my torment to the vigour of my understanding, which teaches me that my
punishment is just. Why should I procrastinate my doom and strive to
render my burden more light? It is but just that it should crush me. Its
procrastination is impossible. The stroke is already felt. Even now I
drink of the cup of retribution. A change of being cannot aggravate my
woe. Till consciousness itself be extinct, the worm that gnaws me will
never perish.

Fain would I be relieved from this task. Gladly would I bury in oblivion
the transactions of my life. But no! My fate is uniform. The demon that
controlled me at first is still in the fruition of power. I am entangled
in his fold, and every effort that I make to escape only involves me in
deeper ruin. I need not conceal, for all the consequences of disclosure
are already experienced. I cannot endure a groundless imputation, though
to free me from it I must create and justify imputations still more
atrocious. My story may at least be brief. If the agonies of remembrance
must be awakened afresh, let me do all that in me lies to shorten them.

I was born in the county of Armagh. My parents were of the better sort
of peasants, and were able to provide me with the rudiments of
knowledge. I should doubtless have trodden in their footsteps, and have
spent my life in the cultivation of their scanty fields, if an event had
not happened, Which, for a long time, I regarded as the most fortunate
of my life, but which I now regard as the scheme of some infernal agent,
and as the primary source of all my calamities.

My father's farm was a portion of the demesne of one who resided wholly
in the metropolis and consigned the management of his estates to his
stewards and retainers. This person married a lady who brought him great
accession of fortune. Her wealth was her only recommendation in the eyes