Scotland/Scots > Wilson's tales of the Borders and of Scotland > Volume 3

THE CONSCIENCE-STRICKEN.
51
I think of removing it, an attack comes upon me ?” I
cannot explain that, I replied; and he then went on.
“ The last time yon were sent for, I was seized, after my
wife despatched yon the message; and now,” holding up
his hand, “ behold it comes again, the very instant I begin
to talk of a remedy! Yet I must suffer—it is ordained that
I must suffer—it is right and just that I should suffer.
Welcome, ye dreadful messenger whom I fear and tremble
at, yet love! You see, sir, he comes!”
The unhappy man spoke truth: an attack of his disease
came on him at that moment, and he fell back on the
couch, screaming, and pressing, with all his force, his hand
against the seat from which the pains lancinated through
the bones and muscles of his face. His cries brought
his wife to his assistance; but it is one of the character¬
istics of this disease, that assistants and comforters can
only look on and weep, so utterly does it defy and mock
all human efforts. I left him in the charge of his wife, to
whom I gave some directions, rather to revive her hope
and remove from her countenance a painful anxiety that
clouded it, than with any hope of affording relief. As I
proceeded through the planting in which the house was
situated, I heard his cries for some distance; and, while I
pitied the victim, called up into my mind his sentiments,
which struck me as being peculiar and mysterious. His
conviction of some connection between an attack of his
complaint and his attempt to get it removed, was clearly
a fancy ;• yet the existence of such an idea indicated some¬
thing wrong either in his mind or conscience—even with
the admission that a pain so extraordinary might itself
suggest, to a sober-minded man, some thoughts of Divine
retribution, where there was no crime to be expiated of a
deeper die than the most of mankind are in the habit of
committing.
Whatever might be the ground of the delusion under