out: he told us
anecdotes of his rascality, and the distresses to which it had brought
him; and he finished by saying: 'Yet you see me now almost rich, and
wholly contented. I have always been the luckiest of human beings; no
matter what ill-chances to-day, good turns up to-morrow. I confess that
I bring on myself the ill, and Providence sends me the good.' We met
accidentally more than once, and his conversation was always of the same
strain--his luck and his rascality: he had no other theme, and no other
boast. And did not this stir into gloomy speculation the depths of my
mind? Was it not an ordination that called upon men to take fortune in
their own hands, when Fate lavished her rewards on this low and creeping
thing, that could only enter even Vice by its sewers and alleys? Was it
worth while to be virtuous, and look on, while the bad seized upon
the feast of life? This man was instinct with the basest passions, the
pettiest desires: he gratified them, and Fate smiled upon his daring. I,
who had shut out from my heart the poor temptations of sense--I, who
fed only the most glorious visions, the most august desires--I, denied
myself their fruition, trembling and spell-bound in the cerements of
human laws, without hope, without reward,--losing the very powers of
virtue because I would not stray into crime.

"These thoughts fell on me darkly and rapidly; but they led to no
result. I saw nothing beyond them. I suffered my indignation to gnaw my
heart; and preserved the same calm and serene demeanour which had grown
with my growth of mind. Nay, while I upbraided Fate, I did not cease to
love mankind. I envied--what? the power to serve them! I had been kind
and loving to all things from a boy; there was not a dumb animal that
would not single me from a crowd as its protector, [Note: All the
authentic anecdotes of Aram corroborate the fact of his natural
gentleness to all things. A clergyman (the Rev. Mr. Hinton) said that he
used frequently to observe Aram, when walking in the garden, stoop down
to remove a snail or worm from the path, to prevent its being destroyed.
Mr. Hinton ingeniously conjectured that Aram wished to atone for his
crime by shewing mercy to every animal and insect: but the fact is, that
there are several anecdotes to shew that he was equally humane before
the crime was committed. Such are the strange contradictions of the
human heart!] and yet I was doomed--but I must not premeditate my tale.
In ret