re, and it seemed they were
pressed for time to reach a certain spot before the snow should fall.

And sure enough, the next day there fell a sprinkle even in Albany; but
it passed as it came, and was but a reminder of what lay before us. I
thought of it lightly then, knowing so little as I did of that inclement
province: the retrospect is different; and I wonder at times if some of
the horror of these events which I must now rehearse flowed not from the
foul skies and savage winds to which we were exposed, and the agony of
cold that we must suffer.

The boat having passed by, I thought at first we should have left the
town. But no such matter. My lord continued his stay in Albany, where he
had no ostensible affairs, and kept me by him, far from my due
employment, and making a pretence of occupation. It is upon this passage
I expect, and perhaps deserve, censure. I was not so dull but what I had
my own thoughts. I could not see the Master entrust himself into the
hands of Harris, and not suspect some underhand contrivance. Harris bore
a villainous reputation, and he had been tampered with in private by my
lord; Mountain, the trader, proved, upon inquiry, to be another of the
same kidney; the errand they were all gone upon being the recovery of
ill-gotten treasures, offered in itself a very strong incentive to foul
play; and the character of the country where they journeyed promised
impunity to deeds of blood. Well: it is true I had all these thoughts
and fears, and guesses of the Master's fate. But you are to consider I
was the same man that sought to dash him from the bulwarks of a ship in
the mid-sea; the same that, a little before, very impiously but
sincerely offered God a bargain, seeking to hire God to be my bravo. It
is true again that I had a good deal melted towards our enemy. But this
I always thought of as a weakness of the flesh, and even culpable; my
mind remaining steady and quite bent against him. True, yet again, that
it was one thing to assume on my own shoulders the guilt and danger of a
criminal attempt, and another to stand by and see my lord imperil and
besmirch himself. But this was the very ground of my inaction. For
(should I anyway stir in the business) I might fail indeed to save the
Master, but I could not miss to make a byword of my lord.

Thus it was that I did nothing; and upon the same reasons, I am still
strong to justify my course. My lord had carried with him several
introductions to