I see it all quite clearly. My sufferings and my expiation are deserved.
I was a thief! I stole the highest treasures of all: confidence, love,
honor, respect, splendor.

How noble and exalted the tender souls appear to themselves when a poor
rogue is sent to jail for having committed a theft! But what are all
possessions which can be carried away, when compared with those that are
intangible!

Those who are summoned to the bar of justice are not always the basest
of mankind.

I acknowledge my sin, and my repentance is sincere.

My fatal sin, the sin for which I now atone, was that I dissembled, that
I denied and extenuated that which I represented to myself as a natural
right. Against the Queen I have sinned worst of all. To me she
represents that moral order which I violated and yet wished to enjoy.

To you, O Queen, to you--lovely, good, and deeply injured one--do I
confess all this!

If I die before you,--and I hope that I may,--these pages are to be
given to you.

* * * * *

I can now accurately tell the season of the year, and often the hour of
the day, by the way in which the first sunbeams fall into my room and on
my work-bench in the morning. My chisel hangs before me on the wall, and