--FORTITUDE. The reader will note, that the answer to the reasonings that
probably convinced the mind of Aram, and blinded him to his crime, may be
found in the change of feelings by which the crime was followed. I must
apologize for this interruption--it seemed to me advisable in this
place;--though, in general, the moment we begin to inculcate morality as
a science, we ought to discard moralizing as a method.] No, it was for
this, for the guilt and its penance, for the wasted life and the shameful
death--with all my thirst for good, my dreams of glory--that I was born,
that I was marked from my first sleep in the cradle!

"The disappearance of Clarke of course created great excitement;--those
whom he had over-reached had naturally an interest in discovering him.
Some vague surmises that he might have been made away with, were rumoured
abroad. Houseman and I, owing to some concurrence of circumstance, were
examined,--not that suspicion attached to me before or after the
examination. That ceremony ended in nothing. Houseman did not betray
himself; and I, who from a boy had mastered my passions, could master
also the nerves, which are the passions' puppets: but I read in the face
of the woman with whom I lodged, that I was suspected. Houseman told me
that she had openly expressed her suspicion to him; nay, he entertained
some design against her life, which he naturally abandoned on quitting
the town. This he did soon afterwards. I did not linger long behind him.
I dug up my jewels,--I concealed them about me, and departed on foot to
Scotland. There I converted my booty into money. And now I was above
want--was I at rest? Not yet. I felt urged on to wander--Cain's curse
descends to Cain's children. I travelled for some considerable time,--I
saw men and cities, and I opened a new volume in my kind. It was strange;
but before the deed, I was as a child in the ways of the world, and a
child, despite my knowledge, might have duped me. The moment after it, a
light broke upon me,--it seemed as if my eyes were touched with a charm,