"Well, Richard, well, Evroult, my boys, how are you to-day?"
"As well as we ever shall be here."
"I want to get out of this place."
"And I."
"Oh will you not get us out? Can you not speak to the governor? see, we are nearly well." Then Richard looked at his hand, where two fingers were missing, and sobbed aloud.
"It is no use, my dear boys, to dash yourselves against the bars of your cage, like poor silly birds; I fear the time of release will never come, till death brings it either for you or me—see, I share your lot."
"But you have had your day in the world, and come here of your own accord; we are only boys, oh, perhaps with threescore and ten years here before us, as you say in the Psalms."
"Nay, few here attain the age the Psalmist gives as the ordinary limit of human life in his day, and, indeed, few outside in these days."[16]
"Well, we should have been out of it all, had you not interfered."
"And where?"