ing spirit he had displayed.
A few weeks after his departure a letter which he wrote from London,
detailing his adventures in the great metropolis, was read in my
presence to a circle of admiring friends with expressions of wonder
and surprise. This little circumstance made it clear to me that
the easiest way out of my difficulty was to out the Gordian knot,
run away from Dr. Foshay, and join my father in New England.

No doubt the uppermost question in the mind of the reader will be:
Why did you wait so long without having a clear understanding with
the doctor? Why not ask him to his face how he expected you to
remain with him when he had failed in his pledges, and demand that
he should either keep them or let you go?

One answer, perhaps the first, must be lack of moral courage to face
him with such a demand. I have already spoken of the mystery which
seemed to enshroud his personality, and of the fascination which,
through it, he seemed to exercise over me. But behind this was
the conviction that he could not do anything for me were he ever so
well disposed. That he was himself uneducated in many essentials of
his profession had gradually become plain enough; but what he knew
or possibly might know remained a mystery. I had heard occasional
allusions, perhaps from Mrs. Foshay rather than from himself, to an
institution supposed to be in Maine, where he had studied medicine,
but its name and exact location were never mentioned. Altogether,
if I told him of my intention, it could not possibly do any good,
and he might be able to prevent my carrying it out, or in some other
way to do much harm. And so I kept silent.

Tuesday, September 13, 1853, was the day on which I fixed for the
execution of my plan. The day previous I was so abstracted as to
excite remarks both from Mrs. Foshay and her girl help, the latter
more than once declaring me crazy when I made some queer blunder.
The fact is I was oppressed by the feeling that the step about to
be taken was the most momentous of my life. I packed a few books
and clothes, including some mementoes of my mother, and took the box
to the stage and post-office in the evening, to be forwarded to an
assumed name in St. John the next afternoon. This box I never saw
again; it was probably stopped by Foshay before being dispatched.
My plan was to start early in the morning, walk as far as I could
during the day, and, in the evening, take the mail stage when it
should ov