the hopeless misfortune in which I am at present involved. The man must
indeed possess an uncommon portion of hardness of heart, who can envy
me so slight a relief.--To proceed.

For some time after the explanation which had thus taken place between
me and Mr. Falkland, his melancholy, instead of being in the slightest
degree diminished by the lenient hand of time, went on perpetually to
increase. His fits of insanity--for such I must denominate them for want
of a distinct appellation, though it is possible they might not fall
under the definition that either the faculty or the court of chancery
appropriate to the term--became stronger and more durable than ever. It
was no longer practicable wholly to conceal them from the family, and
even from the neighbourhood. He would sometimes, without any previous
notice, absent himself from his house for two or three days,
unaccompanied by servant or attendant. This was the more extraordinary,
as it was well known that he paid no visits, nor kept up any sort of
intercourse with the gentlemen of the vicinity. But it was impossible
that a man of Mr. Falkland's distinction and fortune should long
continue in such a practice, without its being discovered what was
become of him; though a considerable part of our county was among the
wildest and most desolate districts that are to be found in South
Britain. Mr. Falkland was sometimes seen climbing among the rocks,
reclining motionless for hours together upon the edge of a precipice, or
lulled into a kind of nameless lethargy of despair by the dashing of the
torrents. He would remain for whole nights together under the naked cope
of heaven, inattentive to the consideration either of place or time;
insensible to the variations of the weather, or rather seeming to be
delighted with that uproar of the elements, which partially called off
his attention from the discord and dejection that occupied his own mind.