been docile and obedient--as might have been mine if I had tried to win it. I sought for congenial companionship away from the social circle in which my parents moved; it is true that I found associates among men who, doubtless with more reason than myself, were dissatisfied with things as they were, and that I identified myself--being, as a youth, proud of the connection--with a body of so-called Freethinkers, whose chief crime was that they were groping to find truth by the light of reason. My father, hearing of this connection, sternly commanded me to relinquish it, and when I refused, threatened me. He declared he would drive the evil spirit out of me, and he tried to do so by blows; but he hurt only my body--my spirit he strengthened. About this time a circumstance occurred which for ever destroyed all chance of peace between us. We had a servant at home, a poor half-witted creature--an orphan without a friend in the world. One would have supposed that my father, being so fond of his prayers, would have been kind to this servant because of her utterly dependent condition, and because she performed her work as well and as faithfully as her dull wits allowed her. Had this been so, I think I might have been inclined to waver in my estimate of him; but the contrary was the case. My father, through his unvarying harshness towards the poor girl, made her life a torture to her. I constituted myself her champion, and stepped between her and his blows many a time. Boy as I was, he chose to place misconstruction upon my championship, and each became more embittered against the other. I fed my bitterness by contemplation of the girl's misery, and the unhappy war went on until it was terminated by a tragic circumstance. One day the servant was missing; the next, the body was found in the river. The idea fixed itself firmly in my mind that my father was accountable for her death; I even hinted as much to him when my blood was boiling with a new injustice inflicted upon myself. What passed between us after that, it will be as well not to recall; the result was that I left my home, and no hand was held out to stay me. I never saw my parents from that day, nor have I ever mentioned them until this evening. Whether I have done them injustice cannot now be decided; but I have no doubt, if the world were to judge between us, the verdict would be against me.