m everywhere he went;
still, I think I suffered a shade more than the legitimate hero does, he
being privileged to soften his misery with the reflection that his glory
was at any rate golden and reproachless in its origin, whereas I had no
such privilege, there being no possible way to make mine respectable.

How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo
that work again! Thirty-five years after those evil exploits of mine I
visited my old mother, whom I had not seen for ten years; and being
moved by what seemed to me a rather noble and perhaps heroic impulse, I
thought I would humble myself and confess my ancient fault. It cost me a
great effort to make up my mind; I dreaded the sorrow that would rise in
her face, and the shame that would look out of her eyes; but after long
and troubled reflection, the sacrifice seemed due and right, and I
gathered my resolution together and made the confession.

To my astonishment there were no sentimentalities, no dramatics, no
George Washington effects; she was not moved in the least degree; she
simply did not believe me, and said so! I was not merely disappointed, I
was nettled, to have my costly truthfulness flung out of the market in
this placid and confident way when I was expecting to get a profit out
of it. I asserted, and reasserted, with rising heat, my statement that
every single thing I had done on those long-vanished nights was a lie
and a swindle; and when she shook her head tranquilly and said she knew
better, I put up my hand and _swore_ to it--adding a triumphant "_Now_
what do you say?"

It did not affect her at all; it did not budge her the fraction of an
inch from her position. If this was hard for me to endure, it did not
begin with the blister she put upon the raw when she began to put my
sworn oath out of court with _arguments_ to prove that I was under a
delusion and did not know what I was talking about. Arguments! Arguments
to show that a person on a man's outside can know better what is on his
inside than he does himself! I had cherished some contempt for arguments
before, I have not enlarged my respect for them since. She refused to
believe that I had invented my visions myself; she said it was folly:
that I was only a child at the time and could not have done it. She
cited the Richmond fire and the colonial mansion and said they were
quite beyond my capacities. Then I saw my chance! I said she was
right--I didn't invent those, I