Sunt arreptitii, vexati dæmone multo

Est energumenus, quem dæmon possidet unus.

Lines which draw a subtle delicate distinction between the demoniac and

man possessed by a devil.

At the bottom of this inscription, nailed flat against the wall, was a

stone ladder, which had been originally of wood, but which had been

changed into stone by being buried in earth of petrifying quality at a

place called Apsley Gowis, near Woburn Abbey.

The prison of Southwark, now demolished, opened on two streets, between

which, as a gate, it formerly served as means of communication. It had

two doors. In the large street a door, apparently used by the

authorities; and in the lane the door of punishment, used by the rest of

the living and by the dead also, because when a prisoner in the jail

died it was by that issue that his corpse was carried out. A liberation

not to be despised. Death is release into infinity.

It was by the gate of punishment that Gwynplaine had been taken into

prison. The lane, as we have said, was nothing but a little passage,

paved with flints, confined between two opposite walls. There is one of

the same kind at Brussels called Rue d'une Personne. The walls were

unequal in height. The high one was the prison; the low one, the

cemetery--the enclosure for the mortuary remains of the jail--was not

higher than the ordinary stature of a man. In it was a gate almost

opposite the prison wicket. The dead had only to cross the street; the

590

The Man Who Laughs