they would be distrusted and discredited accordingly, and they would therefore be powerless to place my interests or Percival’s secret in jeopardy.  I committed one error in trusting myself to such a blindfold calculation of chances as this.  I committed another when Percival had paid the penalty of his own obstinacy and violence, by granting Lady Glyde a second reprieve from the mad-house, and allowing Mr. Hartright a second chance of escaping me.  In brief, Fosco, at this serious crisis, was untrue to himself.  Deplorable and uncharacteristic fault!  Behold the cause, in my heart—­behold, in the image of Marian Halcombe, the first and last weakness of Fosco’s life!

At the ripe age of sixty, I make this unparalleled confession.  Youths!  I invoke your sympathy.  Maidens!  I claim your tears.

A word more, and the attention of the reader (concentrated breathlessly on myself) shall be released.

My own mental insight informs me that three inevitable questions will be asked here by persons of inquiring minds.  They shall be stated—­they shall be answered.

First question.  What is the secret of Madame Fosco’s unhesitating devotion of herself to the fulfilment of my boldest wishes, to the furtherance of my deepest plans?  I might answer this by simply referring to my own character, and by asking, in my turn, Where, in the history of the world, has a man of my order ever been found without a woman in the background self-immolated on the altar of his life?  But I remember that I am writing in England, I remember that I was married in England, and I ask if a woman’s marriage obligations in this country provide for her private opinion of her husband’s principles?  No!  They charge her unreservedly to love, honour, and obey him.  That is exactly what my wife has done.  I stand here on a supreme moral elevation, and I loftily assert her accurate performance of her conjugal duties.  Silence, Calumny!  Your sympathy, Wives of England, for Madame Fosco!

Second question.  If Anne Catherick had not died when she did, what should I have done?  I should, in that case, have assisted worn-out Nature in finding permanent repose.  I should have opened the doors of the Prison of Life, and have extended to the captive (incurably afflicted in mind and body both) a happy release.

Third question.  On a calm revision of all the circumstances—­Is my conduct worthy of any serious blame?  Most emphatically, No!  Have I not carefully avoided exposing myself to the odium of committing unnecessary crime?  With my vast resources in chemistry, I might have taken Lady Glyde’s life.  At immense personal sacrifice I followed the dictates of my own ingenuity, my own humanity, my own caution, and took her identity instead.  Judge me by what I might have done.  How comparatively innocent! how indirectly virtuous I appear in what I really did!

I announced on beginning it that this narrative would be a remarkable document.  It has entirely answered my expectations.  Receive these fervid lines—­my last legacy to the country I leave for ever.  They are worthy of the occasion, and worthy of
                                      Fosco.