d; and my poor cousin being charged with a crime no less serious,
we were conducted to the same execution, which was inflicted with great
severity. If finding a remedy in the evil itself, they had sought ever
to allay my depraved desires, they could not have chosen a shorter method
to accomplish their designs, and, I can assure my readers, I was for a
long time freed from the dominion of them.

As this severity could not draw from me the expected acknowledgment,
which obstinacy brought on several repetitions, and reduced me to a
deplorable situation, yet I was immovable, and resolutely determined to
suffer death rather than submit. Force, at length, was obliged to yield
to the diabolical infatuation of a child, for no better name was bestowed
on my constancy, and I came out of this dreadful trial, torn, it is true,
but triumphant. Fifty years have expired since this adventure--the fear
of punishment is no more. Well, then, I aver, in the face of Heaven, I
was absolutely innocent: and, so far from breaking, or even touching the
comb, never came near the fire. It will be asked, how did this mischief
happen? I can form no conception of it, I only know my own innocence.

Let any one figure to himself a character whose leading traits were
docility and timidity, but haughty, ardent, and invincible, in its
passions; a child, hitherto governed by the voice of reason, treated with
mildness, equity, and complaisance, who could not even support the idea
of injustice, experiencing, for the first time, so violent an instance of
it, inflicted by those he most loved and respected. What perversion of
ideas! What confusion in the heart, the brain, in all my little being,
intelligent and moral!--let any one, I say, if possible, imagine all
this, for I am incapable of giving the least idea of what passed in my
mind at that period.

My reason was not sufficiently established to enable me to put myself in
the place of others, and judge how much appearances condemned me, I only
beheld the rigor of a dreadful chastisement, inflicted for a crime I had
not committed; yet I can truly affirm, the smart I suffered, though
violent, was inconsiderable compared to what I felt from indignation,
rage, and despair. My cousin, who was almost in similar circumstances,
having been punished for an involuntary fault as guilty of a premediated
crime, became furious by my example. Both in the same bed, we embraced
each other with convulsive transpor