filled just then with gayly-dressed ladies. Why I did not ask some
gentleman to aid me I can not now recall. I only recollect waiting for
several minutes in blank dismay over the seeming impossibility of ever
entering the door before me. Finally I went to the curbstone and
walked as rapidly and steadily as possible to the lower step, and
summoning all my energies made a plunge upward and fortunately caught
the door-knob. The physician was at dinner, which gave me some time to
recover myself from the agitation into which I had been thrown. After
I had narrated my case with special reference to the suspicion of
internal inflammation and its possible effect upon the brain, he
assured me that no danger of the kind needs to be anticipated. He
hoped I might succeed in my purpose, but thought it doubtful. An uncle
of his own, a clergyman of some reputation, had died in making the
effort. However, if I would take care of my own resolution, he would
answer for my continued sanity. He prescribed some preparation of
valerian and red pepper, I think, which I used for a week with little
appreciable benefit. Finding no great relief from this prescription,
or from those of other medical men whom for a few days about this time
I consulted, and feeling a constant craving for something bitter, I at
last prescribed for myself. Passing a store where liquor was sold, my
eye accidentally rested upon a placard in the window which read
"Stoughton's Bitters." This preparation gave me momentary relief, and
the only appreciable relief I found in medicine during the experiment.

The nights now began to bring new apprehensions. A constant dread
haunted my mind, in spite of the physician's assurances, that my brain
might give way from the excitement under which I labored. I was
especially afraid of some sudden paroxysm of mania, under the
influence of which I might do myself unpremeditated injury. I never
feared any settled purpose of self-injury, but I had become nervously