ich a cork was restlessly dancing. Further off
no object could be discerned; the inky darkness of the cloudy sky hid
everything from view. The wind howled in a ravine near the lake, like
some caged beast of prey, and the trees near the house groaned under
the weight of the gushing rain. It was an unfavourable moment for
standing near an open window but the stranger seemed to be listening
intently to the dismal sound of the storm which raged without. Only
when the wind drove the rain straight into his face, he moved away, and
paced up and down between the bare walls of the little room, with his
hands crossed behind his back. His face was quite calm, and his eyes
appeared to be looking beyond what surrounded him, into some distant
world.

At last he took writing materials, and a small portfolio from his
travelling pouch, sat down beside the dim candle, and wrote as follows:

"I cannot go to rest, Charles, without bidding you good night. How
weary I am, you must have perceived when we met, unfortunately for so
short a time, six weeks ago. _Then_ I ought to have spoken to you, and
we might have come to an agreement on this chapter on pathology, as we
have done on so many others: Had I done so, I could now have quietly
smoked my last cigar, instead of tiring us both, with this dull
writing, but the words seemed to cleave to my lips. We should have
probably disputed about the matter--Each of us would have maintained
his own opinion, so I thought it useless to spoil the few hours we had
to spend in each other's society. I am well acquainted with your
principles, and know that if you were here, you would endeavour to
reconcile me to existence. But you would wrong me, if you thought that
I had caused this dissension between life and myself which nothing but
a divorce can appease. I would willingly live if I _could_. I am not
such a coward, or so fastidious that a few 'slings and arrows of
outrageous fortune' should drive me distracted and make me take the
resolution to leap out of my skin in the full sense of the word. Who
would throw over the whole concern, and fume against the inscrutable
powers because many things are disagreeable to bear? Are not the
decrees of the eternal powers equally unfathomable and indisputable?
But here lies the fault--I can play the part of a wise man no longer.
The desperate attempt to save reason at least from the general wreck of
soul and mind has failed. Just now when I watched an old cork which