vil to which our
indiscreet familiarity with this man had probably exposed us. I burnt
with impatience to see you, and to do what in me lay to avert the
calamity which threatened us. It was already five o'clock. Night was
hastening, and there was no time to be lost. On leaving Mr. Hallet's
house, who should meet me in the street, but Bertrand, the servant whom
I left in Germany. His appearance and accoutrements bespoke him to have
just alighted from a toilsome and long journey. I was not wholly without
expectation of seeing him about this time, but no one was then more
distant from my thoughts. You know what reasons I have for anxiety
respecting scenes with which this man was conversant. Carwin was for a
moment forgotten. In answer to my vehement inquiries, Bertrand produced
a copious packet. I shall not at present mention its contents, nor the
measures which they obliged me to adopt. I bestowed a brief perusal on
these papers, and having given some directions to Bertrand, resumed
my purpose with regard to you. My horse I was obliged to resign to my
servant, he being charged with a commission that required speed. The
clock had struck ten, and Mettingen was five miles distant. I was
to Journey thither on foot. These circumstances only added to my
expedition.

"As I passed swiftly along, I reviewed all the incidents accompanying
the appearance and deportment of that man among us. Late events have
been inexplicable and mysterious beyond any of which I have either read
or heard. These events were coeval with Carwin's introduction. I am
unable to explain their origin and mutual dependance; but I do not, on
that account, believe them to have a supernatural origin. Is not this
man the agent? Some of them seem to be propitious; but what should
I think of those threats of assassination with which you were lately
alarmed? Bloodshed is the trade, and horror is the element of this man.
The process by which the sympathies of nature are extinguished in
our hearts, by which evil is made our good, and by which we are made
susceptible of no activity but in the infliction, and no joy but in the
spectacle of woes, is an obvious process. As to an alliance with evil
geniuses, the power and the malice of daemons have been a thousand times
exemplified in human beings. There are no devils but those which are
begotten upon selfishness, and reared by cunning.

"Now, indeed, the scene was changed. It was not his secret poniard
that I dreaded. I