Grimshawe kind. Such appear,
like exclamations, all over the world. I saw one as huge and thrilling
as these Italian monsters on the Larch Path at the Wayside, a few
years later; but at Montauto they really swaggered and remained. We
perceive such things from a great distance, as all disaster may be
perceived if we are not more usefully employed. A presentiment
whispers, "There he is!" and looking unswervingly in the right
direction, there he is, to be sure. I could easily have written a poor
story, though not a good novel, upon the effectiveness of these
spiders, glaring in the chinks of bed-curtains, or moving like shadows
upon the chamber wall or around the windows, and I can guess my
father's amusement over them. They were as large as plums, with
numerous legs that spread and brought their personality out to the
verge of impossibility. I suppose they stopped there, but I am not
sure. No wonder the romancer humorously added a touch that made a
spider of the doctor himself, with his vast web of pipe-smoke!
The great romance of "Monte Beni" is thus referred to by Mr. Motley
and his wife; I give a few sentences written by the latter, a friend
of many years' standing, and I insert Mr. Motley's letter entire:--
WALTON-ON-THAMES, April 13, 1860.
DEAREST SOPHIA,--My pen continues to be the same instrument of torture
to me that you remember it always was in my youth, when I used to read
your letters with such wonder and delight. This spell is still upon
me, for I appreciate the magic of your mind now as much as I did then,
and have treasured up every little bit of a note that you wrote me in
Rome.
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