1、1The Black Cat 1841by Edgar Allan Poe(1809-1849)For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not -and very surely do I not dream.
2、But to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburden my soul. My immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly, succinctly, and without comment, a series of mere household events. In their consequences, these events have terrified -have tortured -have destroyed me. Yet I will not attempt to ex
3、pound them. To me, they have presented little but Horror -to many they will seem less terrible than baroques. Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the common-place -some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less excitable 2than my own, which will per
4、ceive, in the circumstances I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects.From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to make me the jest of my companions. I was especi
5、ally fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them. This peculiar of character grew with my growth, and in my manhood, I derived from it one of my principal sources of pleasu
6、re. To those who have cherished an affection for a faithful and sagacious dog, I need hardly be at the trouble of explaining the nature or the intensity of the gratification thus derivable. There is something in the unselfish and self-sacrificing love of a brute, which goes directly to the heart of
7、him who has had frequent occasion to test the paltry friendship and gossamer fidelity of mere Man.I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a 3disposition not uncongenial with my own. Observing my partiality for domestic pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring those of the most agreeable
8、kind. We had birds, gold fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat. This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree. In speaking of his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made fr
9、equent allusion to the ancient popular notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise. Not that she was ever serious upon this point -and I mention the matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just now, to be remembered.Pluto -this was the cats name -was my favorite pet
10、 and playmate. I alone fed him, and he attended me wherever I went about the house. It was even with difficulty that I could prevent him from following me through the streets.Our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years, during which my general temperament and character -through the inst
11、rumentality of the Fiend Intemperance -4had (I blush to confess it) experienced a radical alteration for the worse. I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language to my At length, I even offered her personal vi
12、olence. My pets, of course, were made to feel the change in my disposition. I not only neglected, but ill-used them. For Pluto, however, I still retained sufficient regard to restrain me from maltreating him, as I made no scruple of maltreating the rabbits, the monkey, or even the dog, when by accid
13、ent, or through affection, they came in my way. But my disease grew upon me -for what disease is like Alcohol! -and at length even Pluto, who was now becoming old, and consequently somewhat peevish -even Pluto began to experience the effects of my ill temper.One night, returning home, much intoxicat
14、ed, from one of my haunts about town, I fancied that the cat avoided my presence. I seized him; when, in his fright at my violence, he inflicted a slight wound upon my hand with his teeth. The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to 5take
15、 its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fiber of my frame. I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen
16、the damnable atrocity.When reason returned with the morning -when I had slept off the fumes of the nights debauch -I experienced a sentiment half of horror, half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and the soul remained untouched
17、. I again plunged into excess, and soon drowned in wine all memory of the deed.In the meantime the cat slowly recovered. The socket of the lost eye presented, it is true, a frightful appearance, but he no longer appeared to suffer any pain. He went about the house as usual, but, as might be expected
18、, fled in extreme terror at my approach. I had so much of my old heart left, as to be at first grieved by this evident dislike on the part of a creature which had once so loved 6me. But this feeling soon gave place to irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit
19、 of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart -one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which give direction to the character of Man. Who has not
20、, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness
21、, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself -to offer violence to its own nature -to do wrong for the wrongs sake only -that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute. One morning, in cool
22、blood, I slipped a noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree; -hung it with the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart; -hung it because I knew that it had loved me, and because I felt 7it had given me no reason of offense; -hung it because I knew that
23、in so doing I was committing a sin -a deadly sin that would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it -if such a thing were possible -even beyond the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God.On the night of the day on which this cruel deed was done, I was aroused fr
24、om sleep by the cry of fire. The curtains of my bed were in flames. The whole house was blazing. It was with great difficulty that my wife, a servant, and myself, made our escape from the conflagration. The destruction was complete. My entire worldly wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned myself th
25、enceforward to despair. I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity. But I am detailing a chain of facts -and wish not to leave even a possible link imperfect. On the day succeeding the fire, I visited the ruins. The walls, wi
26、th one exception, had fallen in. This exception was found in a compartment wall, not very thick, which stood about the middle of the house, and against which had rested the 8head of my bed. The plastering had here, in great measure, resisted the action of the fire -a fact which I attributed to its h
27、aving been recently spread. About this wall a dense crowd were collected, and many persons seemed to be examining a particular portion of it with every minute and eager attention. The words “strange!“ “singular!“ and other similar expressions, excited my curiosity. I approached and saw, as if graven
28、 in bas relief upon the white surface, the figure of a gigantic cat. The impression was given with an accuracy truly marvelous. There was a rope about the animals neck.When I first beheld this apparition -for I could scarcely regard it as less -my wonder and my terror were extreme. But at length ref
29、lection came to my aid. The cat, I remembered, had been hung in a garden adjacent to the house. Upon the alarm of fire, this garden had been immediately filled by the crowd -by some one of whom the animal must have been cut from the tree and thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. This had
30、probably been done with the view of arousing me from sleep. The falling of other walls had compressed the victim 9of my cruelty into the substance of the freshly-spread plaster; the lime of which, had then with the flames, and the ammonia from the carcass, accomplished the portraiture as I saw it.Al
31、though I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not altogether to my conscience, for the startling fact just detailed, it did not the less fall to make a deep impression upon my fancy. For months I could not rid myself of the phantasm of the cat; and, during this period, there came back into my spi
32、rit a half-sentiment that seemed, but was not, remorse. I went so far as to regret the loss of the animal, and to look about me, among the vile haunts which I now habitually frequented, for another pet of the same species, and of somewhat similar appearance, with which to supply its place.One night
33、as I sat, half stupefied, in a den of more than infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing upon the head of one of the immense hogsheads of Gin, or of Rum, which constituted the chief furniture of the apartment. I had been looking steadily at 10the top of this hogshead fo
34、r some minutes, and what now caused me surprise was the fact that I had not sooner perceived the object thereupon. I approached it, and touched it with my hand. It was a black cat -a very large one -fully as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every respect but one. Pluto had not a white h
35、air upon any portion of his body; but this cat had a large, although indefinite splotch of white, covering nearly the whole region of the breast.Upon my touching him, he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against my hand, and appeared delighted with my notice. This, then, was the very creature
36、 of which I was in search. I at once offered to purchase it of the landlord; but this person made no claim to it -knew nothing of it -had never seen it before. I continued my caresses, and, when I prepared to go home, the animal evinced a disposition to accompany me. I permitted it to do so; occasionally stooping and patting it as I proceeded. When it reached the house it domesticated itself at once, and became immediately a great favorite with my wife.
