When I lifted him from his kneeling position, he obeyed my movement like a
tired child, and again sat on the low pallet, in a state of motionless and
unresisting torpor. The damp sweat stood on my own forehead, though not so
cold as on his; and I poured myself out a small portion of wine, to ward
off the exhaustion which I began to feel unusually strong upon me. I
prevailed upon the poor wretch to swallow a little with me; and, as I
broke a bit of bread, I thought, and spoke to him, of that last repast of
Him who came to call sinners to repentance; and methought his eye grew
lighter than it was. The sinking frame, exhausted and worn down by anxiety,
confinement, and the poor allowance of a felon's gaol, drew a short
respite from the cordial; and he listened to my words with something of
self-collectedness--albeit slight tremblings might still be seen to run
along his nerves at intervals; and his features collapsed, ever and anon,
into that momentary vacuity of wildness which the touch of despair never
fails to give. I endeavoured to improve the occasion. I exhorted him, for
his soul's sake, and the relief of that which needed it too much, to make
a full and unreserved confession, not only to God, who needed it not, but
to man, who did. I besought him, for the good of all, and as he valued his
soul's health, to detail the particulars of his crime, but _his eye fell_.
That dark enemy, who takes care to leave in the heart just hope enough to
keep despair alive, tongue-tied him; and he would not--even now--at the
eleventh hour--give up the vain imagination, that the case of his
companion might yet be confounded with his, to the escape of both--and
vain it was. It had not been felt advisable, so far as to make him
acquainted with the truth, that this had already been sifted and decided;
and I judged this to be the time. Again and again I urged confession upon
him. I put it to him that this act of justice might now be done for its
own sake, and for that of the cleansing from spot of his stained spirit. I
told him, finally, that it could no longer prejudice him in this world,
where his fate was written and sealed, for that his companion _was