t addressed to
me, and jealously sealed and fastened. My friend's communication ran as
follows:--

"There died here yesterday afternoon a warder, Johnson--he who had that
apoplectic seizure, you will remember, the night before poor Shrike's
exit. I attended him to the end, and, being alone with him an hour before
the finish, he took the enclosed from under his pillow, and a solemn oath
from me that I would forward it direct to you, sealed as you will find
it, and permit no other soul to examine or even touch it. I acquit myself
of the charge, but, my dear fellow, with an uneasy sense of the
responsibility I incur in thus possibly suggesting to you a retrospect of
events which you had much best consign to the limbo of the--not
unexplainable, but not worth trying to explain. It was patent from what
I have gathered that you were in an overstrung and excitable condition at
that time, and that your temporary collapse was purely nervous in its
character. It seems there was some nonsense abroad in the prison about a
certain cell, and that there were fools who thought fit to associate
Johnson's attack and the other's death with the opening of that cell's
door. I have given the new Governor a tip, and he has stopped all that.
We have examined the cell in company, and found it, as one might suppose,
a very ordinary chamber. The two men died perfectly natural deaths, and
there is the last to be said on the subject. I mention it only from the
fear that enclosed may contain some allusion to the rubbish, a perusal of
which might check the wholesome convalescence of your thoughts. If you
take my advice, you will throw the packet into the fire unread. At least,
if you do examine it, postpone the duty till you feel yourself absolutely
impervious to any mental trickery, and--bear in mind that you are a
worthy member of a particularly matter-of-fact and unemotional
profession."

* * * * *

I smiled at the last clause, for I was now in a condition to feel a
rather warm shame over my erst weak-knee'd collapse before a sheet and an
illuminated turnip. I took the packet to my bedroom, shut the door, and
sat myself down by the open window. The garden lay below me, and the dewy
meadows beyond. In the one, bees were busy ruffling the ruddy
gillyflowers and April stocks; in the other, the hedge twigs were all
frosted with Mary buds, as if Spring had brushed them with the fleece of
her wings in passing.

I fetch