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make a full confession, Father Beron would declare, lean-
ing forward with that dull, surfeited look which can be seen
in the eyes of gluttonous persons after a heavy meal.
The priest’s inquisitorial instincts suffered but little from
the want of classical apparatus of the Inquisition At no time
of the world’s history have men been at a loss how to in-
flict mental and bodily anguish upon their fellow-creatures.
This aptitude came to them in the growing complexity of
their passions and the early refinement of their ingenu-
ity. But it may safely be said that primeval man did not go
to the trouble of inventing tortures. He was indolent and
pure of heart. He brained his neighbour ferociously with a
stone axe from necessity and without malice. The stupidest
mind may invent a rankling phrase or brand the innocent
with a cruel aspersion. A piece of string and a ramrod; a
few muskets in combination with a length of hide rope; or
even a simple mallet of heavy, hard wood applied with a
swing to human fingers or to the joints of a human body is
enough for the infliction of the most exquisite torture. The
doctor had been a very stubborn prisoner, and, as a natu-
ral consequence of that ‘bad disposition’ (so Father Beron
called it), his subjugation had been very crushing and very
complete. That is why the limp in his walk, the twist of his
shoulders, the scars on his cheeks were so pronounced. His
confessions, when they came at last, were very complete,
too. Sometimes on the nights when he walked the floor, he
wondered, grinding his teeth with shame and rage, at the
fertility of his imagination when stimulated by a sort of
pain which makes truth, honour, selfrespect, and life itself

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