606 



CARROTS AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES. 



the mixture which was to renew " old JEson." I had no opportunity to 

 try the effect of my lotion till after our embarkation, and it was not till 

 we were half-seas-over, and free from the influence of sea- sickness, that 

 I mustered resolution to avail myself of my panacea. It was then, as 

 our vessel bounded across the ocean to its western shore, that I mused 

 upon the new mode of life which would be my lot in a far remote 

 region. Divested of the painful distinction which had marked my early 

 career, I should at length enjoy, and probably ornament society ; and as 

 I abandoned myself to the fond anticipations of hope, I revelled in a 

 day-dream of the most delicious nature, and looked forward to the 

 coming morrow with delight. I pictured to myself the surprise of my 

 companions aboard at my transformation, and I rejoiced in the idea of 

 being then more than on a level with themselves. This hope inspired 

 me with cheerfulness, and I spent a happy evening. That night, when 

 the hour of our coucher approached, I prepared for the mysterious rite, 

 and with feelings akin to those of Frankestein when near the completion 

 of his " secret work." I anointed myself, not like the old woman of 

 Berkeley, but with the sacred oil from the Ampulla of Messieurs Fox. 

 Enveloping my head in a thickly quilted nightcap, tightly bound round 

 with a silken kerchief, in order that the charm might be " firm and 

 good/' I threw myself on my berth, and resigned my excited mind to 

 the dominion of sleep. 



The sun rose brightly above the waves, and the fresh breeze of mom- 

 ing breathed lightly through the cabin window, when I awoke. My 

 first impulse was, to feel if the bandage was secure : it was so, and all 

 seemed to promise a happy result to the experiment. In a court of jus- 

 tice, when the sentence of a martial condemnation is passed, the judge 

 arrays himself in a black cap, to pronounce the doom. Here, thought 

 I, we shall reverse the case. I rose, and approached my dressing-case : 

 the lock yielded to my pressure, and the mirror stood before me. I 

 placed it in a conspicuous light, and with trembling hands I unloosed 

 the mysterious fillet. Pursuant to the printed instructions, I instantly 

 plunged my head into a bason of water ; and there, like a dripping 

 triton or merman, I confronted the oracle of my destiny. Powers of 

 transformation, what did I behold ! Fiend of darkness, what spell of 

 evil had been at work ! I might have been compared to Priam gazing 

 on the messenger of the fate of Troy; to the usurper of Scotland before 

 the spirit of Banquo; to the affrighted Leporello, on beholding the 

 solemn nod of the commander's statue ; to the cat, which regards its 

 prototype in the sublime advertisements of Warren ; in short, there, 

 " mute and motionless" as Zuliekha, I 



" Stood like that statue of distress, 

 When, her last hope for ever gone, 

 The mother harden'd into stone." 



Before me, in the looking-glass, I beheld a gorgon, and I shuddered ; 

 for, instead of a luxuriant head of hair, redundant in curl, redolent of 

 perfume, and in hue " a rich chesnut" or " a golden brown," such were 

 the words of promise, my locks were stiff and wiry; a vile smell of 

 aqua-fortis infected the air ; and the colour which blasted my sightno 

 phantasm, no capricious fancy, no distorted vision, was a vivid 

 green ! ! ! 



