“I'll do it, sir,--I'll do it,” cried the jailer; saying which he motioned me to follow, while he muttered between his teeth, “there must come an end to this, one day or other.” With that he unlocked a strongly barred gate, and led me along a narrow passage; at the extremity of which he opened a door into a small and rather comfortably furnished room. “Here, sir,” said he, “you 'll be better than where I have my orders to put you; and in any case, I trust that our acquaintance will be but a short one.” These were the first words of kindness I had heard for some time past. I turned to thank the speaker; but already the door had closed, and he was gone. The quickly succeeding incidents of my life, the dark destiny that seemed to track me, had given a reflective character to my mind while I was yet a boy. The troubles and cares of life, that in manhood serve only to mould and fashion character,--to call forth efforts of endurance, of courage, or ability,--come upon us in early years with far different effect and far different teaching. Every lesson tit deceit and duplicity is a direct shock to some preconceived notion of faith and honor; every punishment, whose severity in after years we had forgotten in its justice, has to the eyes of youth a character of vindictive cruelty. Looking only to effects, and never to causes, our views of life are one-sided and imperfect; the better parts of our nature will as often mislead us by false sympathy, as will the worst ones by their pernicious tendency. From the hour I quitted my father's house to the present, I had seen nothing but what to me appeared the sufferings of a poor, defenceless people at the hands of wanton tyranny and outrage. I had seen the peasant's cabin burned because it had been a shelter to an outcast; I had heard the loud and drunken denunciations of a ruffianly soldiery against those who professed no other object, who acknowledged no other wish, than liberty and equality; and in my heart I vowed a rooted hate to the enemies of my country,--a vow that lost nothing of its bitterness because it was made within the walls of a prison. In reflections like these my evening passed on, and with it the greater part of the night also. My mind was too much excited to permit me to sleep, and I longed for daybreak with that craving impatience which sick men feel who count the long hours of darkness, and think the morning must bring relief. It came at last; and the heavy, clanking sounds of massive doors opening and shutting--the mournful echoes that told of captivity and durance--sighed along the corridors, and then all was still.