which I laboured. But my distempered thoughts
confounded them together. I cursed the whole system of human existence.
I said, "Here I am, an outcast, destined to perish with hunger and cold.
All men desert me. All men hate me. I am driven with mortal threats
from the sources of comfort and existence. Accursed world! that hates
without a cause, that overwhelms innocence with calamities which ought
to be spared even to guilt! Accursed world! dead to every manly
sympathy; with eyes of horn, and hearts of steel! Why do I consent to
live any longer? Why do I seek to drag on an existence, which, if
protracted, must be protracted amidst the lairs of these human tigers?"

This paroxysm at length exhausted itself. Presently after, I discovered
a solitary shed, which I was contented to resort to for shelter. In a
corner of the shed I found some clean straw. I threw off my rags, placed
them in a situation where they would best be dried, and buried myself
amidst this friendly warmth. Here I forgot by degrees the anguish that
had racked me. A wholesome shed and fresh straw may seem but scanty
benefits; but they offered themselves when least expected, and my whole
heart was lightened by the encounter. Through fatigue of mind and body,
it happened in this instance, though in general my repose was remarkably
short, that I slept till almost noon of the next day. When I rose, I
found that I was at no great distance from the ferry, which I crossed,
and entered the town where I intended to have rested the preceding
night.

It was market-day. As I passed near the cross, I observed two people
look at me with great earnestness: after which one of them exclaimed, "I
will be damned if I do not think that this is the very fellow those men
were enquiring for who set off an hour ago by the coach for ----." I was
extremely alarmed at this information; and, quickening my pace, turned
sharp down a narrow lane. The moment I was out of sight I ran with all
the speed I could exert, and did not think myself safe till I was
several miles distant from the place where this information had reached
my ears. I have always believed that the men to whom it related were the
very persons who had apprehended me on board the ship in which I had
embarked for Ireland; that, by some accident, they had met with the
description of my person as published on the part of Mr. Falkland; and
that, from putting together the circumstances, they had been led to
believe that this