He was in a high fever while he was writing, and the blood-and-thunder
Magazine diction he adopted did not calm him. Two
months afterward he was reported fit for duty, but, in spite of the
fact that he was urgently needed to help an undermanned
Commission stagger through a deficit, he preferred to die; vowing
at the last that he was hag-ridden. I got his manuscript before he
died, and this is his version of the affair, dated 1885:

My doctor tells me that I need rest and change of air. It is not
improbable that I shall get both ere long--rest that neither the
red-coated messenger nor the midday gun can break, and change
of air far beyond that which any homeward-bound steamer can
give me. In the meantime I am resolved to stay where I am; and,
in flat defiance of my doctor's orders, to take all the world into my
confidence. You shall learn for yourselves the precise nature of
my malady; and shall, too, judge for yourselves whether any man
born of woman on this weary earth was ever so tormented as I.

Speaking now as a condemned criminal might speak ere the
drop-bolts are drawn, my story, wild and hideously improbable as
it may appear, demands at least attention. That it will ever receive
credence I utterly disbelieve. Two months ago I should have
scouted as mad or drunk the man who had dared tell me the like.
Two months ago I was the happiest man in India. Today, from
Peshawur to the sea, there is no one more wretched. My doctor
and I are the only two who know this. His explanation is, that my
brain, digestion, and eyesight are all slightly affected; giving rise
to my frequent and persistent "delusions." Delusions, indeed! I
call him a fool; but he attends me still with the same unwearied