"Grief often produces these gloomy thoughts," said I; "but they are the mere fancies of a sick mind--generated in sorrow, and dying with the time-subdued cause that produces them. There is not a bereaved husband, wife, parent, or child in the land, that does not, in the first struggle with a new grief, entertain and cherish, for passing moments of agony, such sick fancies of rebelling nature. You have not yet given time and your energies a fair trial. You must have patience." "There is some consolation in that," he replied. "I am glad when I think that the thought that haunts and alarms me is no sae dangerous as it sometimes appears to me. This book (sweet comforter!) tells me that Tobit prayed to be dissolved, and become earth, because o' his sorrow. It tells me, also, that Job, in his agonies, cried, 'My soul chooseth strangling and death rather than life.' My experience o' the ills o' life (and a man o' sixty-five must have some portion o' that) informs me o' the truth o' what you have told me, that an extraordinary burden o' grief often wrings frae the sick soul a wish to dee and be at rest. But oh! I fear my situation is different. I hae _mair_ than a wish to be dissolved; for sure none o' my brethren in sorrow"--here his voice fell almost to a whisper, and tears rolled down his cheek--"ever lay wi' the like o' that"--holding up a razor--"under his sick pillow." I was alarmed, being utterly unprepared for this exhibition. "You need be under nae alarm," he continued, wiping the tears from his eyes. "My courage is not yet strong enough. God be praised for it! Moments o' fearfu fortitude sometimes come owre me, and I have held that instrument in my clenched hand--ay, within an inch o' my bared throat; but the resolution passes as quickly as it comes, and terror, cowardice, and a shiverin cauld--dreadfu to suffer--come in their place. Lay it past, sir--lay it past." I obeyed; and, as I proceeded to place the instrument on the top of a chest of drawers, I heard the noise of some one in the passage, with suppressed ejaculations of--"O God! O God!" "I wadna hae shown you that," he continued, as I sat down, "but that it is my wish to tell you the warst; for nae man can expect assistance, if he is ashamed or afraid to show his necessities and his danger. I didna send for you to cure my body, but to examine my mind, and tell me if it is sound and healthy, or weak and diseased, and therefore I will conceal naething frae ye that may show you its state and condition."