About twelve o'clock
The struggling energies of conscience loaded with crime , have been witnessed by philosophers who have denied the existence of the moral sense as an original power ; but of what avail is their scepticism , when they are bound to admit that this great sanction of God 's law is incident to all mankind -- having been found as vivid and strong in the new-found islands of Polynesia , as it ever was in the Old World ? It would be for the interest of mankind if those who call themselves its teachers , and dignify themselves with the name of investigators of truth , had looked more often at the workings of this extraordinary power -- witnessed and described the agonies of the heart convulsed by its throes , heard and narrated the piercing cries and the flaming words that are wrung from the throat of him who is under its scorpion lash , felt and told the horrors of those sights and sounds -- instead of inquiring whether it is connate or constructed by social and political institutions . Yet this , too , has been done , and well done ; and it is not because the effects are unknown , or have been inadequately described , that I contribute the results of my experience on this interesting subject , but simply because I conceive they can not be too well known , or too forcibly delineated , in a country where a struggling competition of interests and a fierce ambition are exerted hourly in attempting to still the voice of the monitor that so indefatigably and thanklessly whispers a better life . About twelve o'clock on the night of the 15th of December , 18 -- , I was aroused by a loud knocking at my bedroom door -- a mode of calling me to my patients different from that generally followed by my domestics ; and , upon my requesting the servant to come in , he entered hurriedly , with some one behind him , who called out , in the dark , that Mr. T -- , a retired undertaker , whom I had been in the habit of attending , had been shot by an assassin , but that life remained , and might eventually be preserved , by my speedy attendance . I dressed instantly , and accompanied the messenger -- a nephew of the wounded man , called William B -- , whom I recollected to have seen in his house , and in whom he had much confidence -- to where my services were thus so urgently required . We had about a mile to walk -- the residence being beyond the town , in the midst of a small plantation of fir trees , and too well situated for the accomplishment of any felonious or murderous intention which the reputed riches of the proprietor might generate in the minds of ruffians . The night was pitch dark ; our path was rendered more doubtful by a heavy fall of snow , which , having continued all day , had ceased about two hours before ; and I was obliged to trust almost implicitly to my guide , whose familiarity with the road rendered it an easy task for him to get forward .