“I found a coal and a bit of brick in the yard.  I pounded them and mixed them with water and laid them on with a brush I had made and hid.”

“Very ingenious!  Are you cold?”

“No.”

“Because your voice trembles.”

“Does it?”

“What is the matter?”

“Can’t you guess?”

“No!  But I remember you used to tremble when I spoke to you in the cell.  Why was that?  Have your nerves been shaken by ill-usage, my poor fellow?”

“Oh, no! it is not that.”

“Tell me, then!”

“Oh, sir! you know all a poor fellow feels.  You can guess what made me tremble, and makes me tremble now, like an aspen I do.”

“No, indeed! pray tell me!  Are we not friends?”

“The best ever I had, or ever shall.”

“Then tell me.”

I’ll try; but it is a long story, and the door is so thick.”

“Ah! but I hear you better now.  I have got used to your voice.

“Well, sir; but I’ve no words to speak to you as I ought.  Why did I use to tremble when you used to speak kind to me?  Sir, when I first came here I hadn’t a bad heart.  I was a felon, but I was a man.  They turned me to a brute by cruelty and wrong.  You came too late, sir.  It wasn’t Tom Robinson you found in that cell.  I had got to think all men were devils They poisoned my soul!  I hated God and man!

“The very chaplain before you said good, kind words in church, but out of it he was Hawes’ tool!  Then you came and spoke good, kind words.  My heart ran to meet them; then it drew back all shivering and said, this is a hypocrite, too!  I was a fool and a villain to think so for a moment, and perhaps I didn’t at bottom, but I was turned to gall.

“Oh, sir! you don’t know what it is to lose hope, to find out that do what you will you can’t be right, can’t escape abuse and hatred and torture.  Treat a man like a dog and you make him one!

“But you came.  Your voice, your face, your eye were all pity and kindness.  I hoped, but I was afraid to hope!  I had seen but two things—­butchers and hypocrites.  Then I had sworn in my despair never to speak again, and I wouldn’t speak to you.  Fool!  How kind and patient you were.  Sir, once when you left me you sighed as you closed the cell door.  I came after you to beg your pardon, when it was too late; indeed I did, upon my honor.  And when you would rub the ointment on my throat in spite of my ingratitude, I could have worshipped you; but my pride held me back like an iron hand.  Why did I tremble? that was the devil and my better part fighting inside me for the upper hand.  And another thing, I did not dare speak to you.  I felt that if I did I should give way altogether, like a woman or a child.  I feel so now.  For, oh! can’t you guess what it must be to a poor fellow when all the rest are savage as wolves and one is kind as a woman?  Oh! you have been a friend to me.  You don’t know all you have done.  You have