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METZENGERSTEIN.
A TALE IN IMITATION OF THE GERMAN.
BY EDGAR A. POE.
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Pestis eram vivus — moriens tua
mors ero.
Martin Luther.
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 Horror and Fatality have been
stalking abroad in all ages. Why then give a date to the story I have
to
tell? I will not. Besides, I have other reasons for concealment. Let it
suffice to say, that at the period of which I speak, there
existed, in the interior of Hungary, a settled although hidden belief
in
the doctrines of the Metempsychosis. Of the doctrines themselves — that
is, of their falsity, or of their probability — I say nothing. I
assert,
however, that much of our incredulity — as La Bruyére says of
all
our unhappiness — "vient de ne puvoir etre seuls."
But there were some points in the
Hungarian
superstition
which were fast verging to absurdity. They — the Hungarians — differed
very essentially from their Eastern authorities. For example. "The
soul,"
said the former — I give the words of an acute and intelligent Parisian
— [["]]ne demeure qu'un seul fois dans un corps sensible: au reste —
un
cheval, un chien, un homme
même
n' est que la ressemblance peu tangible de ces animaux."
The families of Berlifitzing and
Metzengerstein
had
been at variance for centuries. Never before were two houses so
illustrious
mutually embittered by hostility so deadly. Indeed, at the era of this
history, it was observed by an old crone of haggard and sinister
appearance,
that "fire and water might sooner mingle than a Berlifitzing clasp the
hand of a Metzengerstein." The origin of this enmity seems to be found
in the words of an ancient prophecy — "A lofty name shall have a
fearful
fall when, like the rider over his horse, the mortality of
Metzengerstein
shall triumph over the immortality of Berlifitzing."
To be sure the words themselves had
little or no
meaning. But more trivial causes have given rise — and that no long
while
ago — to consequences equally eventful. Besides, the estates, which
were
contiguous, had long exercised a rival influence in the affairs of a
busy
government. Moreover, near neighbors are seldom friends — and the
inhabitants
of the Castle Berlifitzing might look, from their
lofty
buttresses, into the very windows of the Chateau Metzengerstein. Least
of all was the more than feudal magnificence thus discovered calculated
to allay the irritable feelings of the less ancient and less wealthy
Berlifitzings.
What wonder, then, that the words, however silly, of that prediction,
should
have succeeded in setting and keeping at variance two families already
predisposed to quarrel by every instigation of hereditary jealousy? The
prophecy seemed to imply — if it
implied
any thing — a final triumph on the part of the already more powerful
house;
and was of course remembered with the more bitter animosity on the side
of the weaker and less influential.
Wilhelm, Count Berlifitzing, although
honorably
and
loftily descended, was, at the epoch of this narrative, an infirm and
doting
old man, remarkable for nothing but an inordinate and inveterate
personal
antipathy to the family of his rival, and so passionate a love of
horses,
and of hunting, that neither bodily infirmity, great age, [column
2:] nor mental
incapacity,
prevented his daily participation in the dangers of the chase.
Frederick, Baron Metzengerstein, was,
on the
other
hand, not yet of age. His father, the Minister G——, died young. His
mother,
the Lady Mary, followed quickly after. Frederick was, at that time, in
his fifteenth year. In a city fifteen years are no long period — a
child
may be still a child in his third lustrum: but in a wilderness — in so
magnificent a wilderness as that old principality, fifteen years have a
far deeper meaning.
The beautiful Lady Mary! How could
she
die?
— and of consumption! But it is a path I have prayed to follow. I would
wish all I love to perish of that gentle disease. How glorious! to
depart
in the hey-day of the young blood — the heart all passion — the
imagination
all fire — amid the remembrances of happier days — in the fall of the
year
— and so be buried up forever in the gorgeous autumnal leaves!
Thus died the Lady Mary. The young
Baron
Frederick
stood without a living relative by the coffin of his dead mother. He
placed his hand upon her placid forehead. No
shudder
came over his delicate frame — no sigh from his flinty bosom.
Heartless,
self-willed, and impetuous from his childhood, he had reached the age
of
which I speak through a career of unfeeling, wanton, and reckless
dissipation;
and a barrier had long since arisen in the channel of all holy thoughts
and gentle recollections.
From some peculiar circumstances
attending the
administration
of his father, the young Baron, at the decease of the former, entered
immediately
upon his vast possessions. Such estates were seldom held before by a
nobleman
of Hungary. His castles were without number — of these the chief in
point
of splendor and extent was the "Chateau Metzengerstein." The boundary
line
of his dominions was never clearly defined — but his principal park
embraced
a circuit of fifty miles.
Upon the succession of a proprietor
so young —
with
a character so well known — to a fortune so unparalleled — little
speculation
was afloat in regard to his probable course of conduct. And, indeed,
for
the space of three days the behavior of the heir out-heroded Herod, and
fairly surpassed the expectations of his most enthusiastic admirers.
Shameful
debaucheries — flagrant treacheries — unheard-of atrocities — gave his
trembling vassals quickly to understand that no servile submission on
their
part — no punctilios of conscience on his own — were thenceforward to
prove
any security against the remorseless and bloody fangs of a petty
Caligula.
On the night of the fourth day, the
stables
of the Castle Berlifitzing were discovered to be on fire: and the
unanimous
opinion of the neighborhood instantaneously added the crime of the
incendiary
to the already hideous list of the Baron's misdemeanors and enormities.
But during the tumult occasioned by
this
occurrence,
the young nobleman himself sat, apparently buried in meditation, in a
vast
and desolate upper apartment of the family palace of Metzengerstein.
The
rich although faded tapestry-hangings which swung gloomily upon the
walls,
represented the shadowy and majestic forms of a thousand illustrious
ancestors. Here, rich-ermined priests, and pontifical
dignitaties,
familiarly
seated with the autocrat and the sovereign, put a veto on the wishes of
a temporal king — or restrained [page 98:] with the fiat of
papal supremacy the
rebellious
sceptre of the Arch-Enemy. There, the dark, tall statures of
the
Princes Metzengerstein — their muscular war-coursers
plunging over the
carcass of a fallen foe — startled the steadiest nerves with their
vigorous
expression: and here, again, the voluptuous and swan-like
figures
of the dames of days gone by, floated away in the mazes of an unreal
dance
to the strains of imaginary melody.
But as the Baron listened, or
affected to listen[[,]]
to the gradually increasing uproar in the stables of Berlifitzing — or
perhaps pondered upon some more novel — some more decided act of
audacity
— his eyes became unwittingly rivetted to the figure of an enormous,
and
unnaturally colored horse, represented in the tapestry as belonging to
a Saracen ancestor of the family of
his
rival. The horse itself, in the foreground of the design, stood
motionless
and statue-like — while farther back its discomfited rider perished by
the dagger of a Metzengerstein.
On Frederick's lip arose a fiendish
expression,
as
he became aware of the direction his glance had, without his
consciousness,
assumed. Yet he did not remove it. On the contrary he could by no means
account for the singular, intense, and overwhelming anxiety which
appeared falling like a
shroud
upon his senses. It was with difficulty that he reconciled his dreamy
and
incoherent feelings with the certainty of being awake. The longer he
gazed,
the more absorbing became the spell — the more impossible did it appear
that he could ever withdraw his glance from the fascination of that
tapestry.
But the tumult without becoming suddenly more violent, with a kind of
compulsory
and desperate exertion he diverted his attention to the glare of ruddy
light thrown full by the flaming stables upon the windows of the
apartment.
The action, however, was but
momentary — his gaze
returned mechanically to the wall. To his extreme horror and
astonishment
the head of the gigantic steed had, in the meantime, altered its
position.
The neck of the animal, before arched, as if in compassion, over the
prostrate
body of its lord, was now extended, at full length, in the direction of
the Baron. The eyes, before invisible, now wore an energetic and human
expression, while they gleamed with a fiery and unusual red: and the
distended
lips of the apparently enraged horse left in full view his sepulchral
and
disgusting teeth.
Stupified with terror the young
nobleman tottered
to the door. As he threw it open, a flash of red light streaming far
into
the chamber, flung his shadow with a clear outline against the
quivering
tapestry; and he shuddered to perceive that shadow — as he staggered
awhile
upon the threshold — assuming the exact position, and precisely filling
up the contour of the relentless and triumphant murderer of the
Saracen
Berlifitzing.
To lighten the depression of his
spirits the
Baron
hurried into the open air. At the principal gate of the Chateau he
encountered
three equerries. With much difficulty, and at the imminent peril of
their
lives, they were restraining the unnatural and convulsive plunges of a
gigantic and fiery-colored horse.
"Whose horse? Where did you get him?"
demanded
the
youth in a querulous and husky tone of voice, as he became instantly
aware
that the mysterious steed [column 2:] in the tapestried chamber
was the very
counterpart
of the furious animal before his eyes.
"He is your own property, Sire" —
replied one of
the equerries — "at least he is claimed by no other owner. We caught
him
flying, all smoking and foaming with rage, from the burning stables of
the Castle Berlifitzing. Supposing him to have belonged to the old
Count's
stud of foreign horses, we led him back as an estray. But the grooms
there
disclaim any title to the creature — which is strange, since he bears
evident
marks of having made a narrow escape from the flames."
"The letters W. V. B. are also
branded very
distinctly on his forehead" —
interrupted a second
equerry — "I supposed them, of course, to be the initials of Wilhelm
Von
Berlifitzing — but all at the Castle are positive in denying any
knowledge
of the horse."
"Extremely singular!" said the young
Baron, with
a musing air, and apparently unconscious of the meaning of his words —
"He is, as you say, a remarkable horse — a prodigious horse! although,
as you very justly observe, of a suspicious and untractable character —
Let him be mine, however," he added, after a pause — "perhaps a rider
like
Frederick of Metzengerstein, may tame even the devil from the stables
of
Berlifitzing."
"You are mistaken, my lord — the
horse, as I
think
we mentioned, is not from the stables of the Count. If such
were
the case, we know our duty better than to bring him into the presence
of
a noble of your family."
"True!" observed the Baron drily —
and at that
instant
a page of the bed-chamber came from the Chateau with a heightened
color,
and precipitate step. He whispered into his master's ear an account of
the miraculous and sudden disappearance of a small portion of the
tapestry,
in an apartment which he designated: entering, at the same time, into
particulars
of a minute and circumstantial character — but from the low tone of
voice
in which these latter were communicated, nothing escaped to gratify the
excited curiosity of the equerries.
The young Frederick, during the
conference, seemed agitated by a variety of emotions. He soon,
however,
recovered his composure, and an expression of determined malignancy
settled
upon his countenance, as he gave peremptory orders that a certain
chamber
should be immediately locked up, and the key placed in his own
possession.
"Have you heard of the unhappy death
of the old
hunter
Berlifitzing?" said one of his vassals to the Baron, as, after the
affair
of the page, the huge and mysterious steed which that nobleman had
adopted
as his own, plunged and curvetted, with redoubled and supernatural
fury,
down the long avenue which extended from the Chateau to the stables of
Metzengerstein.
"No!" — said the Baron, turning
abruptly towards
the speaker — "dead! say you?"
"It is indeed true, my lord — and, to
a noble of
your name, will be, I imagine, no unwelcome intelligence."
A rapid
smile
of a peculiar and unintelligible meaning shot over the beautiful
countenance
of the listener — "How died he?"
"In his rash exertions to rescue a
favorite
portion
of his hunting stud, he has himself perished miserably in the flames."
"I — n — d — e — e — d — !"
— ejaculated the Baron,
as if [page 99:] slowly and deliberately impressed with the
truth of some exciting
idea.
"Indeed" — repeated the vassal.
"Shocking!" said the youth calmly,
and turned
quietly
into the Chateau.
From this date a marked alteration
took place in
the outward demeanor of the dissolute young Baron Frederick Von
Metzengerstein.
Indeed his behaviour disappointed every expectation, and proved little
in accordance with the views of many a manœuvering mamma — while his
habits
and manners, still less than formerly, offered any thing congenial with
those of the neighboring aristocracy. He was never to be seen beyond
the
limits of his own domain, and, in this wide and social world, was
utterly
companionless — unless, indeed, that unnatural, impetuous, and
fiery-colored
horse, which he henceforward continually bestrode, had any mysterious
right
to the title of his friend.
Numerous invitations on the part of
the
neighborhood
for a long time, however, periodically came in — "Will the Baron honor
our festivals with his presence?" "Will the Baron join us in a hunting
of the boar?" "Metzengerstein does not hunt" — "Metzengerstein will
not
attend" — were the haughty and laconic answers.
These repeated insults were not to be
endured by
an imperious nobility. Such invitations became less cordial — less
frequent
— in time they ceased altogether. The widow of the unfortunate Count
Berlifitzing,
was even heard to express a hope — "that the Baron might be at home
when
he did not wish to be at home, since he disdained the company of his
equals:
and ride when he did not wish to ride, since he preferred the society
of
a horse." This to be sure was a very silly explosion of hereditary
pique; and merely proved how singularly unmeaning our
sayings are apt to become, when we desire to be unusually energetic.
The charitable, nevertheless,
attributed the
alteration
in the conduct of the young nobleman to the natural sorrow of a son for
the untimely loss of his parents — forgetting, however, his atrocious
and
reckless behavior during the short period immediately succeeding that
bereavement.
Some there were, indeed, who suggested a too haughty idea of
self-consequence
and dignity. Others again — among whom may be mentioned the family
physician
— did not hesitate in speaking of morbid melancholy, and hereditary
ill-health:
while dark hints, of a more equivocal nature, were current among the
multitude.
Indeed the Baron's perverse
attachment to his
lately-acquired
charger — an attachment which seemed to attain new strength from every
fresh example of the animal's ferocious and demonlike propensities —
at
length became, in the eyes of all reasonable men, a hideous and
unnatural
fervor. In the glare of noon — at the dead hour of night — in sickness
or in health — in calm or in tempest — in moonlight or in shadow — the
young Metzengerstein seemed rivetted to the saddle of that colossal
horse,
whose intractable audacities so well accorded with the spirit of his
own.
There were circumstances, moreover,
which,
coupled
with late events, gave an unearthly and portentous character to the
mania
of the rider, and to the capabilities of the steed. The space passed
over in a single leap had been
accurately
measured,
and was [column 2:] found to exceed by an astounding
difference, the wildest
expectations
of the most imaginative. The Baron, besides, had no particular name
for
the animal, although all the rest in his extensive collection were
distinguished
by characteristic appellations. His stable, too, was appointed at a
distance
from the rest; and with regard to grooming and other necessary offices,
none but the owner in person had ventured to officiate, or even to
enter
the enclosure of that particular stall. It was also to be observed,
that
although the three grooms, who had caught the horse as he fled from the
conflagration at Berlifitzing, had succeeded in arresting his course,
by
means of a chain-bridle and noose — yet no one of the three could with
any certainty affirm that he had, during that dangerous struggle, or at
any period thereafter, actually placed his hand upon the body of the
beast.
Instances of peculiar intelligence in the demeanor of a noble and high
spirited steed are not to be supposed capable of exciting unreasonable
attention — especially among men who, daily trained to the labors of
the
chase, might appear well acquainted with the sagacity of a horse — but
there were certain circumstances which intruded themselves per force,
upon
the most skeptical and phlegmatic — and it is said there were times
when
this singular and mysterious animal, caused the gaping crowd who stood
around to recoil in silent
horror from the deep and impressive meaning of his terrible stamp —
times
when the young Metzengerstein turned pale and shrunk away from the
rapid and searching expression of
his intense
and human-looking eye.
Among all the retinue of the Baron,
however, none
were found to doubt the ardor of that extraordinary affection which
existed
on the part of the young nobleman for the fiery qualities of his horse
— at least, none but an insignificant and misshapen little page, whose
deformities were in every body's way, and whose opinions were of the
least
possible importance. He — if his ideas are worth mentioning at all —
had
the effrontery to assert that his master never vaulted into the saddle,
without an unaccountable and almost imperceptible shudder — and that,
upon
his return from every long-continued and habitual ride, an expression
of
triumphant malignity distorted every muscle in his countenance.
One tempestuous night,
Metzengerstein, awaking
from
a heavy and oppressive slumber, descended like a maniac from his
chamber,
and mounting in great haste, bounded away into the mazes of the forest.
An occurrence so common attracted no particular attention — but his
return
was looked for with intense anxiety on the part of his domestics, when,
after some hour's absence, the stupendous and magnificent battlements
of
the Chateau Metzengerstein, were discovered crackling and rocking to
their
very foundation, under the influence of a dense and livid mass of
ungovernable
fire.
As the flames, when first seen, had
already made
so terrible a progress that all efforts to save any portion of the
building were evidently futile, the astonished
neighborhood stood idly around in silent and apathetic wonder. But a
new
and fearful object soon rivetted the attention of the multitude, and
proved
how much more intense is the excitement wrought in the feelings of a
crowd
by the contemplation of human agony, than that brought about by the
most
appalling spectacles of inanimate matter. [page 100:]
Up the long avenue of aged oaks which
led from
the
forest to the main entrance of the Chateau Metzengerstein, a steed,
bearing
an unbonneted and disordered rider, was seen leaping with an
impetuosity
which out-stripped the very Demon of the Tempest, and extorted from
every
stupified beholder the ejaculation — "horrible!"
The career of the horseman was
indisputably, on
his
own part, uncontrollable. The agony of his countenance — the convulsive
struggle of his frame — gave evidence of superhuman exertion: but no
sound,
save a solitary shriek, escaped from his lacerated lips, which were
bitten
through and through in the intensity of terror. One instant, and the
clattering
of hoofs resounded sharply and shrilly above the roaring of the flames
and the shrieking of the winds — another, and, clearing at a single
plunge
the gateway and the moat, the steed bounded far up the tottering
stair-cases
of the Palace, and, with its rider, disappeared amid the whirlwind of
chaotic
fire.
The fury of the tempest immediately
died away,
and
a dead calm sullenly succeeded. A white flame still enveloped the
building like a shroud, and, streaming far away
into
the quiet atmosphere, shot forth a glare of preternatural light; while
a cloud of smoke settled heavily over the battlements in the distinct
colossal
figure of — a horse. |
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