At an early hour next morning Mr. Herbert came to see me, and found me very ill; my anxieties had brought on a fit of the ague: I had passed the night in dismal dreams; sleep I had none: the spell of an incantation was upon me; my bed was surrounded with auguries and omens, and I beheld dreadful apparitions flashing athwart the gloom.

My intention was to have gone with him to Judiville, to ascertain from the Cockspurs which of his old associates were yet living to whom he could write on behalf of my son; but the residue of the ague-fit was still upon me, and I could not quit the blankets, so that he was obliged to go alone.

In the course of the afternoon, having enjoyed some refreshing sleep, I rose, anxiously looking for Mr. Herbert; but he did not return till it was almost sunset. His mission was, however, satisfactory; he found that many of his oldest and most intimate acquaintances were still living, and he wrote to several of them from Judiville, that a post should not be lost.

Although it could not be said that this attentive kindness made any difference in my situation, it yet, in some measure, relieved my mind,—if that can be accounted relief, which merely provided that the fugitive, in the event of reaching England, should not find himself utterly destitute.

By the next post I wrote to my father. It was a heart-breaking thing to address that pious old man on such a subject, and to entreat him to receive with compassionate affection, if ever the rash lad reached his dwelling, one who was stained with blood. It is true, we had not heard that the victim of the duel was dead; but the hopes of his recovery were slender, and I prepared my mind for the worst. Alas! that the felicity of parents should so often be limited to the childhood of their children!

It was on this occasion that I first began to reflect seriously on the pain I had given to my kind father, when, intoxicated with the democratic vapours of the French Revolution, I was art and part in those projects of perfectibility, which brought me, and so many of my young companions, under the tawse of the Lord Advocate.