Under ordinary circumstances, therefore, I should not tell you this
story at all. I should say to myself, "No! It is a good story, it
is a moral story, it is a strange, weird, enthralling sort of a
story; and the public, I know, would like to hear it; and I should
like to tell it to them; but it is all about myself--about what I
said, and what I saw, and what I did, and I cannot do it. My
retiring, anti-egotistical nature will not permit me to talk in
this way about myself."

But the circumstances surrounding this story are not ordinary, and
there are reasons prompting me, in spite of my modesty, to rather
welcome the opportunity of relating it.

As I stated at the beginning, there has been unpleasantness in our
family over this party of ours, and, as regards myself in
particular, and my share in the events I am now about to set forth,
gross injustice has been done me.

As a means of replacing my character in its proper light--of
dispelling the clouds of calumny and misconception with which it
has been darkened, I feel that my best course is to give a simple,
dignified narration of the plain facts, and allow the unprejudiced
to judge for themselves. My chief object, I candidly confess, is
to clear myself from unjust aspersion. Spurred by this motive--and
I think it is an honourable and a right motive--I find I am enabled
to overcome my usual repugnance to talking about myself, and can
thus tell -