I think it was done by an educated man.' The literary artist had detected the literary machinery.

If you will look at the letter now, you will detect it yourself--it is observable in every line.
Straightway the clergyman went off, with this seed of suspicion sprouting in him, and wrote to a minister residing in that town where Williams had been jailed and converted; asked for light; and also asked if a person in the literary line (meaning me) might be allowed to print the letter and tell its history.

He presently received this answer-- Rev .-- -- ---- MY DEAR FRIEND,--In regard to that 'convict's letter' there can be no doubt as to its genuineness.

'Williams,' to whom it was written, lay in our jail and professed to have been converted, and Rev.Mr .-- --, the chaplain, had great faith in the genuineness of the change--as much as one can have in any such case.
The letter was sent to one of our ladies, who is a Sunday-school teacher,--sent either by Williams himself, or the chaplain of the State's prison, probably.

She has been greatly annoyed in having so much publicity, lest it might seem a breach of confidence, or be an injury to Williams.