 | The fiend's delight |  |
L. S.
Early one evening in the autumn of '64, a pale
girl stood singing Methodist hymns at the summit
of Bush Street hill. She was attired, Spanish
fashion, in a loose overcoat and slippers. Suddenly
she broke off her song, a dark-browed young soldier
from the Presidio cautiously approached, and seizing
retreating with it to an auction-house on Pacific
Street, where it may still be seen by the benighted
traveller, just a-going for two-and-half—and never
gone!
The poor maiden after this misfortune felt a
bitter resentment swelling in her heart, and scorning
to remain among her kind in that costume,
took her way to the Cliff House, where she arrived,
worn and weary, about breakfast-time.
The landlord received her kindly, and offered her
a pair of his best trousers; but she was of noble
blood, and having been reared in luxury, respectfully
declined to receive charity from a low-born stranger.
All efforts to induce her to eat were equally unavailing.
She would stand for hours on the rocks where
the road descends to the beach, and gaze at the
playful seals in the surf below, who seemed rather
flattered by her attention, and would swim about,
singing their sweetest songs to her alone. Passersby
were equally curious as to her, but a broken
lyre gives forth no music, and her heart responded
not with any more long metre hymns.
After a few weeks of this solitary life she was
suddenly missed. At the same time a strange seal
was noted among the rest. She was remarkable
for being always clad in an overcoat, which she had
doubtless fished up from the wreck of the French
years afterward.
One tempestuous night, an old hag who had long
done business as a hermitess on Helmet Rock came
into the bar-room at the Cliff House, and there,
amidst the crushing thunders and lightnings spilling
all over the horizon, she related that she had
seen a young seal in a comfortable overcoat, sitting
pensively upon the pinnacle of Seal Rock, and had
distinctly heard the familiar words of a Methodist
hymn. Upon inquiry the tale was discovered to be
founded upon fact. The identity of this seal could
no longer be denied without downright blasphemy,
and in all the old chronicles of that period not a
doubt is even implied.
One day a handsome, dark, young lieutenant of
infantry, Don Edmundo by name, came out to the
Cliff House to celebrate his recent promotion.
While standing upon the verge of the cliff, with
his friends all about him, Lady Celia, as visitors
had christened her, came swimming below him, and
taking off her overcoat, laid it upon a rock. She
then turned up her eyes and sang a Methodist hymn.
No sooner did the brave Don Edmundo hear it
than he tore off his gorgeous clothes, and cast himself
headlong in the billows. Lady Celia caught
him dexterously by the waist in her mouth, and,
swimming to the outer rock, sat up and softly bit
him in halves. She then laid the pieces tenderly
plunging into the waters was never seen more.
Many are the wild fabrications of the poets
about her subsequent career, but to this day
nothing authentic has turned up. For some months
strenuous efforts were made to recover the wicked
Lieutenant's body. Every appliance which genius
could invent and skill could wield was put in requisition;
until one night the landlord, fearing
these constant efforts might frighten away the
seals, had the remains quietly removed and secretly
interred.
| The fiend's delight | |