do
so wholeheartedly, and with no mental reservations. Those who are not
with us must inevitably be against us; and the issues at stake with us
are of far too grave a character to allow of our running any risk from
secret enemies. No mercy will be shown to traitors, I assure you; so do
not permit your mind to dwell upon any plan in which submission that is
to be only apparent has a place."

"You do not leave me very much choice," I remarked. "If I refuse to
throw in my lot with you, you drown me; and if I accept your
alternative, and should be unlucky enough to incur the suspicion that I
am not acting honestly with you, what happens?"

"We hang you," answered Wilde tersely.

"I see," I said. "The choice you offer me appears to lie between the
certainty of drowning and the risk of hanging. I am by no means certain
that it would not wiser on my part to choose the former, and get it over
and done with at once. But I will think it over and let you know."

"Yes, pray do so," returned Wilde, in the same exasperating tone of
suavity. "And, before we dismiss the subject," he continued, "let me
give you a word of genuinely friendly advice. Get rid of that idiotic
idea of choosing the alternative of being drowned, and getting it over
and done with as soon as possible; because so long as you allow your
imagination to dwell upon it, it will simply warp your judgment and
prevent you from arriving at a sound, sensible conclusion. No young man
possessing a sound mind in a sound body--as you appear to do--
deliberately chooses death, and the annihilation which follows it,
rather than the long years of ease, happiness, and comfort which will be
yours if you join us; so why should you, eh?"

"I will think it over, and let you know as soon as I have arrived at a
decision," I repeated. "But don't you make any mistake about the
annihilation that comes after death. That is the atheist's notion; but,
if you are reckoning upon anything of that kind, to save you from
punishment for your misdeeds in this present life, you are going to be
badly undeceived; make no mistake about that."

"My boy," he said, laying his hand upon my shoulder, "if you possess any
religious convictions, retain them by all means, and much good may they
do you; but do not try to convert me. No scruples of what they term a
religious character will ever be permitted to deter me from taking any
steps, that may appear necessary to further and ensure the succ