pen and
paper and take notes of what I tell you. It will be all disjointed; one
day I shall remember this, and another that, but there will not be many
more days on which I shall remember anything at all. I cannot write a
coherent page. You, when I am gone, can piece what I tell you together,
and tell it as I should have told it if I had been still sound. But do
not publish it yet; it might do harm to those dear good people. Take the
notes now, and arrange them the sooner the better, for you may want to
ask me questions, and I shall not be here much longer. Let publishing
wait till you are confident that publication can do no harm; and above
all, say nothing to betray the whereabouts of Erewhon, beyond admitting
(which I fear I have already done) that it is in the Southern
hemisphere."

These instructions I have religiously obeyed. For the first days after
his return, my father had few attacks of loss of memory, and I was in
hopes that his former health of mind would return when he found himself
in his old surroundings. During these days he poured forth the story of
his adventures so fast, that if I had not had a fancy for acquiring
shorthand, I should not have been able to keep pace with him. I
repeatedly urged him not to overtax his strength, but he was oppressed by
the fear that if he did not speak at once, he might never be able to tell
me all he had to say; I had, therefore, to submit, though seeing plainly
enough that he was only hastening the complete paralysis which he so
greatly feared.

Sometimes his narrative would be coherent for pages together, and he
could answer any questions without hesitation; at others, he was now here
and now there, and if I tried to keep him to the order of events he would
say that he had forgotten intermediate incidents, but that they would
probably come back to him, and I should perhaps be able to put them in
their proper places.

After about ten days he seemed satisfied that I had got all the facts,
and that with the help of the pamphlets which he had brought with him I
should be able to make out a connected story. "Remember," he said, "that
I thought I was quite well so long as I was in Erewhon, and do not let me
appear as anything else."

When he had fully delivered himself, he seemed easier in his mind, but
before a month had passed he became completely paralysed, and though he
lingered till the beginning of June, he was seldom more than dimly
conscious of what