I well remember one lovely starlight night, walking on the terrace in front of Somerset House with Henry Fuseli, and whilst speculating on futurity, he told me that he and Lavater had made a solemn agreement, that whichever should die first, would, if permitted, make himself manifest to the other, in some way. Lavater died many years before his friend, but Mr. Fuseli informed me with a sigh, he had never, in any way, waking or dreaming, made himself manifest. It is, perhaps, useless to mention that Fuseli was a classical scholar of very high attainments, and I know that he was a firm, undoubting believer in the immortality of the soul. He died at the ripe age of 86, whilst on a visit to the Dowager Countess of Guilford, and whilst on his death-bed, within an hour of the time his immortal spirit took its flight for a better world, he had an impression that he heard soft sweet music in the room, and faintly inquired of the countess, why she had placed musical snuff-boxes on the bed. Yet the dying man never had an ear for music, and could not distinguish one air from another—music was all perfectly monotonous to him—but the music which he imagined he _then_ heard was to him heavenly. This impression on the _ear_ seems altogether different to that made on the visual organ of many persons on the approach of death. Fervently do we pray that such impressions as visited the dying hour of Henry Fuseli, may equally be the blissful harbinger to eternity of all such good men.
The above story related by a lady, coincides in some degree with a visitation which occurred to Sir Walter Scott and his lady, at Abbotsford, who were both awakened by some extraordinary noise on the premises. He says in a letter—“The night before last, we were awakened by a violent noise, like the drawing of heavy boards along the new part of the house. I fancied something had fallen, and thought no more about it. This was about two in the morning. Last night, at the same witching hour, the very same noises occurred. So I got up, with Beardies’ broad-sword under my arm, but nothing was out of order, neither could I discover what occasioned the disturbance.
“I protest to you, the noise resembled half a dozen men putting up boards and furniture, and nothing can be more certain than that there was nobody on the premises at the time.”