The cruel potion had possession of me, and entered into every fibre of
my brain through the avenues prepared for it by the treacherous anodyne;
so that, enervated and intoxicated, I yielded passively, after a brief
struggle, to the power of the then newly-invented sedative, called
chloroform.
When the carriage stopped, or whither it transported me, or who lifted
my insensible form to the chamber prepared for me, I know not--never
knew. There was a faint reviving, I remember; a process of disrobing
gone through by the aid of foreign assistance (whose, I recognized
not), then I slumbered profoundly and securely through the entire night,
to recover no clearness of perception until a late hour on the following
morning.
CHAPTER VI.
I awoke, as I had done of old, after one of my lethargic seizures, from
a deep, unrefreshing slumber, with a lingering sense about me of
drowsiness and even fatigue.
I found myself lying on a broad, canopied bedstead, the massive posts of
which were of wrought rosewood, bare of draperies, as became the season,
save at the head-board, behind which a heavy curtain was dropped of
rose-colored damask satin.
Of the same rich material were composed the tester and the
lightly-quilted coverlet, thrown across the foot of the bed, over a fine
white Marseilles counterpane.
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