"Set your mind at rest," replied Captain M----, who saw that there was some lingering suspicion still in the stranger's bosom. "I have no commission, and certainly no wish, to disturb you in any way; neither did I come to these countries altogether from mere curiosity. A desire to benefit my fellow-creatures, and a strong interest in the fate of men whose crimes have shut them out from the general pale of society, but not, I trust, from the compassion of their brethren, or from the mercy of their God, first led me to a neighbouring island; and I am extending my wanderings through this uncultivated but beautiful country, with a hope of turning to account for others what I have myself observed. Perhaps you can give me some information; and I promise you, as a man of honour and a gentleman, never to say a word to any one which can do you the least detriment. I see you must be a man of superior education, and I should imagine of superior rank, to those who are usually met with in this country; and I am sure, after the candid expression of my views, and the pledge I have given you will not scruple to say anything that can further my objects." "I have nothing to say," answered the other, seating himself where he had before been lying. "I know little, have seen little; but all I have seen has been iniquity, and villany, and vice, and folly, and ignorance, in high and low, master and servant, convict and tyrant. I am inclined to cry with the Psalmist, 'There is none that doeth good; no, not one.'" Captain M---- smiled somewhat sadly. "I am afraid you are quite right," he answered; "and it has long been my conviction that the system of what is called convict discipline in these colonies not only does not tend in the slightest degree to reform an offender, but tends to degrade his moral character to the lowest possible point. It is my belief that even the system followed at a very rude period of our history, and when the person sentenced to transportation was actually sold as a slave to the planters of America, though corrupt and abominable in a high degree, was really less detrimental to the unhappy convict than that upon which we now act. I have always held that we have no right to condemn a man's soul as well as his body; and I feel that we are here instrumental in plunging those whom we expel from our own country into vice and crimes more horrible than they ever contemplated when they committed the act which brought them hither." The stranger smiled brightly. "You seem to me," he said, "to be the first really benevolent and reasonable man who has visited a place of abominations. But even you, perhaps, have not considered all. What little I can tell you, I will tell. Call down your men from above, and seat yourself here by me, and in the face of nature, and of the God who willed it to be 'very good,' I will tell you truly, without even a shade of deceit, all that my own short experience has shown."