"For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I
neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where
my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not-and very surely do I
not dream. But to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburden my soul. My!
immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly, succinctly, and without
comment, a series of mere household events. In their consequences, these events
have terrified-have tortured-have destroyed me. Yet I will not attempt to
expound them. To me, they have presented little but Horror-to many they will
seem less terrible than barroques. Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found
which will reduce my phantasm to the common-place-some intellect more calm,
more logical, and far less excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the
circumstances I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very
natural causes and effects." what is the effect of beginning a story this way?