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comes this strange anxiety and alarm?" and, with a sort of inward
vision, my mind seemed to behold the approach of some great
calamity. Even yet in prison I retain the impression of that sudden
dread and parting anguish, and can recall each word and every look
of my distressed parents. The tender reproach of my mother, "Ah!
Silvio has not come to Turin to see US!" seemed to hang like a
weight upon my soul. I regretted a thousand instances in which I
might have shown myself more grateful and agreeable to them; I did
not even tell them how much I loved; all that I owed to them. I was
never to see them more, and yet I turned my eyes with so much like
indifference from their dear and venerable features! Why, why was I
so chary of giving expression to what I felt (would they could have
read it in my looks), to all my gratitude and love? In utter
solitude, thoughts like these pierced me to the soul.

I rose, shut the window, and sat some hours, in the idea that it
would be in vain to seek repose. At length I threw myself on my
pallet, and excessive weariness brought me sleep.



CHAPTER III.



To awake the first night in a prison is a horrible thing. Is it
possible, I murmured, trying to collect my thoughts, is it possible
I am here? Is not all that passed a dream? Did they really seize
me yesterday? Was it I whom they examined from morning till night,
who am doomed to the same process day after day, and who wept so
bitterly last night when I thought of my dear parents? Slumber, the
unbroken silence, and rest had, in restoring my mental powers, added
incalculably to the capability of reflecting, and, consequently, of
grief. There was nothing to distract my attention; my fancy grew
busy with absent forms, and pictured, to my eye the pain and terror
of my father and mother, and of all dear to me, on first hearing the
tidings of my arrest.

At this moment, said I, they are sleeping in peace; or perhaps,
anxiety for me may keep them watching, yet little anticipating the
fate to which I am here consigned. Happy for them, were it the will
of God, that they should cease to exist ere they hear of this
horrible misfortune. Who will give them strength to bear it? Some
inward voice seemed to whisper me, He whom the afflicted look up to,
love and acknowledge in their hearts; who enabled a mother to follow
her son to the mount of Golgotha, and to stand under His cross. He,
the friend of the unhappy, the friend of man.

Strange this should be the first time I truly felt the power of
religion in my heart; and to filial love did I owe this consolation.
Though not ill-disposed, I had hitherto been little impressed with
its truth, and had not well adhered to it. All common-place
objections I estimated at their just value, yet there were many
doubts and sophisms which had shaken my faith. It was long, indeed,
since they had ceased to trouble my belief in the existence of the

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