resence of the
destined deliverer who was to restore me to my natural place among my
fellow men and women. It was on the Tiber that I met the young maiden
who drew me once more into that inner circle which surrounded young
womanhood with deadly peril for me, if I dared to pass its limits. I was
floating with the stream in the little boat in which I passed many long
hours of reverie when I saw another small boat with a boy and a young
girl in it. The boy had been rowing, and one of his oars had slipped
from his grasp. He did not know how to paddle with a single oar, and was
hopelessly rowing round and round, his oar all the time floating farther
away from him. I could not refuse my assistance. I picked up the oar
and brought my skiff alongside of the boat. When I handed the oar to the
boy the young girl lifted her veil and thanked me in the exquisite music
of the language which

'Sounds as if it should be writ on satin.'

She was a type of Italian beauty,--a nocturne in flesh and blood, if I
may borrow a term certain artists are fond of; but it was her voice which
captivated me and for a moment made me believe that I was no longer shut
off from all relations with the social life of my race. An hour later I
was found lying insensible on the floor of my boat, white, cold, almost
pulseless. It cost much patient labor to bring me back to consciousness.
Had not such extreme efforts been made, it seems probable that I should
never have waked from a slumber which was hardly distinguishable from
that of death.

Why should I provoke a catastrophe which appears inevitable if I invite
it by exposing myself to its too well ascertained cause? The habit of
these deadly seizures has become a second nature. The strongest and the
ablest men have found it impossible to resist the impression produced by
the most insignificant object, by the most harmless sight or sound to
which they had a congenital or acquired antipathy. What prospect have I
of ever being rid of this long and deep-seated infirmity? I may well ask
myself these questions, but my answer is that I will never give up the
hope that time will yet bring its remedy. It may be that the wild
prediction which so haunts me shall find itself fulfilled. I have had of
late strange premonitions, to which if I were superstitious I could not
help giving heed. But I have seen too much of the faith that deals in
miracles to accept the supernatural in any shape,--assuredly when it
comes