“Well, so do I,” responded the publican. “The poor gentleman has been looking very badly, and sometimes gets into a strange wild taking, and then he goes along seeing nobody. Only last Saturday I said to my old woman, as how I thought everything warn't altogether right HERE,”--and the licensed sinner touched his head with his fore-finger, himself looking the very picture of well-satisfied sagacity. We said nothing, but leaving the eloquence to him, followed him up to Edgerton's chamber. I struck the door thrice with the butt end of my whip, then called his name, but without receiving any answer. Endeavoring to look through the key-hole, I discovered the key on the inside, and within the lock. I then immediately conjectured the truth. William Edgerton had committed suicide. And so it was. We burst the door, and found him suspended by a silk handkerchief to a beam that traversed the apartment. He had raised himself upon a chair, which he had kicked over after the knot had been adjusted. Such a proceeding evinced the most determined resolution. We took him down with all despatch, but life had already been long extinct. He must have been hanging two hours. His face was perfectly livid--his eyeballs dilated--his mouth distorted--but the neck remained unbroken. He had died by suffocation. I pass over the ordinary proceedings--the consternation, the clamor, the attendance of the grave-looking gentlemen with lancet and lotion. They did a great deal, of course, in doing nothing. Nothing could be done. Then followed the “crowner's” inquest. A paper, addressed to the landlord, was submitted to them, and formed the burden of their report. “I die by my own hands,” said this document, “that I may lose the sense of pain, bodily and mental. I die at peace with the world. It has never wronged me. I am the source of my own sorrows, as I am the cause of my own death. I will not say that I die sane. I am doubtful on that head. I am sure that I have been the victim of a sort of madness for a very long time. This has led me to do wrong, and to meditate wrong--has made me guilty of many things, which, in my better moments of mind and body, I should have shrunk from in horror. I write this that nobody may be suspected of sharing in a deed the blame of which must rest on my head only.” Then followed certain apologies to the landlord for having made his house the scene of an event so shocking. The same paper also conveyed certain presents of personal stuff to the same person, with thanks for his courtesy and attention. An adequate sum of money, paying his bill, and the expenses of his funeral, was left in his purse, upon the paper. Kingsley assumed the final direction of these affairs; and having seen everything in a fair way for the funeral, which was appointed to take place the next morning, he hurried me away to his lodging-house. CHAPTER L. CONFESSION OF EDGERTON. When within his chamber, he carefully fastened the door and placed a packet in my hands.