Suddenly he beheld a man leaning against the wall, and staring at him as he passed in a wild and almost ferocious manner. There seemed to be something peculiar in that poor creature's garb:—Holford looked again—and that second glance made him shudder fearfully!
The man had on a strait-waistcoat,—a strong garment made of bed-ticking, and resembling a smock that was too small for him. The sleeves were beneath, instead of outside, and were sewn to the waistcoat—a contrivance by which the arms of the unhappy wretch were held in a necessary restraint, but without the infliction of pain.
"Merciful God!" thought Holford, within himself; "if a residence within these walls should drive me really mad! Oh! if I should ever come to such an abject state as that!"
His miserable reflections were strangely interrupted.
One of the lunatics abruptly drew near and addressed him in a wild and incoherent tone.
"The nation is falling," he said; "and the worst of it is that it does not know that it is falling! It is going down as rapidly as it can; and I only can save it! Yes—the nation is falling—falling——"
Holford felt a cold and shuddering sensation creep over him; for these manifestations of a ruined intellect struck him forcibly—fearfully,—as if they were an omen—a warning—a presage of the condition to which he himself must speedily come!
He was relieved from the farther importunities of the poor lunatic, by the sudden opening of a door, by which Busby admitted him into a narrow passage with two gratings, having a small space between them. The inner grating was at the bottom of a stone staircase, down which another keeper speedily came in obedience to a summons from Busby's lips.
This second keeper now took charge of Henry Holford, whom he conducted up the stairs to a gallery entered by a wicket in an iron grating, and divided by a similar defence into two compartments.
One of these compartments was much larger than the other, and contained many inmates and many rooms: the smaller division had but six chambers opening from it.