My belief of somewhat preternatural in this appearance was confirmed by recollection of resemblances between these features and those of one who was dead.

In this shape and visage, shadowy and death-like as they were, the lineaments of Wallace, of him who had misled my rustic simplicity on my first visit to this city, and whose death I had conceived to be incontestably ascertained, were forcibly recognised.
This recognition, which at first alarmed my superstition, speedily led to more rational inferences.

Wallace had been dragged to the hospital.
Nothing was less to be suspected than that he would return alive from that hideous receptacle, but this was by no means impossible.

The figure that stood before me had just risen from the bed of sickness, and from the brink of the grave.

The crisis of his malady had passed, and he was once more entitled to be ranked among the living.
This event, and the consequences which my imagination connected with it, filled me with the liveliest joy.