“Well said, Naylor.  Come, sir, One higher than the State takes precedence here.  We must on no account shake a Christian frame of mind or rekindle a sufferer’s wrongs.  Yes, Naylor, forgive and you shall be forgiven.  I am pleased with you, greatly pleased with you, my poor fellow.  There is my hand!” Naylor took his reverence’s hand and his very forehead reddened with pride and pleasure at so warm a word of praise from the revered mouth.  They went out of the cell.  Being now in the corridor, Mr. Eden addressed the Government official thus: 

“My proofs draw to a close.  I could multiply instances ad infinitum—­but what is the use?  If these do not convince you you would not believe though one rose from the dead.  What do I say?  Have not Naylor and Joram and many others come back from the dead to tell you by what roads they were driven there?  One example remains to be shown.  To a philosophical mind it is no stronger than the rest; but there are many men who can receive no very strong impression except through their senses.  You may be one of these; and it is my duty to give your judgment every aid.  Where is Mr. Fry?  He has left us.”

“I am coming to attend you, sir,” cried Evans from above.  “Mr. Fry is gone to the governor.”

“Where are we going?” asked Mr. Lacy.

“To examine a prisoner whom the jailer tortured with the jacket, and starved, and ended by robbing him of his gas and his bed contrary to law.  Evans, since you are here, relate all that happened to Edward Josephs on the fourth of this month—­and mind you don’t exaggerate.”

“Well, sir, they had been at him for near a month, overtasking him and then giving him the jacket, and starving him and overtasking him again on his empty stomach till the poor lad was a living skeleton.  On the fourth the governor put him in the jacket, and there he was kept till he swooned.”

“Ah!”

“Then they flung two buckets of water over him and that brought him to.  Then they sent him to his cell and there he was in his wet clothes.  Then him being there shaking with cold, the governor ordered his gas to be taken away—­his hands were shaking over it for a little warmth when they robbed him of that bit o’ comfort.”

“Hum!”

“Contrary to law!” put in Mr. Eden.

“Well, sir, he was a quiet lad not given to murmur, but at losing his gas he began to cry out so loud you might hear him all over the prison.”

“What did he cry?”

“Sir, he cried MURDER!”

“Go on.”

“Then I came to him and found him shivering and dripping, and crying fit to break his poor heart.”

“And did you do nothing for him?”

“I did what I could, sir.  I took him and twisted his bedclothes so tight round him the air could not get in, and before I left him his sobs went down and he looked like warm and sleeping after all his troubles.  Well, sir, they can tell you better that did the job, but it seems the governor sent another turnkey called Hodges to take away his bed from under him.”