It is
not what we believe, as I said before, that frightens us commonly, but
what we conceive. A principle that reaches a good way if I am not
mistaken. I say, then, that, if these odd sounds coming from the Little
Gentleman's chamber sometimes make me nervous, so that I cannot get to
sleep, it is not because I suppose he is engaged in any unlawful or
mysterious way. The only wicked suggestion that ever came into my head
was one that was founded on the landlady's story of his having a pile of
gold; it was a ridiculous fancy; besides, I suspect the story of sweating
gold was only one of the many fables got up to make the Jews odious and
afford a pretext for plundering them. As for the sound like a woman
laughing and crying, I never said it was a woman's voice; for, in the
first place, I could only hear indistinctly; and, secondly, he may have
an organ, or some queer instrument or other, with what they call the vox
humana stop. If he moves his bed round to get away from the window, or
for any such reason, there is nothing very frightful in that simple
operation.
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