shame, nor
was it the fear of increasing my crime by plunder. I believe it was
out of a spirit of defiance that I flung away the watch, and only kept
half the money. I wished to be taken for a personal enemy of the
murdered man, but not for one who had robbed him.

"I now fled deeper into the wood, which I knew extended four German
miles to the north, and there touched the border of the country. Till
noon I ran breathless. The rapidity of my flight had dissipated the
anguish of my conscience, but the return of that anguish was frightful,
when my strength more and more declined. A thousand hideous forms
passed before me, and struck into my heart, like sharp knives. Between
a life filled with an increasing terror of death, and a violent end,
the awful choice was now left me--and choose I must. I had not the
heart to quit the world by self-destruction, and I was terrified at the
prospect of remaining in it. Fixed as it were between the certain
torments of life, and the uncertain terrors of eternity--unable to live
or to die--I passed the sixth hour of my flight--an hour brimful of
horrors, such as no living man could narrate.

"Slowly--absorbed in myself, and with my hat unconsciously slouched
over my face, as if I wished to conceal myself from the eye of
inanimate nature,--I had insensibly followed a narrow path, which led
me through the deepest part of the thicket--when suddenly a rough
imperious voice called to me, 'stop.' The voice was quite close; my
abstraction and the slouched hat had prevented me from looking round.
I raised my eyes and saw a wild man, armed with a great knotted club,
approaching me. His figure was almost gigantic--at least my first
surprise made me think so--and the colour of his skin was a yellow
mulatto sort of black, with which the whiteness of a squinting eye
stood in terrible contrast. Instead of a girdle he had a thick rope
wound twice round a green woollen coat, in which were stuck a broad
knife and a pistol. The cry was repeated, and a powerful arm held me
fast. The sound of a man had frightened me, but the aspect of a
villain gave me new heart. In my present situation, I had cause to
tremble before every honest man, but none to tremble before a robber.

"'Who is there?' said the apparition.

"'One like yourself,' was my answer, 'if you really correspond to your
appearance.'

"'That is not the way out? What are you looking for here?'

"'What is that to you?' retorted