.

A Murderer's Wake and the Arrival of a Stranger.
It is the month of June, and the sun has gone down amidst a mass of those red and angry clouds which prognosticate a night of storm and tempest.

The air is felt to be oppressive and sultry, and the whole sky is overshadowed with gloom.

On such a night the spirit sinks, cheerfulness abandons the heart, and an indefinable anxiety depresses it.

This impression is not peculiar to man, who, on such occasions, is only subject to the same instinctive apprehension which is known to influence the irrational animals.