would kill him; I have persuaded him to wait a little while and go

west when I go."

Another letter had this paragraph in it:

"He is better one day and worse the next, and is out of his mind a

good deal of the time. Lately his case has developed a something

which is a wonder to the hired nurses, but which will not be much of

a marvel to you if you have read medical philosophy much. It is

this: his lost memory returns to him when he is delirious, and goes

away again when he is himself-just as old Canada Joe used to talk

the French patois of his boyhood in the delirium of typhus fever,

though he could not do it when his mind was clear. Now this poor

gentleman's memory has always broken down before he reached the

explosion of the steamer; he could only remember starting up the

river with his wife and child, and he had an idea that there was a

race, but he was not certain; he could not name the boat he was on;

there was a dead blank of a month or more that supplied not an item

to his recollection. It was not for me to assist him, of course.

But now in his delirium it all comes out: the names of the boats,

every incident of the explosion, and likewise the details of his

astonishing escape--that is, up to where, just as a yawl-boat was

approaching him (he was clinging to the starboard wheel of the

burning wreck at the time), a falling timber struck him on the head.

But I will write out his wonderful escape in full to-morrow or next

day. Of course the physicians will not let me tell him now that our

105

The Gilded Age