and Alfred to the naked eye was a sane man.
But then Bailey had no naked eye left: he had
been twenty years an M.D. The certificates
of Wycherley and Speers were the green
spectacles he wore—very green ones—whenever he
looked at Alfred Hardie.

Perhaps in time he will forget those certificates,
and, on his spectacles dropping off, he will
see Alfred is sane. If he does, he will publish
him as one of his most remarkable cures.

Meanwhile the whole treatment of this ill-
starred young gentleman gravitated towards
insanity. The inner mind was exasperated by
barefaced injustice, and oppression; above all,
by his letters being stopped; for that convinced
him both Baker and Bailey, with their see-saw
evasions, knew he was sane, and dreaded a visit
from honest, understanding men: and the mind's
external organ, the brain, which an asylum
professes to soothe, was steadily undermined by
artificial sleeplessness. A man can't sleep in
irons till he is used to them: and when Alfred
was relieved of these, his sleep was still driven
away by biting insects and barking dogs, two
opiates provided in many of these placid Retreats,
with a view to the permanence, rather than the
comfort, of the lodgers.

On the eighth day Alfred succeeded at last in
an object he had steadily pursued for some time:
he caught the two see-saw humbugs together.

"Now," said he, "you say he intercepts my
letters; and he says it is you who do it. Which
is the truth?"

They were staggered, and he followed up his
advantage: "Look me in the face, gentlemen,"
said he. "Can you pretend you do not know I
am sane? Ah, you turn your heads away. You
can only tell this barefaced lie behind my back.
Do you believe in God, and in a judgment to
come? Then, if you cannot release me, at least
don't be such scoundrels as to stop my letters,
and so swindle me out of a fair trial, an open,
public trial."

The doctor parried with a formula. "Publicity
would be the greatest misfortune could befal you.
Pray be calm."

Now, an asylum is a place not entirely exempt
from prejudices: and one of them is that any
sort of appeal to God Almighty is a sign or else
forerunner of maniacal excitement.

These philosophers forget that by stopping
letters, evading public trials, and, in a word,
cutting off all appeals to human justice, they compel
the patient to turn his despairing eyes, and lift
his despairing voice to Him, whose eye alone
can ever really penetrate these dark abodes.

Accordingly the patient who appealed to God
above a whisper in Silverton Grove House used
to get soothed directly. And the tranquillising
influences employed were morphia, croton oil, or
a blister.

The keeper came to Alfred in his room.
"Doctor has ordered a blister."

"What for? Send for him directly."

"He is gone."

This way of ordering torture, and then coolly
going, irritated Alfred beyond endurance. Though
he knew he should soon be powerless, he showed
fight; made his mark as usual on a couple of his
zealous attendants; but, not having room to
work in, was soon overpowered, hobbled and
handcuffed: then they cut off his hair, and put a
large blister on the top of his head.

The obstinate brute declined to go mad. They
began to respect him for this tenacity of
purpose; a decent bedroom was allotted him; his
portmanteau and bag were brought him, and he
was let walk every day on the lawn with a keeper,
only there were no ladders left about, and the
trap-door was locked; i.e. the iron gate.

On one of these occasions he heard the
gate-keeper whistle three times consecutively; his
attendant followed suit, and hurried Alfred into
the house, which soon rang with treble signals.

"What is it?" inquired Alfred.

"The visiting justices are in sight: go into your
room, please."

"Yes, I'll go," said Alfred, affecting cheerful
compliance, and the man ran off.

The whole house was in a furious bustle. All
the hobbles, and chains, and instruments of
restraint, were hastily collected and bundled out
of sight, and clean sheets were being put on
many a filthy bed whose occupant had never
slept in sheets since he came there, when two
justices arrived and were shown into the drawing-
room.

During the few minutes they were detained
there by Mrs. Archbold, who was mistress of her
whole business, quite a new face was put on
everything and everybody; ancient cobwebs fell;
soap and water explored unwonted territories:
the harshest attendants began practising pleasant
looks and kind words on the patients, to get into
the way of it, so that it might not come too
abrupt and startle the patients visibly under the
visitors' eyes: something like actors working up
a factitious sentiment at the wing for the public
display, or like a racehorse's preliminary canter.
Alfred's heart beat with joy inexpressible. He
had only to keep calm, and this was his last day
at Silverton Grove. The first thing he did was
to make a careful toilet.

The stinginess of relations, and the greed of
madhouse proprietors, make many a patient
look ten times madder than he is, by means of
dress. Clothes wear out in an asylum, and are
not always taken off, though Agriculture has long
and justly claimed them for her own. And when
it is no longer possible to refuse the Reverend
Mad Tom or Mrs. Crazy Jane some new raiment,
then consanguineous munificence does not go to
Poole or Elise, but oftener to paternal or
maternal wardrobes, and even to the ancestral
chest, the old oak one, singing:

"Poor things, they are out of the world: what
need for them to be in the fashion!" (Formula.)

This arrangement keeps the bump of self-
esteem down, especially in women, and so