He describes him in general terms, as the most incomprehensible and formidable among men; as engaged in schemes, reasonably suspected to be, in the highest degree, criminal, but such as no human intelligence is able to unravel: that his ends are pursued by means which leave it in doubt whether he be not in league with some infernal spirit: that his crimes have hitherto been perpetrated with the aid of some unknown but desperate accomplices: that he wages a perpetual war against the happiness of mankind, and sets his engines of destruction at work against every object that presents itself.
"This is the substance of the letter.

Hallet expressed some surprize at the curiosity which was manifested by me on this occasion.

I was too much absorbed by the ideas suggested by this letter, to pay attention to his remarks.

I shuddered with the apprehension of the evil to which our indiscreet familiarity with this man had probably exposed us.

I burnt with impatience to see you, and to do what in me lay to avert the calamity which threatened us.