You are the stranger who came to stop in the 'Mitre.' Yes, you came down to stop in the 'Mitre.' I know you by your strong grasp.

I care not, however, for your attempt to strangle me.

I forgive you--I pardon you; and I will tell you why--treat me as violently as you may--I feel that there is goodness in your face, and mercy in your heart.

But I did see a face, one day, in the inn," he added, in a voice that gradually became quite frantic--"a face that was dark, damnable, and demoniac--oh, oh! may God of heaven ever preserve me from seeing that face again!" he exclaimed, shuddering wildly.

"Open me up the shrouded graves, my friend; I will call you so notwithstanding what has happened, for I still think you are a gentleman; open me up, I say, the shrouded graves--set me among the hideous dead, in all their ghastly and loathsome putrefaction--lay me side by side with the sweltering carcass of the gibbeted murderer--give me such a vision, and expose me to the anger of the Almighty when raging in his vengeance; or, if there be a pitch of horror still beyond this, then I say--mark me, my friend--then I say, open me up all hell at full work--hissing, boiling, bubbling, scalding, roasting, frying, scorching, blazing, burning, but ever-consuming hell, sir, I say, in full operation--the whole dark and penal machinery in full play--open it up--there they are--the yell, the scream, the blasphemy, the shout, the torture, the laughter of despair--with the pleasing consciousness that all this is to be eternal; hark ye, sir, open me up a view of this aforesaid spectacle upon the very brow of perdition, and having allowed me time to console myself by a contemplation of it, fling me, soul and body, into the uttermost depths of its howling tortures; do any or all of these things, sooner than let me have a sight of that face again--it bears such a terrible resemblance to that which blighted me." He then paused for a little, and seemed as if about to sink into a calmer and more thoughtful mood--at least the baronet inferred as much from his silence.