What I did I know not.

I have tried to urge my memory along from the point of my awakening, but in vain.

By what miracle I crawled forth, I cannot tell; but in the morning I was found by my man lying prone in the garden, half a dozen paces from the blackened ruins of the cottage, as near death as man may go and live.
"God willed that I should not die, but it was close upon a year before I was restored to any semblance of my former self, and then I was so changed that I was hardly to be recognized as that same joyous, vigorous lad, who had set out, fowling-piece on shoulder, one fine morning a year agone.

There was grey in my hair, as much as there is now, though I was but twenty-one; my face was seared and marked as that of a man who had lived twice my years.

It was to my faithful servant that I owed my life, though I ask myself to-night whether I have cause for gratitude towards him on that score.
"So soon as I had regained sufficient strength, I went secretly home, wishing that men might continue to believe me dead.