'This morning, in the course of my walk, I entered into conversation with two persons of whom I made enquiry myself. They said the accused man, a simple person, had been locked up in a high chamber,--protesting his innocence strongly,--and troubled in his mind by the affair altogether and the turn it was taking, had profited by the gendarme's negligence, and thrown himself out of the window--and so died, continuing to the last to protest as before. My presentiment of what such a person might have to undergo was justified you see--though I should not in any case have taken _that_ way of getting out of the difficulty. The man added, "it was not he who committed the murder, but the companions of the man, an Italian charcoal-burner, who owed him a grudge, killed him, and dragged him to the field--filling his sack with potatoes as if stolen, to give a likelihood that the field's owner had caught him stealing and killed him,--so M. Perrier the greffier told me." Enough of this grim story. . . . . . 'My sister was anxious to know exactly where the body was found: "Vouz savez la croix au sommet de la colline? A cette distance de cela!" That is precisely where I was standing when the thought came over me.' A passage in a subsequent letter of September 3 clearly refers to some comment of Mrs. Fitz-Gerald's on the peculiar nature of this presentiment: 'No--I attribute no sort of supernaturalism to my fancy about the thing that was really about to take place. By a law of the association of ideas--_contraries_ come into the mind as often as _similarities_--and the peace and solitude readily called up the notion of what would most jar with them. I have often thought of the trouble that might have befallen me if poor Miss Smith's death had happened the night before, when we were on the mountain alone together--or next morning when we were on the proposed excursion--only _then_ we should have had companions.' The letter then passes to other subjects. 'This is the fifth magnificent day--like magnificence, unfit for turning to much account--for we cannot walk till sunset. I had two hours' walk, or nearly, before breakfast, however: It is the loveliest country I ever had experience of, and we shall prolong our stay perhaps--apart from the concern for poor Cholmondeley and his friends, I should be glad to apprehend no long journey--besides the annoyance of having to pass Florence and Rome unvisited, for S.'s sake, I mean: even Naples would have been with its wonderful environs a tantalizing impracticability. 'Your "Academy" came and was welcomed. The newspaper is like an electric eel, as one touches it and expects a shock. I am very anxious about the Archbishop who has always been strangely kind to me.'