As the man to whom I was now to owe my freedom said, this must soon have led to softening of the brain. The strain had become terrible. The belief in the existence of a system of organised pillage among this undisciplined crew, which might well have possessed a stronger head than mine was then, was wearing me out, though I tried to argue myself out of it. Some of the men played on it, as I said. And I was becoming too thoroughly ill and nerveless under this trial to be much more than a sort of automaton. I even began to have a sort of feeling that this was my home, and that I might be turned out to wander again when they grew tired of me. When the relation of whom I have spoken came to stay in a neighbouring town--not at the asylum, happily for me--I was allowed to spend the day like a boy with an _exeat_, and even in my illness resented the house-doctor's objections to giving me too much leave from school. Conscious of fair powers of heart and brain, the paltry unworthiness of the whole thing jarred me even more than greater sins; and it does so still. How ill I was may be judged from the fact that I did not press, scarcely even wish, for my removal. But the skilful doctor who came to see me--I have reached nearly the last in my story now--who had rescued others besides me, practically insisted upon it; and one morning I received at the asylum the news that I was to go. I could not believe it--could not take it in; thought myself permanently 'on the establishment.' The doctors grinned sardonic disgust; intimated that a serious danger was threatening society, and hinted an _au revoir_. So did the warders, smiling generally, and holding out expectant hands. I had been allowed a little pocket-money when I was good, but had not much to give. I have not been inclined, upon reflection, to be lavish of donations since. The last report of the 'attendants' was--whether in connexion with this tightness of my purse-strings or not I cannot say--that they had never seen me worse. So the 'treatment' had done me no good, at all events. My new guardian took me to his house by the sea, and, with his wife and daughter, gave me for a time a real home, and was something more than kind. He had not much assistance. From one near relative abroad he received an abusive letter; from the Master of Pecksniff Hall an angry warning that he was taking into his house 'a suicidal and homicidal patient, the most dangerous in his establishment.' But a few days before the man had made me his guest at his own tea-table, alone with his wife and young daughters. How does he reconcile the two things? The charge was cruel, and nearly robbed me of the hard-won home. My rescuer believed no word of it; but his wife was naturally frightened, and for a night or two a new watcher slept at my door, and I had to submit to a new cross-examination from two more doctors for the edification of the Commission. They said that my eye wandered, and drew up such a certificate