This tale by Sir Walter Scott is justly reckoned among the most effective ghost stories ever written. Its art lies in its perfect simplicity, which for the moment convinces the reader of its truth and therefore makes the horror of it intensely real. Scott had himself a strain of superstition in his nature, derived in part from his Scottish ancestry and heightened by the strange stories and gruesome legends which had been told him by the peasants around whose fires he had sat at night while still a boy.
His belief in the supernatural appears and reappears in many of his most famous novels, as in the episode of the _Gray Specter_ in "Waverley," the second-sight of _Meg Merrilies_ in "Guy Mannering," and the weird figure of _Norna of the Fitful Head_ in "The Pirate." But no better example can be found of Scott's command of the mysterious as an element in fiction than this short story of "The Tapestried Chamber."
The following narrative is given from the pen, so far as memory permits, in the same character in which it was presented to the author's ear; nor has he claim to further praise, or to be more deeply censured, than in proportion to the good or bad judgment which he has employed in selecting his materials, as he has studiously avoided any attempt at ornament which might interfere with the simplicity of the tale.
At the same time it must be admitted that the particular class of stories which turns on the marvelous, possesses a stronger influence when told than when committed to print. The volume taken up at noonday, though rehearsing the same incidents, conveys a much more feeble impression than is achieved by the voice of the speaker on a circle of fireside auditors, who hang upon the narrative as the narrator details the minute incidents which serve to give it authenticity, and lowers his voice with an affectation of mystery while he approaches the fearful and wonderful part.
It was with such advantages that the present writer heard the following events related, more than twenty years since, by the celebrated Miss Seward, of Litchfield, who, to her numerous accomplishments, added, in a remarkable degree, the power of narrative in private conversation.
In its present form the tale must necessarily lose all the interest which was attached to it by the flexible voice and intelligent features of the gifted narrator. Yet still, read aloud, to an undoubting audience by the doubtful light of the closing evening, or, in silence, by a decaying taper, and amidst the solitude of a half-lighted apartment, it may redeem its character as a good ghost-story.