The Vampyre, a Tale
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John Polidori >> The Vampyre, a Tale
THE
VAMPYRE;
A Tale.
By John Polidori
EXTRACT OF A LETTER
FROM GENEVA.
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"I breathe freely in the neighbourhood of this lake; the ground upon
which I tread has been subdued from the earliest ages; the principal
objects which immediately strike my eye, bring to my recollection
scenes, in which man acted the hero and was the chief object of
interest. Not to look back to earlier times of battles and sieges,
here is the bust of Rousseau--here is a house with an inscription
denoting that the Genevan philosopher first drew breath under its
roof. A little out of the town is Ferney, the residence of Voltaire;
where that wonderful, though certainly in many respects contemptible,
character, received, like the hermits of old, the visits of pilgrims,
not only from his own nation, but from the farthest boundaries of
Europe. Here too is Bonnet's abode, and, a few steps beyond, the house
of that astonishing woman Madame de Stael: perhaps the first of her
sex, who has really proved its often claimed equality with, the nobler
man. We have before had women who have written interesting-novels and
poems, in which their tact at observing drawing-room characters has
availed them; but never since the days of Heloise have those faculties
which arc peculiar to man, been developed as the possible inheritance
of woman. Though even here, as in the case of Heloise, our sex have
not been backward in alledging the existence of an Abeilard in the
person of M. Schlegel as the inspirer of her works. But to proceed:
upon the same side of the lake, Gibbon, Bonnivard, Bradshaw, and
others mark, as it were, the stages for our progress; whilst upon the
other side there is one house, built by Diodati, the friend of Milton,
which has contained within its walls, for several months, that poet
whom we have so often read together, and who--if human passions remain
the same, and human feelings, like. chords, on being swept by nature's
impulses shall vibrate as before---will be placed by posterity in the
first rank of our English Poets. You must have heard, or the Third
Canto of Childe Harold will have informed you, that Lord Byron resided
many months in this neighbourhood. I went with some friends a few days
ago, after having seen Ferney, to view this mansion. I trod the floors
with the same feelings of awe and respect as we did, together, those
of Shakespeare's dwelling at Stratford. I sat down in a chair of the
saloon, and satisfied myself that I was resting on what he had made
his constant scat. I found a servant there who had lived with him;
she, however, gave me but little information. She pointed out his
bed-chamber upon the same level as the saloon and dining-room, and
informed me that he retired to rest at three, got up at two, and
employed himself a long time over his toilette; that he never went to
sleep without a pair of pistols and a dagger by his side, and that he
never eat animal food. He apparently spent some part of every day upon
the lake in an English boat. There is a balcony from the saloon which
looks upon the lake and the mountain Jura; and I imagine, that it must
have been hence, he contemplated the storm BO magnificently described
in the Third Canto; for you have from here a most extensive view of
all the points he has therein depicted. I can fancy him like the
scathed pine, whilst all around was sunk to repose, still waking to
observe, what gave but a weak image of the storms which had desolated
his own breast.
The sky is changed!--and such a change; Oh, night!
And storm and darkness, ye are wond'rous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light
Of a dark eye in woman! Far along
>From peak to peak, the rattling crags among,
Leaps the lire thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue,
And Jura answers thro' her misty shroud,
Back to the joyous Alps who call to her aloud!
And this is in the night:--Most glorious night!
Thou wer't not sent for slumber! let me be
A sharer in thy far and fierce delight,--
A portion of the tempest and of me!
How the lit lake shines a phosphoric sea,
And the big rain comet dancing to the earth!
And now again 'tis black,--and now the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain mirth,
As if they did rejoice o'er a young; earthquake's birth,
Now where the swift Rhine cleaves his way between
Heights which appear, as lovers who have parted
In haste, whose mining depths so intervene,
That they can meet no more, tho' broken hearted;
Tho' in their souls which thus each other thwarted,
Love was the very root of the fond rage
Which blighted their life's bloom, and then departed--
Itself expired, but leaving; them an age
Of years all winter--war within themselves to wage.
I went clown to the little port, if I may use the expression, wherein
his vessel used to lay, and conversed with the cottager, who had the
care of it. You may smile, but I have my pleasure in thus helping my
personification of the individual I admire, by attaining to the
knowledge of those circumstances which were daily around him. I have
made numerous enquiries in the town concerning him, but can learn
nothing. He only went into society there once, when M. Pictet took him
to the house of a lady to spend the evening. They say he is a very
singular man, and seem to think him very uncivil. Amongst other things
they relate, that having invited M. Pictet and Bonstetten to dinner,
he went on the lake to Chillon, leaving a gentleman who travelled with
him to receive them and make his apologies. Another evening, being
invited to the house of Lady D------ H------, he promised to attend,
but upon approaching the windows of her ladyship's villa, and
perceiving the room to be full of company, he set down his friend,
desiring him to plead his excuse, and immediately returned home. This
will serve as a contradiction to the report which yon tell me is
current in England, of his having been avoided by his countrymen on
the continent. The case happens to be directly the reverse, as he has
been generally sought by them, though on most occasions, apparently
without success. It is said, indeed, that upon paying his first visit
at Coppet, following the servant who had announced his name, he was
surprised to meet a lady carried oat fainting; but before he had been
seated many minutes, the same lady, who had been so affected at the
sound of his name, returned and conversed with him a considerable
time--- such is female curiosity and affectation! He visited Coppet
frequently, and of course associated there with several of his
countrymen, who evinced no reluctance to moot him whom his enemies
alone would represent as au outcast.
Though I have been so unsuccessful in this town, 1 have been more
fortunate in my enquiries elsewhere. There is a society three or four
miles from Geneva, the centre of which is the Countess of Breuss, a
Russian lady, well acquainted with the agrémens de la Société, and who
has collected them round herself at her mansion. It was chiefly here,
I find, that the gentleman who travelled with Lord Byron, as
physician, sought for society. He used almost every day to cross the
lake by himself, in one of their flat-bottomed boats, and return after
passing the evening with his friends, about eleven or twelve at night,
often whilst the storms were raging in the circling summits of the
mountains around. As he became intimate, from long acquaintance, with
several of the families in this neighbourhood, I have gathered from
their accounts some excellent traits of his lordship's character,
which I will relate to you at some future opportunity. I must,
however, free him from one imputation attached to him--- of having in
his house two sisters as the partakers of his revels. This is, like
many other charges which have been brought against his lordship,
entirely destitute of truth. His only companion was the physician I
have already mentioned. The report originated from the following
circumstance: Mr. Percy Bysshe Shelly, a gentleman well known for
extravagance of doctrine, and for his daring, in their profession,
even to sign himself with the title of ATHeo*s in the Album at
Chamouny, having taken a house below, in which he resided with Miss M.
W. Godwin and Miss Clermont, (the daughters of the celebrated Mr.
Godwin) they were frequently visitors at Diodati, and were often seen
upon the lake with his Lordship, which gave rise to the report, the
truth of which is here positively denied.
Among other things which the lady, from whom I procured these
anecdotes, related to me, she mentioned tho outline of a ghost story
by Lord Byron. It appears that one evening Lord B., Mr. P. B. Shelly,
the two ladies and the gentleman before alluded to, after having
perused a German work, which was entitled Phantasmagoriana, began
relating ghost stories; when his lordship having recited the beginning
of Christabel, then unpublished, the whole took so strong a hold of
Mr. Shelly's mind, that he suddenly started up and ran out of the
room. The physician and Lord Byron followed, and discovered him
leaning against a mantle-piece, with cold drops of perspiration
trickling down his face. After having given him something to refresh
him, upon enquiring into the cause of his alarm, they found that his
wild imagination having pictured to him the bosom of one of the ladies
with eyes (which was reported of a lady in the neighbourhood where he
lived) he was obliged to leave the room in order to destroy the
impression. It was afterwards proposed, in the course of conversation,
that each of the company present should write a tale depending upon
some supernatural agency, which was undertaken by Lord B., the
physician, and Miss M. W. Godwin.[1]* My friend, the lady above
referred to, had in her possession the outline of each of these
stories; I obtained them as a great favour, and herewith Forward them
to you, as I was assured you would feel as much curiosity as myself,
to peruse the ebauches of so great a genius, and those immediately
under his influence. "
* Since published under the title of "Frankenstein; or, The Modern
Prometheus."
THE VAMPYRE.
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INTRODUCTION.
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THE superstition upon which this tale is founded is very general in
the East. Among the Arabians it appears to be common: it did not,
however, extend itself to the Greeks until after the establishment of
Christianity; and it has only assumed its present form since the
division of the Latin and Greek churches; at which time, the idea
becoming prevalent, that a Latin body could not corrupt if buried in
their territory, it gradually increased, and formed the subject of
many wonderful stories, still extant, of the dead rising from their
graves, and feeding upon the blood of the young and beautiful. In the
West it spread, with some slight variation, all over Hungary, Poland,
Austria, and Lorraine, where the belief existed, that vampyres nightly
imbibed a certain portion of the blood of their victims, who became
emaciated, lost their strength, and speedily died of consumptions;
whilst these human blood-suckers fattened --- and their veins became
distended to such a state of repletion, as to cause the blood to flow
from all the passages of their bodies, and even from the very pores of
their skins.
In the London Journal, of March, 1732, is a curious, and, of course,
credible account of a particular case of vampyrism, which is stated to
have occurred at Madreyga, in Hungary. It appears, that upon an
examination of the commander-in-chief and magistrates of the place,
they positively and unanimously affirmed, that, about five years
before, a certain Heyduke, named Arnold Paul, had been heard to say,
that, at Cassovia, on the frontiers of the Turkish Servia, he had been
tormented by a vampyre, but had found a way to rid himself of the
evil, by eating some of the earth out of the vampyre's grave, and
rubbing himself with his blood. This precaution, however, did not
prevent him from becoming a vampyre[2]* himself; for, about twenty or
thirty days after his death and burial, many persons complained of
having been tormented by him, and a deposition was made, that four
persons had been deprived of life by his attacks. To prevent further
mischief, the inhabitants having consulted their Hadagni,[3]/- took up
tho body, and found it (as is supposed to be usual in cases of
vampyrism) fresh, and entirely free from corruption, and emitting at
the mouth, nose, and ears, pure and florid blood. Proof having been
thus obtained, they resorted to the accustomed remedy. A stake was
driven entirely through the heart and body of Arnold Paul, at which he
is reported to have cried out as dreadfully as if he had been alive.
This done, they cut off his head, burned his body, and threw the ashes
into his grave. The same measures were adopted with the corses of
those persons who had previously died from vampyrism, lest they
should, in their turn, become agents upon others who survived them.
* The universal belief is, that a person tucked by a vampyre becomes a
vampyre himself, and sucks in his turn.
/- Chief bailiff.
This monstrous rodomontade is here related, because it seems better
adapted to illustrate the subject of the present observations than any
other instance which could be adduced. In many parts of Greece it is
considered as a sort of punishment after death, for some heinous crime
committed whilst in existence, that the deceased is not only doomed to
vampyrise, but compelled to confine his infernal visitations solely to
those beings he loved most while upon earththose to whom he was bound
by ties of kindred and affection. ---A supposition alluded to in the
"Giaour."
But first on earth, as Vampyre sent,
Thy corse shall from its tomb be rent;
Then ghastly haunt the native place,
And suck the blood of all thy race;
There from thy daughter, sister, wife,
At midnight drain the stream of life;
Yet loathe the banquet which perforce
Must feed thy livid living corse,
Thy victims, ere they yet expire,
Shall know the demon for their sire;
As cursing thee, thou cursing them,
Thy flowers are withered on the stem.
But one that for thy crime must fall,
The youngest, best beloved of all,
Shall bless thee with a father's name--
That word shall wrap thy heart in flame!
Yet thou must end thy task and mark
Her cheek's last tinge--her eye's last spark,
And the last glassy glance must view
Which freezes o'er its lifeless blue;
Then with unhallowed hand shall tear
The tresses of her yellow hair,
Of which, in life a lock when shorn
Affection's fondest pledge was worn--
But now is borne away by thee
Memorial of thine agony!
Yet with thine own best blood shall drip;
Thy gnashing tooth, and haggard lip;
Then stalking to thy sullen grave,
Go--and with Gouls and Afrits rave,
Till these in horror shrink away
>From spectre more accursed than they.
Mr. Southey has also introduced in his wild but beautiful poem of "
Thalaba, " the vampyre corse of the Arabian maid Oneiza, who is
represented as having returned from the grave for the purpose of
tormenting him she best loved whilst in existence. But this cannot be
supposed to have resulted from the sinfulness of her life, she being
pourtrayed throughout the whole of the tale as a complete type of
purity and innocence. The veracious Tournefort gives a long account in
his travels of several astonishing cases of vampyrism, to which he
pretends to have been an eyewitness; and Calmet, in his great work
upon this subject, besides a variety of anecdotes, and traditionary
narratives illustrative of its effects, has put forth some learned
dissertations, tending to prove it to be a classical, as well as
barbarian error.
Many curious and interesting notices on this singularly horrible
superstition might be added; though the present may suffice for the
limits of a note, necessarily devoted to explanation, and which may
now be concluded by merely remarking, that though the term Vampyre is
the one in most general acceptation, there are several others
synonimous with it, made use of in various parts of the world: as
Vroucolocha, Vardoulacha, Goul, Broucoloka, &c.
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THE VAMPYRE.
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IT happened that in the midst of the dissipations attendant upon a
London winter, there appeared at the various parties of the leaders of
the ton a nobleman, more remarkable for his singularities, than his
rank. He gazed upon the mirth around him, as if he could not
participate therein. Apparently, the light laughter of the fair only
attracted his attention, that he might by a look quell it, and throw
fear into those breasts where thoughtlessness reigned. Those who felt
this sensation of awe, could not explain whence it arose: some
attributed it to the dead grey eye, which, fixing upon the object's
face, did not seem to penetrate, and at one glance to pierce through
to the inward workings of the heart; but fell upon the cheek with a
leaden ray that weighed upon the skin it could not pass. His
peculiarities caused him to be invited to every house; all wished to
see him, and those who had been accustomed to violent excitement, and
now felt the weight of ennui, were pleased at having something in
their presence capable of engaging their attention. In spite of the
deadly hue of his face, which never gained a warmer tint, either from
the blush of modesty, or from the strong emotion of passion, though
its form and outline were beautiful, many of the female hunters after
notoriety attempted to win his attentions, and gain, at least, some
marks of what they might term affection: Lady Mercer, who had been the
mockery of every monster shewn in drawing-rooms since her marriage,
threw herself in his way, and did all but put on the dress of a
mountebank, to attract his notice:--- though in vain:--- when she
stood before him, though his eyes were apparently fixed upon her's,
still it seemed as if they were unperceived;---even her unappalled
impudence was baffled, and she left, the field. But though the common
adultress could not influence even the guidance of his eyes, it was
not that the female sex was indifferent to him: yet such was the
apparent caution with which he spoke to the virtuous wife and innocent
daughter, that few knew he ever addressed himself to females. He had,
however, the reputation of a winning tongue; and whether it was that
it even overcame the dread of his singular character, or that they
were moved by his apparent hatred of vice, he was as often among those
females who form the boast of their sex from their domestic virtues,
as among those who sully it by their vices.
About the same time, there came to London a young gentleman of the
name of Aubrey: he was an orphan left with an only sister in the
possession of great wealth, by parent» who died while he was yet in
childhood. Left also to himself by guardians, who thought it their
duty merely to take care of his fortune, while they relinquished the
more important charge of his mind to the care of mercenary subalterns,
he cultivated more his imagination than his judgment. He had, hence,
that high romantic feeling of honour and candour, which daily ruins so
many milliners' apprentices. He believed all to sympathise with
virtue, and thought that vice was thrown in by Providence merely for
the picturesque effect of the scene, as we see in romances: he thought
that the misery of a cottage merely consisted in the vesting of
clothes, which were as warm, but which were better adapted to the
painter's eye by their irregular folds and various coloured patches.
Me thought, in fine, that the dreams of poets were the realities of
life. He was handsome, frank, and rich: for these reasons, upon his
entering into the gay circles, many mothers surrounded him, striving
which should describe with least truth their languishing or romping
favourites: the daughters at the same time, by their brightening
countenances when he approached, and by their sparkling eyes, when he
opened his lips, soon led him into false notions of his talents and
his merit. Attached as lie was to the romance of his solitary hours,
he was startled at finding, that, except in the tallow and wax candles
that flickered, not from the presence of a ghost, but from want of
snuffing, there was no foundation in real life for any of that
congeries of pleasing pictures and descriptions contained in those
volumes, from which he had formed his study. Finding, however, some
compensation in his gratified vanity, he was about to relinquish his
dreams, when the extraordinary being we have above described, crossed
him in his career.
He watched him; and the very impossibility of forming an idea of the
character of a man entirely absorbed in himself, who gave few other
signs of his observation of external objects, than the tacit assent to
their existence, implied by the avoidance of their contact: allowing
his imagination to picture every thing that flattered its propensity
to extravagant ideas, he soon formed this object into the hero of a
romance, and determined to observe the offspring of his fancy, rather
than the person before him. He became acquainted with him, paid him
attentions, and so far advanced upon his notice, that his presence was
always recognised. He gradually learnt that Lord Ruthven's affairs
were embarrassed, and soon found, from the notes of preparation in --
Street, that he was about to travel. Desirous of gaining some
information respecting this singular character, who, till now, had
only whetted his curiosity, he hinted to his guardians, that it was
time for him to perform the tour, which for many generations has been
thought necessary to enable the young to take some rapid steps in the
career of vice towards putting themselves upon an equality with the
aged, and not allowing them to appear as if fallen from the skies,
whenever scandalous intrigues are mentioned as the subjects of
pleasantry or of praise, according to the degree of skill shewn in
carrying them on. They consented: and Aubrey immediately mentioning
his intentions to Lord Ruthven, was surprised to receive from him a
proposal to join him. Flattered by such a mark of esteem from him,
who, apparently, had nothing in common with other men, he gladly
accepted it, and in a few days they hail passed the circling waters.
Hitherto, Aubrey had had no opportunity of studying Lord Ruthven's
character, and now he found, that, though many more of his actions
were exposed to his view, the results offered different conclusions
from (lie apparent motives to his conduct. His companion was profuse
in his liberality; ---the idle, the vagabond, and the beggar, received
from his hand more than enough to relieve their immediate wants. But
Aubrey could not avoid remarking, that it was not upon the virtuous,
reduced to indigence by the misfortunes attendant even upon virtue,
that he bestowed his alms; ---these were sent from the door with
hardly suppressed sneers; but when the profligate came to ask
something, not to relieve his wants, but to allow him to wallow in his
lust, or to sink him still deeper in his iniquity, he was sent away
with rich charity. This was, however, attributed by him to the greater
importunity of the vicious, which generally prevails over the retiring
bashfulness of the virtuous indigent. There was one circumstance about
the charity of his Lordship, which was still more impressed upon his
mind: all those upon whom it was bestowed, inevitably found that there
was a curse upon it, for they were all either led to the scaffold, or
sunk to the lowest and the most abject misery. At Brussels and other
towns through which they passed, Aubrey was surprized at the apparent
eagerness with which his companion sought for the centres of all
fashionable vice; there he entered into all the spirit of the faro
table: he betted, and always gambled with success, except where the
known sharper was his antagonist, and then he lost even more than he
gained; but it was always with the same unchanging face, with which he
generally watched the society around: it was not, however, so when he
encountered the rash youthful novice, or the luckless father of a
numerous family; then his very wish seemed fortune's law---this
apparent abstractedness of mind was laid aside, and his eyes sparkled
with more fire than that of the cat whilst dallying with lire
half-dead mouse. In every town, he left the formerly affluent youth,
torn from the circle he adorned, cursing, in the solitude of a
dungeon, the fate that had drawn him within the reach of this fiend;
whilst many a father sat frantic, amidst the speaking looks of mute
hungry children, without a single farthing of his late immense wealth,
wherewith to buy even sufficient to satisfy their present craving. Yet
he took no money from tho gambling table; but immediately lost, to the
ruiner of many, the last gilder he had just snatched from the
convulsive grasp of the innocent: this might but be the result of a
certain degree of knowledge, which was not, however, capable of
combating the cunning of the more experienced. Aubrey often wished to
represent this to his friend, and beg him to resign that charity and
pleasure which proved the ruin of all, and did not tend to his own
profit; ---but he delayed it---for each day ho hoped his friend would
give him some opportunity of speaking frankly and openly to him;
however, this never occurred. Lord Ruthven in his carriage, and amidst
the various wild and rich scenes of nature, was always the same: his
eye spoke less than his lip; and though Aubrey was near the object of
his curiosity, he obtained no greater gratification from it than the
constant excitement of vainly wishing to break that mystery, which to
his exalted imagination began to assume the appearance of something
supernatural.