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The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe. For the most wild yet most homely

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narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief,

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Mad, Indeed would I be to
expect it in a case where my very

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senses reject their own evidence. Yet, Mad, I am not, and

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very surely do I not dream.
But to morrow I die, and to

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day I would unburden my soul.
My immediate purpose is to place before the

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world, plainly, succinctly, and
without comment, a series of mere household

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events. In their consequences. These
events have terrified, have tortured, have

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destroyed me. Yet I will not
attempt to expound them. To me,

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they have presented little but whore to
many. They will seem less bearable than

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baroques. Hereafter, perhaps some intellect
may be found which will reduce my phantasm

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to the commonplace, some intellect more
calm, more logical, and far less

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excitable than my own, which will
perceive, in the circumstances I detail with

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awe nothing more than an ordinary succession
of very natural causes and effects. From

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my infancy. I was noted for
the docility and humanity of my disposition.

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My tenderness of heart was even so
conspicuous as to make me the jest of

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my companions. I was especially fond
of animals, and was indulged by my

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parents with a great variety of pets. With these I spent most of my

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time, and never was so happy
as when feeding and caressing them. This

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peculiarity of character grew with my growth
and in my manhood. I derived from

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one of my principal sources of pleasure. To those who have cherished an affection

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for a faithful and sagacious dog,
I need hardly be at the trouble of

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explaining the nature or the intensity of
the gratification thus deliverable. There is something

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in the unselfish and self sacrificing love
of a brute which goes directly to the

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heart of him who has had frequent
occasion to test the paltry friendship and gossamer

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fidelity of mere man. I married
early, and was happy to find in

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my wife a disposition not uncongenial with
my own. Observing my partiality for domestic

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pets, she lost no opportunity of
procuring those of the most agreeable kind.

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We had birds, goldfish, a
fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey,

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and a cat. This latter was
a remarkable, large and beautiful animal,

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entirely black and sagacious to an astonishing
degree. In speaking of his intelligence,

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my wife, who at heart was
not a little tincture with superstition,

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made frequent allusions to the ancient popular
notion which regarded all black cats as witches

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in disguise. Not that she was
ever serious upon this point, And I

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mentioned the matter at all for no
better reason than that it happens just now

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to be remembered. Pluto, this
was the cat's name, was my favorite

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pet and playmate. I alone fed
him, and he attended me wherever I

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went about the house. It was
even with difficulty that I could prevent him

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from following me through the streets.
Our friendship lasted in this manner for several

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years, during which my general temperament
and character, through the instrumentality of the

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fiend in temperance, had I blushed
to confess, it, experienced a radical

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alteration. For the worse. I
grew day by day more moody, more

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irritable, more regardless of the feelings
of others, I suffered myself to use

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intemperate languish to my wife. At
length, I even offered her personal violence.

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My pets, of course, were
made to feel the change in my

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disposition. I not only neglected them, but ill used them. For Pluto,

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however, I still retained sufficient regard
to restrain me from maltreating him,

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as I made no scruple of maltreating
the rabbits, the monkey, or even

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the dog, when by accident or
through affection, they came in my way.

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But my disease grew upon me,
for what disease is like alcohol,

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And at length even Tuto, who
was now becoming old and consequently somewhat peevish.

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Even Pluto began to experience the effects
of my ill temper. One night,

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returning home, much intoxicated from one
of my haunts about town, I

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fancied that the cat avoided my presence. I seized him, when, in

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his fright at my violence, he
inflicted a slight wound upon my hand with

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his teeth. The fury of a
demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself

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no longer. My original soul seemed
at once to take its flight from my

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body, and a more than fiendish
malevolence gin nurtured thrilled every fiber of my

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frame. I took from my waistcoat
pocket a penknife. Opened it, grasped

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the poor beast by the throat,
and deliberately cut one of his eyes from

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the socket. I blush, I
burn, I shudder while I pen the

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damnable atrocity. When reason returned with
the morning, when I had slept off

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the fumes of the night's debauch,
I experienced a sentiment half of horror,

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half of remorse for the crime of
which I had been guilty. But it

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was at best a feeble and equivocal
feeling, and the soul remained untouched.

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I again plunged into excess, and
soon drowned in wine all memory of the

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deed. In the meantime, the
cat slowly recovered the socket of the lost

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eye presented, is true a frightful
appearance, but he no longer appeared to

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suffer any pain. He went about
the house as usual, but as might

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be expected, fled in extreme tear
at my approach. I had so much

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of my old heart left as to
be at first grieved by this evident dislike

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on the part of a creature which
had once so loved me. But this

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feeling soon gave place to irritation,
and then came, as if to my

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final and irrevocable overthrow. The spirit
of perverseness of this spirit, philosophy takes

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no account. Yet I am not
more sure that my soul lives than I

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am that perverseness is one of the
primitive impulses of the human heart, one

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of the indivisible primary faculties or sentiments, which give direction to the character of

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man, who has not hundreds of
times found himself committing a vile or silly

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action for no other reason than because
he knows he should not. Have We

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not a perpetual inclination in the teeth
of our best judgment to violate that which

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is law, merely because we understand
it to be such. This spirit of

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perverseness, I say, came to
my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable

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longing of the soul to vex itself, to offer violence to its own nature,

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to do wrong for wrong's sake,
only that urged me to continue,

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and finally, to consummate the injury
I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute.

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One morning, in cold blood,
I slipped a noose about its neck and

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hung it to the limb of a
tree. Hung it with the tears streaming

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from my eyes and the bitterest remorse
at my heart. Hung it because I

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knew that it had loved me,
and because I felt it had given me

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no offense. Hung it because I
knew that in so doing I was committing

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a sin, a deadly sin that
would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to

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place it if such a thing were
possible, even beyond the reach of the

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infinite mercy of the most merciful and
most terrible God. On the night of

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the day on which this cruel deed
was done, I was aroused from sleep

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by the cry of fire. The
curtains of my bed were in flames.

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The whole house was blazing. It
was with great difficulty that my wife,

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a servant, and myself made our
escape from the conflagration. The destruction was

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complete, My entire worldly wealth was
swallowed up, and I resigned myself thenceforward

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to despair. I am above the
weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of

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cause and effect between the disaster and
the atrocity. But I am telling a

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chain of facts, and wished not
to leave even a possible link imperfect.

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On the days succeeding the fire,
I visited the ruins the walls, with

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one exception had fallen in. This
exception was found in a compartment wall not

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very thick, which stood about the
middle of the house, and against which

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had rested the head of my bed. The plastering had here in great measure

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resisted the action of the fire,
a fact which I attribute to its having

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been recently spread about this wall.
A dense crowd were collected, and many

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persons seemed to be examining a particular
portion of it with very minute and eager

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attention. The words strange, singular, and other similar expressions excited my curiosity.

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I approached and saw, as if
graven in base relief, upon the

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white surface, the figure of a
gigantic cat. The impression was given with

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an accuracy truly marvelous. There was
a rope about the animal's neck. When

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I first beheld this apparition, for
I could scarcely regard it as less.

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My wonder and my terror were extreme, But at length reflection came to my

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aid. The cat I remembered had
been hung in a garden adjacent to the

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house. Upon the alarm of fire. This garden had been immediately filled by

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the crowd, by some one of
whom the animal must have been cut from

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the tree and thrown through an open
window in my chamber. This had probably

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been done with a view of arousing
me from sleep. The falling of other

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walls had compressed the victim of my
cruelty into the substance of the freshly spread

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plaster, the lime of which,
with the flames and the ammonia from the

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carcass, had then accomplished the portraiture
as I saw it. Although I thus

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readily accounted to my reason, if
not altogether to my conscience, for the

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startling fact just detailed, it did
not the less fail to make a deep

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impression upon my fancy. For months
I could not rid myself of the phantasm

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of the cat, And during this
period there came back into my spirit a

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half sentiment that seemed but was not
remorse. I went so far as to

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regret the loss of the animal,
and to look about me among the vile

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haunts which I now habitually frequented,
for another pet of the same species,

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and of somewhat similar appearance, with
which to supply its place. One night,

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as I sat half stupefied in a
den of more than infamy. My

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attention was suddenly drawn to some black
object reposing upon the head of one of

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the immense hogheads of gin or of
Rum, which constituted the chief furniture of

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the apartment. I had been looking
steadily at the top of this hogshead for

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some minutes, and what now caused
me surprise was the fact that I had

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not sooner perceived the object. Thereupon
I approached it and touched it with my

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hand. It was a black cat, a very large one, fully as

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large as Pluto, and closely resembling
him in every respect, But only Pluto

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had not a white hair upon any
portion of his body. But this cat

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had a large, although indefinite,
splotch of white covering nearly the whole region

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of the breast. Upon touching him, he immediately arose, purred, loudly,

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rubbed against my hand, and appeared
delighted with my notice. This,

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then, was the very creature of
which I was in search. I at

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once offered to purchase it of the
landlord, but this person made no claim

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to it, knew nothing of it, had never seen it before. I

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continued my caresses, and when I
prepared to go home, the animal evinced

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a disposition to accompany me. I
permitted it to do so, occasionally stooping

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and patting it as I proceeded.
When it reached the house, it domesticated

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itself at once and became immediately a
great favorite with my wife. For my

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own part, I soon found a
dislike to it arising within me. This

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was just the reverse of what I
had anticipate, But I know not how

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or why it was. Its evident
fondness for myself rather disgusted and annoyed me.

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By slow degrees, these feelings of
disgust and annoyance rose into the bitterness

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of hatred. I avoided the creature, a certain sense of shame, and

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the remembrance of my former deed of
cruelty preventing me from physically abusing it.

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I did not for some week strike
or otherwise violently ill use it. But

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gradually, very gradually, I came
to look upon it with unutterable loathing,

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and to flee silently from its odious
presence, as from the breath of a

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pestilence. What added no doubt to
my hatred of the beast was the discovery,

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on the morning after I brought it
home that, like Pluto, it

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all so had been deprived of one
of its eyes. This circumstance, however,

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only endeared it to my wife,
who, as I have already said,

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possessed in a high degree that humanity
of feeling, which had once been

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my distinguishing trait and the source of
many of my simplest and purest pleasures.

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With my aversion to this cat,
however, its partiality for myself seemed to

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increase. It followed my footsteps with
a pernacity which it would be difficult to

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make the reader comprehend. Whenever I
sat, it would crouch beneath my chair,

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or spring upon my knees, covering
me with its loathsome caresses. If

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I arose to walk, it would
get between my feet and thus nearly throw

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me down, or fastening its long
and sharp claws in my dress, clamber

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in its manner to my breast.
At such times, although I longed to

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destroy it with a blow, I
was yet withheld from doing so, partly

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by a memory of my former crime, but chiefly, let me confess it

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at once, by absolute dread of
the beast. This dread was not exactly

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a dread of physical evil. And
yet I should be at a loss how

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otherwise to define it. I am
almost ashamed to own. Yes, even

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in this felon cell I am almost
ashamed to own that the terror and horror

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with which the animal inspired me had
been heightened by one of the merest chimeras

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it would have been possible to conceive. My wife had called my attention more

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than once to the character of the
mark of white hair of which I have

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spoken, and which constituted the sole
visible difference between the strange beast and the

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one I had destroyed. The reader
will remember that this mark, although large,

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had been originally very indefinite, but
by slow degrees degrees nearly imperceptible,

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and which for a long time my
reasons struggled to reject as fanciful, it

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had at length assumed a rigorous distinctness
of outline. It was now the representation

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of an object that I shudder to
name, And for this above all I

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loathed and dreaded, and would have
rid myself of the monster had I dared.

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It was now, I say,
the image of a hideous, of

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a ghastly thing, of the gallows, oh mournful and terrible engine of horror,

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and of cras time of agony and
of death. And now was I

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indeed wretched beyond the wretchedness of mere
humanity, and a brute beast whose fellow

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I had contemptuously destroyed, A brute
beast to work out for me, for

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me, a man fashioned in the
image of the High God, so much

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of insufferable woe, alas neither by
day nor night knew I the blessing of

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rest anymore. During the former,
the creature left me no moment alone,

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And in the latter I started,
hourly from dreams of unutterable fear to find

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the hot breath of a thing upon
my face, and its vast weight,

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an incarnate nightmare that I had no
power to shake off, incumbent eternally upon

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my heart. Beneath the pressure of
torments such as these, the feeble remnants

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of the good within me succumbed.
Evil thoughts became my sole inmates, the

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darkest of most evil thoughts. The
moodiness of my usual temper increased to hatred

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of all things and of all mankind, while from the sudden, frequent,

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and ungovernable outbursts of fury to which
I now blindly abandoned myself, my uncomplaining

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wife alas was the most usual and
the most patient of sufferers. One day

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she accompanied me upon some household errand
into the cellar of the old building which

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our poverty compelled us to inhabit.
The cat followed me down the steep stairs,

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and nearly throwing me headlong, exasperated
me to madness. Lifting an axe

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and forgetting in my wrath the childish
dread which had hitherto stayed my hand.

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I aimed a blow at the animal, which of course would have proved instantly

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fatal had it descended as I wished. But this blow was arrested by the

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hand of my wife. Goaded by
the interference into a rage more than demoniacal,

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I withdrew my arm from her grasp
and buried the axe in her brain.

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She fell dead upon the spot without
a groan. This hideous murder accomplished.

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I set myself forthwith and with entire
deliberation, to the task of concealing

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the body. I knew that I
could not remove it from the house,

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either by day or by night,
without the risk of being observed by the

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neighbors. Many projects entered my mind. At one period I thought of cutting

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the corpse into minute fragments and destroying
them by fire. At another I resolved

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to dig a grave for it in
the floor of the cellar. Again,

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I deliberated about casting it into the
well in the yard, about packing it

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in a box as if merchandise,
with the usual arrangements, and so getting

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a porter to take it from the
house. Finally I hit upon what I

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considered a far better expedient than either
of these. I determined to wall it

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up in the cellar, as the
monks of the Middle Ages I recorded to

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have walled up their victims for a
purpose such as this. The cellar was

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well adapted. Its walls were loosely
constructed, and had lately been plastered throughout

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with a rough plaster, which the
dampness of the atmosphere had prevented from hardening.

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Moreover, in one of the walls
was a projection caused by a false

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chimney or fireplace that had been filled
up and made to resemble the rest of

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the cellar. I made no doubt
that I could readily displace the bricks at

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this point, insert the corpse,
and wall the whole up as before,

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so that no eye could detect anything
suspicious. And in this calculation. I

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was not deceived by means of a
crowbar. I easily dislodged the bricks,

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and having carefully deposited the body against
the inner wall, I propped it in

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that position, while with little trouble, I relayed the whole structure as it

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originally stood, Having procured murder,
sand and hair with every possible precaution,

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I prepared a plaster which could not
be distinguished from the old, and with

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this I very carefully went over the
new brickwork. When I had finished,

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I felt satisfied that all was right. The wall did not present the slightest

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appearance of having been disturbed. The
rubbish on the floor was picked up with

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the minutest care. I looked around
triumphantly and said to myself, here at

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last, then my labor has not
been in vain. My next step was

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to look for the beast which had
been the cause of so much wretchedness,

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for I had at length firmly resolved
to put it to death. Had I

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been able to meet with it at
the moment, there could have been no

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doubt of its fate. But it
appeared that the crafty animal had been alarmed

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at the violence of my previous anger, and forbore to present itself in my

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present mood. It is impossible to
describe or imagine the deep, the blissful

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sense of relief which the absence of
the detested creature occasioned in my bosom.

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It did not make its appearance during
the night, and thus for one night

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at least, since its introduction into
the house, I soundly and tranquility slept.

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I slept, even with the burden
of murder upon my soul. The

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second and third day passed, and
still my tormentor came not once again.

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I breathed as a free man.
The monster in terror had fled the premises,

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forever I should behold it no more. My happiness was supreme. The

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guilt of my dark deed disturbed me
but a little. Some few inquiries had

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been made, but these had been
readily answered. Even a search had been

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instituted, but of course nothing was
to be discovered. I looked upon my

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future felicity as secured. Upon the
fourth day of the assassination, a party

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of the police came very unexpectedly into
the house and proceeded again to make a

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rigorous investigation of the premises. Secure. However, in the inscrutability of my

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place of concealment. I felt no
embarrassment whatever. The officers bade me to

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accompany them in their search. They
left no nook or corner unexplored. At

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length. For the third or fourth
time they descended into the cellar, I

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quivered not in a muscle. My
heart beat as calmly as that of one

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whose slumbers in innocence. I walked
the cellar from end to end. I

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folded my arms upon my bosom,
and roamed easily to and fro. The

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police were thoroughly satisfied and prepared to
depart. The glee at my heart was

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too strong to be restrained. I
burned to say but one word by way

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of triumph, and to render doubly
sure their assurance of my guiltlessness. Gentlemen,

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I said at last, as the
party ascended the steps, I delight

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to have allayed your suspicions. I
wish you all health and a little more

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courtesy. By the bye, gentlemen, this this is a very well constructed

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house. In the rabbit desire to
say something easily, I scarcely knew what

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I uttered it all, I may
say, an excellently well constructed house these

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walls. Are you going, gentlemen? These walls are solidly put together.

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And here, through the mere frenzy
of bravado, I rapped heavily with a

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cane, which I held in my
hand, upon that very portion of the

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brick, behind which stood the corpse
of the wife of my bosom. But

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may God shield and deliver me from
the fangs of the arch fiend. No

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sooner had the reverberation of my blows
sunk into the silence, than I was

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answered by a voice from within the
tomb, by a cry, at first

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muffled and broken, like the sobbing
of a child, and then quickly swelling

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into one long, loud and continuous
scream, utterly anomalous and inhuman, a

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howl, a wailing shriek, half
of horror and half of triumph, such

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as might have arisen only out of
hell, conjointly from the throats of the

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damned in their agony, and of
the demons that exalted in the damnation of

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my own thoughts. It's folly to
speak swooning, I staggered to the opposite

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wall. For an instant. The
party upon the stairs remained motionless through extremity

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of terror, and of awe,
and the next a dozen stout arms were

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toiling at the wall. It fell
bodily. The corpse, already getting decayed

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and clotted with gore, stood erect
before the eyes of the spectators. Upon

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its head, with red extended mouth
and solitary terry eye of fire set the

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hideous beast, whose craft had seduced
me into murder, and whose informing voice

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had consigned me to the hangman.
I had walled the monster up within the

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tomb end of the Black Cat