ge was so mingled
with the feeble delirium resulting from it, and the terrors arising from
the situation in which he felt himself placed, that it was not only wild
and melancholy by turns, but often scarcely intelligible. Still it was
evident that one great apprehension absorbed all his other thoughts and
sensations, and seemed, whilst it lasted, to bury him in the darkness of
despair.

"Hold!" he exclaimed; "where am I?--what is this? Let me see, or,
rather, let me feel where I am, for that is the more appropriate
expression, considering that I am in utter obscurity. What is this, I
ask again? Is my hospitable friend with me? he with whom I partook of
that delicious liquor under 'the greenwood-tree'?"

He then searched about, and in doing so his hands came necessarily in
contact with the bulky person of the baronet. "What!" he proceeded,
supposing still that it was Gillespie, "is this you, my friend?--but I
take that fact for granted. Sir, you are a gentleman, and know how to
address a gentleman with proper respect; but how is this, you have on
your hat? Sir, you forget yourself--uncover, and remember you are in my
presence."

As he uttered the words, he seized the baronet's hat, tore it forcibly
off, and, in doing so, accidentally removed a mask which that worthy
gentleman had taken the precaution to assume, in order to prevent
himself from being recognized.

"Ha!" exclaimed Fenton, with something like a shriek--"a mask! Oh,
my God! This mysterious enemy is upon me! I am once more caught in his
toils! What have I done to deserve this persecution? I am innocent of
all offence--all guilt. My life has been one of horror and of suffering
indescribable, but not of crime; and although they say I am insane, I
know there is a God above who will render me justice, and my oppressor
justice, and who knows that I have given offence to none.

There is a bird that sings alone--heigh ho!
And every note is but a tone of woe.
Heigh ho!"

The baronet grasped his wrist tightly with one hand--and both feeble and
attenuated was that poor wrist--the baronet, we say, grasped it, and in
an instant had regained possession of the mask, which he deliberately
replaced on his face, after which he seized the unfortunate young man
by the neck, and pressed it with such force as almost to occasion
suffocation. Still he (Sir Thomas) uttered not a syllable, a
circumstance which in the terrified mind of his unhappy victim caused