t thee have a light; it is
against orders; and during the day thou'lt be too strictly watched."

"No matter let me have the paper and I'll try to scratch a few lines in
the dark; and thou'lt post it for me, sergeant? I ask thee as a last favor
to do this."

"I promise it," said he, laying his hand on my shoulder. After standing
for a few minutes thus in silence, he started suddenly and left the cell.

I now tried to eat my supper; but although resolved on behaving with a
stout and unflinching courage throughout the whole sad event, I could not
swallow a mouthful. A sense of choking stopped me at every attempt, and
even the water I could only get down by gulps. The efforts I made to bear
up seemed to have caused a species of hysterical excitement that actually
rose to the height of intoxication, for I talked away loudly to myself,
laughed, and sung. I even jested and mocked myself on this sudden
termination of a career that I used to anticipate as stored with future
fame and rewards. At intervals, I have no doubt that my mind wandered far
beyond the control of reason, but as constantly came back again to a full
consciousness of my melancholy position, and the fate that awaited me. The
noise of the key in the door silenced my ravings, and I sat still and
motionless as the sergeant entered with the pen, ink, and paper, which he
laid down upon the bed, and then as silently withdrew.

A long interval of stupor, a state of dreary half consciousness, now came
over me, from which I aroused myself with great difficulty to write the
few lines I destined for Colonel Mahon. I remember even now, long as has
been the space of years since that event, full as it has been of stirring
and strange incidents, I remember perfectly the thought which flashed
across me as I sat, pen in hand, before the paper. It was the notion of a
certain resemblance between our actions in this world with the characters
I was about to inscribe upon that paper. Written in darkness and in doubt,
thought I, how shall they appear when brought to the light! Perhaps those
I have deemed the best and fairest shall seem but to be the weakest or the
worst! What need of kindness to forgive the errors, and of patience to
endure the ignorance! At last I began: "Mon Colonel--Forgive, I pray you,
the errors of these lines, penned in the darkness of my cell, and the
night before my death. They are written to thank you ere I go hence, and
to tell you that the poor heart who