Page 564 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

task he has before him. One relieves one’s brain by these
whirlings of one’s mental limbs. I remember that a prison-
er at Hobart Town, twice condemned and twice reprieved,
jumped and shouted with frenzied vehemence when he
heard his sentence of death was finally pronounced. He
told me, if he had not so shouted, he believed he would have
gone mad.
April 10th.—We had a state dinner last night. The conver-
sation was about nothing in the world but convicts. I never
saw Mrs. Frere to less advantage. Silent, distraite, and sad.
She told me after dinner that she disliked the very name
of ‘convict’ from early associations. ‘I have lived among
them all my life,’ she said, ‘but that does not make it the
better for me. I have terrible fancies at times, Mr. North,
that seem half-memories. I dread to be brought in contact
with prisoners again. I am sure that some evil awaits me at
their hands.’
I laughed, of course, but it would not do. She holds to her
own opinion, and looks at me with horror in her eyes. This
terror in her face is perplexing.
‘You are nervous,’ I said. ‘You want rest.’
‘I am nervous,’ she replied, with that candour of voice
and manner I have before remarked in her, ‘and I have pre-
sentiments of evil.’
We sat silent for a while, and then she suddenly turned
her large eyes on me, and said calmly, ‘Mr. North, what
death shall I die?’ The question was an echo of my own
thoughts—I have some foolish (?) fancies as to physiogno-
my—and it made me start. What death, indeed? What sort