of Kate Dennis. He was careless whether she was in heaven or
hell. Not once, apparently, did it cross his mind that he had destroyed
her young life after nameless horror; that he had killed her in the
bloom of maidenhood; that at one fell swoop he had extinguished all that
she might have been--perhaps a happy wife and mother, living to a white
old age, with the prattle of grandchildren soothing her last steps to
the grave. Such reflections do not occur to gentlemen who are anxious
about their salvation, and in a hurry to get to heaven.

"I and mine"--my fate, my mother, my father, my sisters, my
brothers--this was the sole concern of James Stockwell under the
chaplain's ministrations. In this frame of mind, we presume, he has
sailed to glory, and his family hope to meet him there snug in Abraham's
bosom. Well, we don't. We hope to give the haunt of James Stockwell a
wide berth. If he and others like him are in the upper circles, every
decent person would rather be in the pit.

Let not the reader suppose that James Stockwell's case is uncommon. We
have made a point of reading the letters of condemned murderers,
and thev all bear a family likeness. Religion simply stimulates and
sanctifies selfishness. In selfishness it began and in selfishness it
ends. Extreme cases only show the principle in a glaring light; they do
not alter it, and the light is the light of truth.

James Stockwell has gone to God. No doubt the chaplain of Leeds gaol
feels sure of it. Probably the fellow's relatives are just as sure. But
what of Kate Dennis. Is _she_ with God? What an awful farce it would
be if she were in hell. Perhaps she is. She had no time to prepare for
death. She was cut off "in her sins." But her murderer had three weeks
to prepare for his freehold in New Jerusalem. He qualified himself for
a place with the sore-legged Lazarus. He dwells in the presence of the
Lamb. He drinks of the river of life. He twangs his hallelujah harp and
blows his hallelujah trumpet. Maybe he looks over the battlements and
sees Kate Dennis in Hades. The murderer in heaven, and the victim in
hell! Nay more. It has been held that the bliss of the saved will be
heightened by witnessing the tortures of the damned. In that case Kate
Dennis may burn to make James Stockwell's holiday. He will watch her
writhings with more than the relish of a sportsman who has hooked a
lusty trout. "Ha, ha," the worthy James may exclaim, "I tortured her
before I killed her