by a Latin historian of the
fourth century was the cause, fifteen hundred years after, of the death
in our country of a wretched private soldier. Who will ever disentangle
the web of cause and effect?

"Who can venture to say, as he accomplishes some simple act: 'I know
what I am doing.' My dear friend, this is all I have to tell. The rest
is of no interest except in medical statistics. Le Mansel, shut up in
an insane asylum, remained for fifteen days a prey to the most violent
mania. Whereupon he fell into a state of complete imbecility, during
which he became so greedy that he even devoured the wax with which they
polished the floor. Three months later he was suffocated while trying to
swallow a sponge."

The doctor ceased and lighted a cigarette. After a moment of silence, I
said to him, "You have told me a terrible story, doctor."

"It is terrible," he replied, "but it is true. I should be glad of a
little brandy."

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