brooding sense of mystery and terror
creeping over him. The tones of the voice, and the
wild style of the speaker, recalled the strange incident of
the camp-meeting; and, though he endeavored strenuously
to reason with himself that probably some wild and excited
fanatic, made still more frantic by the presence of death and
destruction all around, was the author of these fearful denunciations,
still he could not help a certain weight of fearful
foreboding.

This life may be truly called a haunted house, built as it
is on the very confines of the land of darkness and the
shadow of death. A thousand living fibres connect us with
the unknown and unseen state; and the strongest hearts,
which never stand still for any mortal terror, have sometimes
hushed their very beating at a breath of a whisper
from within the veil. Perhaps the most resolute unbeliever
in spiritual things has hours of which he would be ashamed
to tell, when he, too, yields to the powers of those awful
affinities which bind us to that unknown realm.

It is not surprising that Clayton, in spite of himself,

should have felt like one mysteriously warned. It was a
relief to him when the dusky dimness of the solemn dawn
was pierced by long shafts of light from the rising sun, and
the day broke gladsome and jubilant, as if sorrow, sighing,
and death, were a dream of the night. During the whole
prevalence of this fearful curse, it was strange to witness
the unaltered regularity, splendor, and beauty, with which
the movements of the natural world went on. Amid fears,
and dying groans, and wailings, and sobs, and broken
hearts, the sun rose and set in splendor, the dews twinkled,
and twilight folded her purple veil heavy with stars; birds
sung, waters danced and warbled, flowers bloomed, and
everything in nature was abundant, and festive, and joyous.

When Clayton entered the boundaries of the plantation,
he inquired eagerly of the first person he met for the health
of its mistress.

“Thank God, she is yet alive!” said he. “It was but
a dream, after all!”