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FRAGMENTS OF A PRISONER'S DIARY
backwaters of the remote village. The hero of our tragedy was one of such cascs. In the town, ho saw things not to be seen in his native place. He heard voices that had not reached him before. He allowed himself to be influenced by the strange sights he saw and disturbing voices he hcard. Why should hc not? Had he not been sent to the city to learn precisely what could not be lcarned in his villagc? Thus, after two years, he returned home, not indeed fully possessed of modern cducation, but with sone new notions about life.
Naturally, the young man would find the life in the village rather dull. There was no excitement, no romance, no movement, not even expectation. All channels for venting his newly awak oned emotions closed, he took to brooding. The condition of his sister, a commonplace of callous disregard, provided him with food for thought. A part of his education in the town had been to be conscious of the sex-impulse. That being a lesson taught by nature, he would have learned it anywhere. Two vears in the atmosphere of semi.. modernisin had only encouraged him to be honest, at least to himself, if not to others. Most probably, he still regarded his willing response to the irresistible call of nature as a shameful thing to do. Yet, presumably, his modern education had gone to the extent of making him admit to himself, perhaps with great reluctance, that he could
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