note of twenty pounds. I had no doubt that he had been
charged to deliver it to me from Mr. Falkland.

What was I to infer? what light did it throw upon the intentions of my
inexorable persecutor? his animosity against me was as great as ever;
that I had just had confirmed to me from his own mouth. Yet his
animosity appeared to be still tempered with the remains of humanity. He
prescribed to it a line, wide enough to embrace the gratification of his
views, and within the boundaries of that line it stopped. But this
discovery carried no consolation to my mind. I knew not what portion of
calamity I was fated to endure, before his jealousy of dishonour, and
inordinate thirst of fame would deem themselves satisfied.

Another question offered itself. Was I to receive the money which had
just been put into my hands? the money of a man who had inflicted upon
me injuries, less than those which he had entailed upon himself, but the
greatest that one man can inflict upon another? who had blasted my
youth, who had destroyed my peace, who had held me up to the abhorrence
of mankind, and rendered me an outcast upon the face of the earth? who
had forced the basest and most atrocious falsehoods, and urged them with
a seriousness and perseverance which produced universal belief? who, an
hour before, had vowed against me inexorable enmity, and sworn to entail
upon me misery without end? Would not this conduct on my part betray a
base and abject spirit, that crouched under tyranny, and kissed the
hands that were imbrued in my blood?

If these reasons appeared strong, neither was the other side without
reasons in reply. I wanted the money: not for any purpose of vice or
superfluity, but for those purposes without which life cannot subsist.
Man ought to be able, wherever placed, to find for himself the means of
existence; but I was to open a new scene of life, to remove to some
distant spot, to be prepared against all the ill-will of mankind, and
the unexplored projects of hostility of a most accomplished foe. The
actual means of existence are the property of all. What should hinder me
from taking that of which I was really in want, when, in taking it, I
risked no vengeance, and perpetrated no violence? The property in
question will be beneficial to me, and the voluntary surrender of it is
accompanied with no injury to its late proprietor; what other condition
can be necessary to render the use of it on my part a duty? He that
lately pos