is the fault of that
woman, and of her hell-born nymphs. The greater the virtue, the nobler
the triumph, was a sentence for ever in their mouths.--I have had it
several times in my head to set fire to the execrable house; and to watch
at the doors and windows, that not a devil in it escape the consuming
flames. Had the house stood by itself, I had certainly done it.

But, it seems, the old wretch is in the way to be rewarded, without my
help. A shocking letter is received of somebody's in relation to her--
your's, I suppose--too shocking for me, they say, to see at present.*

* See Letter XXV. of this volume.

They govern me as a child in strings; yet did I suffer so much in my
fever, that I am willing to bear with them, till I can get tolerably
well.

At present I can neither eat, drink, nor sleep. Yet are my disorders
nothing to what they were; for, Jack, my brain was on fire day and night;
and had it not been of the asbestos kind, it had all been consumed.

I had no distinct ideas, but of dark and confused misery; it was all
remorse and horror indeed!--Thoughts of hanging, drowning, shooting--then
rage, violence, mischief, and despair, took their turns with me. My
lucid intervals still worse, giving me to reflect upon what I was the
hour before, and what I was likely to be the next, and perhaps for life--
the sport of enemies!--the laughter of fools!--and the hanging-sleeved,
go-carted property of hired slaves; who were, perhaps, to find their
account in manacling, and (abhorred thought!) in personally abusing me by
blows and stripes!

Who can bear such reflections as these? TO be made to fear only, to such
a one as me, and to fear such wretches too?--What a thing was this, but
remotely to apprehend! And yet for a man to be in such a state as to
render it necessary for his dearest friends to suffer this to be done for
his own sake, and in order to prevent further mischief!--There is no
thinking of these things!

I will not think of them, therefore; but will either get a train of
cheerful ideas, or hang myself by to-morrow morning.

---- To be a dog, and dead,
Were paradise, to such a life as mine.

LETTER XXXVIII

MR. LOVELACE, TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 20.

I write to demand back again my last letter. I own it was my mind at
the different times I wrote it; and, whatever ailed me, I could not help
writing it. Such a gloomy impulse came upon me, and increased a