She seemed to be in great confusion of thought, and turned her head this way and that; and at last, after much hesitation, said, Alad for me!  I hardly know what I wanted with you.  When I awoke from my intemperate trance, and found what a cursed way I was in, my conscience smote me, and I was for catching like a drowning wretch, at every straw.  I wanted to see every body and any body but those I did see; every body who I thought could give me comfort.  Yet could I expect none from you neither; for you had declared yourself my enemy, although I had never done you harm; for what, Jackey, in her old tone, whining through her nose, was Miss Harlowe to you?—­But she is happy!—­But oh! what will become of me?—­Yet tell me, (for the surgeons have told you the truth, no doubt,) tell me, shall I do well again?  May I recover?  If I may, I will begin a new course of life:  as I hope to be saved, I will.  I’ll renounce you all—­every one of you, [looking round her,] and scrape all I can together, and live a life of penitence; and when I die, leave it all to charitable uses—­I will, by my soul—­every doit of it to charity—­but this once, lifting up her rolling eyes, and folded hands, (with a wry-mouthed earnestness, in which every muscle and feature of her face bore its part,) this one time—­good God of Heaven and earth, but this once! this once! repeating those words five or six times, spare thy poor creature, and every hour of my life shall be passed in penitence and atonement:  upon my soul it shall!

Less vehement! a little less vehement! said I—­it is not for me, who have led so free a life, as you but too well know, to talk to you in a reproaching strain, and to set before you the iniquity you have lived in, and the many souls you have helped to destroy.  But as you are in so penitent a way, if I might advise, you should send for a good clergyman, the purity of whose life and manners may make all these things come from him with a better grace than they can from me.

How, Sir!  What, Sir! interrupting me:  send for a parson!—­Then you indeed think I shall die!  Then you think there is no room for hope!——­A parson, Sir!——­Who sends for a parson, while there is any hope left?—­ The sight of a parson would be death immediate to me!—­I cannot, cannot die!—­Never tell me of it!—­What! die!—­What! cut off in the midst of my sins!

And then she began again to rave.

I cannot bear, said I, rising from my seat with a stern air, to see a reasonable creature behave so outrageously!—­Will this vehemence, think you, mend the matter?  Will it avail you any thing?  Will it not rather shorten the life you are so desirous to have lengthened, and deprive you of the only opportunity you can ever have to settle your affairs for both worlds?—­Death is but the common lot:  and if it be your’s soon, looking at her, it will be also your’s, and your’s, and your’s, speaking with a raised voice, and turning to every trembling devil round her, [for they all shook at my forcible application,] and mine too.  And you have reason to be thankful, turning again to her, that you did not perish in that act of intemperance which brought you to this:  for it might have been your neck, as well as your leg; and then you had not had the opportunity you now have for repentance—­and, the Lord have mercy upon you! into what a state might you have awoke!