When satisfied of this beyond all doubt, Markland, on whose mind suffering had produced a temporary stupor, sought his room at the hotel, and remained there for several days, so hopeless, weak, and undecided, that he seemed almost on the verge of mental imbecility.

How could he return home and communicate the dreadful intelligence to his family?
How could he say to them, that, for his transgressions, they must go forth from their beautiful Eden?
"No--no!" he exclaimed, wringing his hands in anguish.

"I can never tell them this! I can never look into their faces! Never! never!" The moment had come, and the tempter was at his ear.

There was, first, the remote suggestion of self-banishment in some distant land, where the rebuking presence of his injured family could never haunt him.

But he felt that a life in this world, apart from them, would be worse than death.
"I am mocked! I am cursed!" he exclaimed, bitterly.
The tempter was stealthily doing his work.
"Oh! what a vain struggle is this life! What a fitful fever! Would that it were over, and I at rest!" The tempter was leading his thoughts at will.
"How can I meet my wronged family?
How can I look my friends in the face?
I shall be to the world only a thing of pity or reproach.