Page:The Mysterious Warning - Parsons (1796, volume 1).djvu/192

 in age, as you appear to be, such things as nourish the body and enliven the spirits, are highly requisite."

"To some persons," answered the man, "it may be so; but not to a man to whom the hours that he drags here are a weary pilgrimage, such a one seeks not by stimulatives to prolong a life long since grown hateful to him."

"Alas!" cried Ferdinand, "few men can be more wretched than myself; recent afflictions have driven me from my home, and from my friends; yet do I hold it cowardly to desert my post, I have no power over that life I could not give myself; and to neglect the means of its preservation, is little less sinful than to destroy it at once.—But, pardon me one question, are you the owner of this Castle?"

"I am not," returned the other; "but do not be curious in matters that cannot concern you, nor by an idle curiosity which can receive no gratification, oblige me to repent of my charity."