Observations placeholder
Madame de Saulee has a premonition of her husband’s death
Identifier
022722
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Flammarion, C., Carroll, L, - Death and its mystery: before death
203 DEATH AND ITS MYSTERY
In our childhood we had often seen, in our family, a lady about forty years old, who was named Madame de Saulee. Her husband was a rich planter in Santo Domingo. Both of them had come to live in France at the time of the Revolution. Monsieur de Saulee made many trips to the islands, during which he left his wife in Paris. Madame de Saulee was a very good woman, quite simple, not at all nervous, having no belief in those foolish imaginings that easily affect us. During her husband's last trip she was at a gathering one evening where she was playing a game of cards. AII at once she cried out, falling back in her seat, 'Monsieur de Saulee is dead!"
Every one hastened to her and pointed out that such a vision must certainly be false, and her reason once more resumed control. Nevertheless, when she was alone, she could not entirely shake off the presentiment that stifled her, and she waited for news of her husband with fearful anxiety. She received reassuring letters, but their date preceded the day of her vision.
Finally a letter came from Santo Domingo, sealed in black, a letter which was not addressed in Monsieur de Saulee's handwriting. The letter was from another planter and sent to a third person, to lessen the violence of the shock: Monsieur de Saulee was dead, murdered by negroes on the very day on which Madame de Saulee had received the terrible blow. This double event, attested by more than twenty persons of good standing in the community, was one of those which most impressed me during my early years. Ten years had passed since then, when we saw Madame de Saulee again, still dressed in the eternal mourning to which she had vowed herself.