“In this prison I sat for six months, constantly in water, which was perpetually dropping down upon me from the roof of the arch. I can assure my reader that my body was never dry during the first three months and yet I continued in health. As often as I was visited, which was every day at twelve o’clock after guard mounting, the doors were obliged to be left open some minutes, or the stifled vapour and dampness would have extinguished the candles of the lantern. In this condition I remained, abandoned by friends, without help or comfort; where reflection was my only employment and where, during the first days, until my constancy became confirmed and my heart more obdurate, nothing but the most frightful images of grief and woe were perpetually presenting themselves to my diseased imagination. The situation could not have been more calculated for despair, nor can I describe the cause which restrained my arm from suicide, for I was far above all narrow prejudices and never felt the least fear for occurrences beyond the grave. My design was to challenge fortune and obtain my victory in spite of every impediment. The ambition to accomplish this victory was perhaps the strongest inducement to my resolve, which at length rose to such a degree of heroism and perseverance, that Socrates, in his old days, could not boast of more. He was old, ceased to feel, and drank the poison with indifference. I, on the contrary, was in the fire of my youth, and the aim to which I aspired seemed to be on all sides far distant. The present situation of my body and the tortures of my soul were of such a nature as gave me but little reason to expect that my frame could support them for any length of time.