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Istained with tears. Some one when I am dead and mouldered, even here where I am now sitting, will see the sheet; will know of the anguish that now heaves and swells my bosom, and blinds my eyes; will regard the heap of ashes at his feet, and breathe a sigh of commiseration at my dreadful fate. How wonderfully are we human beings bound together, that the pity even of strangers, people whom I shall never see-nay more, that the hope, the dim possibility of it, should soften the rugged horrors by which I am encompassed, and shoot a momentary ray of cheerful feeling through the passages of my crushed and dreary heart. If we are thus knit together by mysterious ties, what a fate is mine! Solitude! ****

Deep, utter, eternal, unchangeable solitude; perpetual shadow and confinement. Never again to see the human face, to hear the human voice; never again to look on nature; never to see the sky, to feel the breeze, to tread on the elastic grass, to lean my ear to the rustle of leaves, to watch the rippling of brooks, and be lulled by the warbling of birds. It is impossible. It cannot be that any one, even if I had been guilty of the charge alleged against me, it cannot be that they will really doom me to this fate, till death. Ah see! night is coming on. I have already become familiar with all the little variations perceptible in this dim sepulchre. I can detect the change of light. The shadows will now thicken rapidly. My invisible keeper will presently send in my pittance of food and drink. These shadows have now darkened many times, and wrapped me in complete gloom. See how dimly the bleak rough walls look already. Ah, now the magnificent sun is verging toward the western horizon, signing millions of weary and grateful laborers to leave their toil. The eyes of my happy fellow creatures are turned on him from the land and the sea. His disc is broad and round; half the heavens is overflowed with rosy waves, and reflects its subdued splendors down upon the earth, kissing fragrant flowers, and painting velvet grass with the lengthened shadows of a thousand peaceful and lovely objects. In some places silver waves are washing up gently, and breaking on the sparkling beach; in others the cottager-happy, happy man-is returning to his VOL. II.-3

simple home; his affectionate wife, his dear and beautiful children. Gradually the twilight steals over the scene, and then the round moon and many stars commence their still courses in the ascending heavens, hushing all to silence, and touching every thing with quiet lustre; and lovers rove through paths perfumed with flowers, while I-these gushing tears-will their source never be dry? It grows darker and darker. I will lie down and hide my face. God of the innocent assist me. Thou canst humble the proud, thou canst lift up the penitent-calm the anguish of my thoughts. If I must drink this bitter cup to the dregs, cheer me in my affliction with thoughts of thee. ****

Days have passed. Dreadful, still, lonely; a monstrous monotony. My greatest joy is to watch for the first sign of morning. I always wake before it approaches, and am almost happy when I discover it. Oh, if the direct sunbeams could visit this dark chamber! If I might once more see his lucid touch on the wall. But no, the light which comes to me must be reflected from some other wall. I cannot see from the high window, if window it may be called. I shall never see sunshine again! ****

I have found a new amusement. I refrain from eating till I am more than usually hungry, and my scanty meal then affords me a sort of temptation, against which to struggle.

I have made a list of all the books I ever read, and put down every thing I can remember concerning them. This I have committed to memory. ****

I believe I shall be released from these horrors, at least I often reason myself into that opinion. It makes me very happy. I used to be exceedingly fond of singing. I have sung all my old songs over and over again. This I do till I am fatigued, fatigue begets the want of sleep, and rest gives me refreshment and new strength. ****

It is unusually dark today, and I am certain I heard thunder, so there is a storm without. How strange to feel that it is nothing whatever to me, unless it would roll these stupendous towers from their base, and restore a poor wretch to the blessed, blessed light of day. is extremely distressing, but I cannot at this moment

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remember where I am. I was conveyed here in a carriage, nearly delirious with horror, and I neglected to observe the way. It would be something of a consolation for me to know where I am, that I might fancy what is passing without the walls. ****

I have been delighted-strange word to use in such a place-but nevertheless I have been delighted with the plan, which suddenly struck me, of composing new words to all the old songs with which I am acquainted. What an amusement! I shall confine myself to one in three days, so as to vary the employment with others of a different kind. ****

The shadows of night have often darkened on the walls since the above. I have produced many songs. I compose them aloud, without the pen. I think several of them are good. If ever I get free, with what emotions I shall recollect them. ****

Time rolls on. I am yet in this solitary dungeon. No tears come to me now. I have no more impulses of feeling. The current of my sensibilities is stagnant. My soul is benumbed. I had a presentiment last night that I was to be released. I watched all night to hear the slightest sound, leaning my ear down against the bottom of the door. Father of heaven, will they never come?

What strange reflections I have had lately. The incidents of my early life seem uppermost in my mind. Ten years ago!-it seems but yesterday-ten years ago I was a happy glowing boy. God! if I had been told, while I stood on the hill side, looking down into my native valley, that in ten fleeting years I should be doomed to perpetual, solitary confinement, what horror would have seized my faculties! I can see, absolutely see before me the forms of those with whom I then used to associate. My father, my mother, my brother. Where are they now? Are they at all? Sometimes I think they never had existence, except in my own brain, that I have never been outside this cavern, that nature placed me here, and that all the remembrances of mankind, which crowd on me sometimes, are only dreams; at least they are no more to me. I shall never see them, never hear them, or know any thing of them again. Suppose they are all destroyed-well, I am in all respects the same. They live to me only in idea. They are phantoms-beautiful, dear, beloved-but still

phantoms. Perhaps they never did live. Perhaps they once lived, but are now ashes; or they are yet living, loving, and rejoicing. They have mourned me as dead; they have talked of me, and regretted me, and now their grief is quelled, and they are happy again, because I am forgotten. Oh! could I hear the voice of but one creature I loved, even for a single moment, though it was not addressed to me, I, too, should be happy, exquisitely happy. But I never shall hear it. I am the most crushed and wretched of all beings. I have the horrors of death, without its peace. I am buried alive. The future-awful reflection. In this existence a blank, an utter waste of precious life, of great capacity and energies. My faculties are losing their keenness, and becoming rusty. I am growing to be something different from other human beings. Could these massive walls be suddenly rent apart, and I appear to some festive assembly, what a sight of horror I should present. My gaunt, emaciated face and shrivelled limbs, my masses of knotted and shaggy hair, my long beard, my hollow eyes and blighted form. Oh! beautiful, happy boyhood; dream of delight; when my limbs were round, and full of health and strength; when my cheeks glowed with crimson, and my lips were bright of joy; when my playful sister parted the glossy curls of hair from my forehead, to kiss that forehead with her sweet mouth; even herself would start away and shrink at this hideous, filthy, loathsome reptile-this ghostly and blasted creature-this-****

If I am never to revisit the world, what is to be the manner of my death? How will this life, this mysterious consciousness, this power by which I remember and suffer, how will it leave me? Will my enemies come in, tired at length of feeding me, and give me poison, or stab me, or strangle me? It would be easy and safe for them to do either, and they may well think it would be merciful. Horror of horrors! They surely will massacre me. Who would know, who would care? Whose hand would be stretched out to protect me? Let me turn from so agonizing a reflection. Yet which way shall I turn? Suppose they have no such design, what, then, will be my fate? I must wait the slow hand of time. Years and years may drag on, perchance, till some execrable disease, engendered in darkness and

filth, shall steal over my limbs, and corrupt my feeble body. When it comes I must meet it alone and unaided. No kind hand to touch my feverish forehead; no dear eyes to watch while I sleep; no friendly voice to cheer me; no beloved bosom, on which sinking nature may breathe its last sigh of affection, and receive its parting caress. No-no-no-madness-darkness-cold

stones. Merciful God!

Fool-fool. I have been ill; how long I know not, but I am better, and firmer, and calmer. So far from fearing death, I court it, and defy it. I am regardless in what form it may come. Men have died before, and will again; ay, and to all those now in the midst of riot and joy, to all the time will come. There is no one of them but death must grapple with, and bear down with him into his unknown gulf. He will stretch out his hand to the triumphant palace, and drag down the proud and noble; he will glide to the sweet cottage, and take the father from his helpless family. Beauty, too, radiant glowing beauty; lips of coral, eyes of light; voice rich with silvery music; how his skeleton hand will blast their warm perfections into motionless and haggard marble! He will touch the child's innocent head, and the lover in his hopes, and the hero, and the poet, and they shall all go to the land of shadows. Why shall I shrink? I fear nothing but bodily pain. The rest-feeling, affection, hope-are all fancy. Is it not better to be thus here, sitting in peace, than writhing and quivering on the dreadful rack? ****

A calm has stolen over me. I feel no more yearnings to leave this dungeon vault. My senses are clear, my mind is full of easy, and I believe rational thoughts. I know perfectly where I am, and what I am. Yes, yes -my name is Walter Hubert. I have been imprisoned a long, long time, in a solitary dungeon, for a crime of which I am entirely innocent. My spirit has at length sunk under the weight of torture. I have been sick, wretched, mad, mad, mad—but now my senses are returned, and I am dying. God prepare me, and bless those I love. I would-the pen-I can scarcely hold it-and the little light from my window is beginning to be darkened-Oh for one parting look. ****