It was this deficiency, I considered, while running over in
      thought the perfect keeping of the character of the premises with
      the accredited character of the people, and while speculating
      upon the possible influence which the one, in the long lapse of
      centuries, might have exercised upon the other—it was this
      deficiency, perhaps, of collateral issue, and the consequent
      undeviating transmission, from sire to son, of the patrimony with
      the name, which had, at length, so identified the two as to merge
      the original title of the estate in the quaint and equivocal
      appellation of the “House of Usher”—an appellation which seemed
      to include, in the minds of the peasantry who used it, both the
      family and the family mansion. I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish
      experiment—that of looking down within the tarn—had been to
      deepen the first singular impression. There can be no doubt that
      the consciousness of the rapid increase of my superstition—for
      why should I not so term it?—served mainly to accelerate the
      increase itself. Such, I have long known, is the paradoxical law
      of all sentiments having terror as a basis. And it might have
      been for this reason only, that, when I again uplifted my eyes to
      the house itself, from its image in the pool, there grew in my
      mind a strange fancy—a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that I but
      mention it to show the vivid force of the sensations which
      oppressed me. I had so worked upon my imagination as really to
      believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an
      atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity—an
      atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but
      which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the gray wall,
      and the silent tarn—a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish,
      faintly discernible, and leaden-hued. Shaking off from my spirit what _must_ have been a dream, I
      scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its
      principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity. The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi overspread
      the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the
      eaves. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary
      dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen; and there
      appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect
      adaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of the
      individual stones. In this there was much that reminded me of the
      specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long
      years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the
      breath of the external air. Beyond this indication of extensive
      decay, however, the fabric gave little token of instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered
      a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of
      the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag
      direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn. Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the house. A servant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the Gothic
      archway of the hall. A valet, of stealthy step, thence conducted
      me, in silence, through many dark and intricate passages in my
      progress to the _studio_ of his master. Much that I encountered
      on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague
      sentiments of which I have already spoken. While the objects
      around me—while the carvings of the ceilings, the sombre
      tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors, and
      the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I strode,
      were but matters to which, or to such as which, I had been
      accustomed from my infancy—while I hesitated not to acknowledge
      how familiar was all this—I still wondered to find how unfamiliar
      were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring up. On one
      of the staircases, I met the physician of the family. His
      countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning
      and perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation and passed on. The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence
      of his master. The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty. The
      windows were long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a distance
      from the black oaken floor as to be altogether inaccessible from
      within. Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their way through
      the trellissed panes, and served to render sufficiently distinct
      the more prominent objects around; the eye, however, struggled in
      vain to reach the remoter angles of the chamber, or the recesses
      of the vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies hung upon the
      walls. The general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique,
      and tattered. Many books and musical instruments lay scattered
      about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene. I felt that
      I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and
      irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all. Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had been
      lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth
      which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone
      cordiality—of the constrained effort of the _ennuyé_ man of the
      world. A glance, however, at his countenance, convinced me of his
      perfect sincerity. We sat down; and for some moments, while he
      spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of
      awe. Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so
      brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It was with difficulty
      that I could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan being
      before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet the
      character of his face had been at all times remarkable. A
      cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous
      beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a
      surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model,
      but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a
      finely moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a
      want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and
      tenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the
      regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not
      easily to be forgotten. And now in the mere exaggeration of the
      prevailing character of these features, and of the expression
      they were wont to convey, lay so much of change that I doubted to
      whom I spoke.