"One who has ever passed the city of Ogdensburg by steamer will no doubt recall a large gambrel-roofed house standing near the water's edge, just out of the town, surrounded by towering trees and enclosed on all sides by a wall nearly as high as the eaves of the building. The wall suggests an asylum, a house of detention or some like place set apart for the unfortunate members of society. In reality, however, it is the residence of a mysterious recluse of the name of Lane, who shut himself up there nearly eighteen years ago and has since been rarely seen. It was built after his own plans, they say, when he came to Ogdensburg with his wife, who died soon afterward. Nobody knows whence he came or anything of his past history.

He is apparently a total stranger here below, holding no intercourse with the world beyond that enclosure. His wife is said to have been a woman of great beauty, and her death doubtless threw him into a morbid state of mind, from which he has never rallied. Many years ago he is known to have bought a full-grown African lion from a traveling menagerie, and, soon after, he erected the wall, presumably out of regard for the public safety. Passers along the street have caught an occasional glimpse of him through the high gate, walking in the grounds surrounding his house, with the lion at his heels apparently in complete subjection to its master. A dense thicket runs along the wall on all sides within the enclosure, which, according to local tradition, is alive with rattlesnakes, bred for some strange purpose known only to himself--perhaps to make his isolation more secure.