monastery there? I'm afraid I'm not up to it. Why don't you try
the old 'Oilan,' nearer home? There's lots of measles and
diphtheria about there lately."

When the heartbroken John Gale received this epistle, he also
received a letter from his uncle, the First Lord of the Admiralty.
"I don't fancy this Damien whim of yours. If you're really in
earnest about killing yourself, why not take a brief trial trip in
one of our latest ironclads? It's just as risky, although--as we
are obliged to keep these things quiet in the Office--you will not
of course get that publicity your noble soul craves."

Abandoned by all in his noble purposes, John Gale took the first
steamer to the Isle of Man.


BOOK VII


But he did not remain there long. Once back in that epistolary
island, he wrote interminable letters to Golly. When they began to
bore each other, he returned to London and entered the Salvation
Army. Crowds flocked to hear him preach. He inveighed against
Society and Wickedness as represented in his mind by Golly and her
friends, and praised a perfect Christianity represented by himself
and HIS friends. A panic of the same remarkable character as the
Bishopsgate Street winter took possession of London. Old Moore's,
Zadkiel's, and Mother Shipton's prophecies were to be fulfilled at
an early and fixed date, with no postponement on account of
weather. Suddenly Society, John Drake, and Antichrist generally