John Galsworthy

“ It floated past through the archway, toward those eyes. Who was it laughed in there? The old South itself—that incredible, fine, lost soul! That "old-time" thing of old ideals, blindfolded by its own history! That queer, proud blend of simple chivalry and tyranny, of piety and the abhorrent thing! Who was it laughed out of that old slave-market, at these white eyeballs glaring from out of the blackness of this dark cattle-pen? What poor departed soul in this House of Melancholy? But there was no ghost when we turned to look—only our old guide with her sweet smile. ”

“ Then the torch died out, and our old guide, pointing through an archway with the blackened stump of it, said:
"'Twas here they kept them—indeed, yes!"
We saw before us a sort of vault, stone-built, and low, and long. The light there was too dim for us to make out anything but walls, and heaps of rusting scrap-iron cast out there and mouldering down. But trying to pierce that darkness we became conscious of innumerable eyes gazing, not at us, but through the archway where we stood; innumerable white eyeballs gleaming out of blackness. ”

“ Here they all came—'twas the finest hotel—before the war-time; old Southern families—bought their property. Yes, ma'am, very interesting! This way! And here were the bells to all the rooms. Broken, you see—all broken!"
And rather quickly we passed away, out of that "old-time place"; where something had laughed, and the drip, drip, drip of water down the walls was as the sound of a spirit grieving. ”