blotted _revise_,
[Footnote: The uninitiated must be informed, that a second proof-sheet
is so called.] the person, or perhaps I should rather say the Eidolon,
or representative Vision of the AUTHOR OF WAVERLEY! You will not be
surprised at the filial instinct which enabled me at once to
acknowledge the features borne by this venerable apparition, and that
I at once bended the knee, with the classical salutation of, _Salve,
magne parens!_ The vision, however, cut me short, by pointing to a
seat, intimating at the same time, that my presence was not expected,
and that he had something to say to me.
I sat down with humble obedience, and endeavoured to note the features
of him with whom I now found myself so unexpectedly in society. But on
this point I can give your reverence no satisfaction; for, besides the
obscurity of the apartment, and the fluttered state of my own nerves,
I seemed to myself overwhelmed by a sense of filial awe, which
prevented my noting and recording what it is probable the personage
before me might most desire to have concealed. Indeed, his figure was
so closely veiled and wimpled, either with a mantle, morning-gown, or
some such loose garb, that the verses of Spenser might well have been
applied--
"Yet, certes, by her face and physnomy,
Whether she man or woman only were,
That could not any creature well descry.
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