Meanwhile I learnt from the keeper that the person to whose humanity I owed the improvement in my situation was the surgeon who attended the institution; and I looked forward to his next visit with all the eagerness of hope. Remembering, however, the dependence he had shown on the keeper's information, I became doubly anxious to remove the impression which I saw was entertained against the soundness of my mind. Alas! I forgot that it is not for the prejudiced eye to detect the almost imperceptible bound which separates soundness of mind from insanity.
'You assure me,' said I, one day, to my inexorable gaoler, 'that you have no instructions to detain me here, and you promise that I shall be dismissed the moment I am well: tell me how you propose to ascertain my recovery.'
'Oh, no fear but I shall know that before you know it yourself.'
'But what reason have you to doubt that I am already in perfect possession of my senses? I speak rationally enough.'
'Oh ay, I can't say but you have spoken rationally enough these three or four days. They all do that, at times.'
'What other proof of my recovery can you expect? Here I have no means of proving it by my actions.'
'Well, well. We'll see one of these days.'
'But if it be true that you have no wish to detain me, why must I linger on in this place of horror? Put me to any proof you will. Propose, for instance, the most complicated question in arithmetic to me; and see whether I do not answer it like a rational creature.'
'I make no doubt. We have a gentleman here these fourteen years, that works at the counting from morning to night.'
'Fourteen years! Good Heavens!—Oh try me for mercy's sake in any way you please. Think of any experiment that will satisfy yourself;—let it only be made quickly.'