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+Project Gutenberg's Paul Clifford, Complete, by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Paul Clifford, Complete
+
+Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton
+
+Release Date: March 16, 2009 [EBook #7735]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PAUL CLIFFORD, COMPLETE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Bryan Sherman and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+PAUL CLIFFORD
+
+By Edward Bulwer-Lytton
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1840.
+
+This novel so far differs from the other fictions by the same author
+that it seeks to draw its interest rather from practical than ideal
+sources. Out of some twelve Novels or Romances, embracing, however
+inadequately, a great variety of scene and character,--from "Pelham"
+to the "Pilgrims of the Rhine," from "Rienzi" to the "Last Days of
+Pompeii,"--"Paul Clifford" is the only one in which a robber has been
+made the hero, or the peculiar phases of life which he illustrates have
+been brought into any prominent description.
+
+Without pausing to inquire what realm of manners or what order of crime
+and sorrow is open to art, and capable of administering to the proper
+ends of fiction, I may be permitted to observe that the present subject
+was selected, and the Novel written, with a twofold object: First,
+to draw attention to two errors in our penal institutions; namely, a
+vicious prison-discipline, and a sanguinary criminal code,--the habit of
+corrupting the boy by the very punishment that ought to redeem him,
+and then hanging the man at the first occasion, as the easiest way of
+getting rid of our own blunders. Between the example of crime which the
+tyro learns from the felons in the prison-yard, and the horrible
+levity with which the mob gather round the drop at Newgate, there is a
+connection which a writer may be pardoned for quitting loftier regions
+of imagination to trace and to detect. So far this book is less
+a picture of the king's highway than the law's royal road to the
+gallows,--a satire on the short cut established between the House of
+Correction and the Condemned Cell. A second and a lighter object in the
+novel of "Paul Clifford" (and hence the introduction of a semi-burlesque
+or travesty in the earlier chapters) was to show that there is nothing
+essentially different between vulgar vice and fashionable vice, and that
+the slang of the one circle is but an easy paraphrase of the cant of the
+other.
+
+The Supplementary Essays, entitled "Tomlinsoniana," which contain
+the corollaries to various problems suggested in the Novel, have been
+restored to the present edition.
+
+CLIFTON, July 25, 1840.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1848.
+
+Most men who with some earnestness of mind examine into the mysteries of
+our social state will perhaps pass through that stage of self-education
+in which this Novel was composed. The contrast between conventional
+frauds, received as component parts of the great system of civilization,
+and the less deceptive invasions of the laws which discriminate the meum
+from the tuum, is tempting to a satire that is not without its justice.
+The tragic truths which lie hid in what I may call the Philosophy of
+Circumstance strike through our philanthropy upon our imagination. We
+see masses of our fellow-creatures the victims of circumstances over
+which they had no control,--contaminated in infancy by the example of
+parents, their intelligence either extinguished or turned against them,
+according as the conscience is stifled in ignorance or perverted
+to apologies for vice. A child who is cradled in ignominy,
+whose schoolmaster is the felon, whose academy is the House of
+Correction,--who breathes an atmosphere in which virtue is poisoned,
+to which religion does not pierce,--becomes less a responsible and
+reasoning human being than a wild beast which we suffer to range in
+the wilderness, till it prowls near our homes, and we kill it in
+self-defence.
+
+In this respect the Novel of "Paul Clifford" is a loud cry to society
+to amend the circumstance,--to redeem the victim. It is an appeal from
+Humanity to Law. And in this, if it could not pretend to influence or
+guide the temper of the times, it was at least a foresign of a coming
+change. Between the literature of imagination, and the practical
+interests of a people, there is a harmony as complete as it is
+mysterious. The heart of an author is the mirror of his age. The shadow
+of the sun is cast on the still surface of literature long before the
+light penetrates to law; but it is ever from the sun that the shadow
+falls, and the moment we see the shadow we may be certain of the light.
+
+Since this work was written, society has been busy with the evils in
+which it was then silently acquiescent. The true movement of the last
+fifteen years has been the progress of one idea,--Social Reform. There
+it advances with steady and noiseless march behind every louder question
+of constitutional change. Let us do justice to our time. There have been
+periods of more brilliant action on the destinies of States, but there
+is no time visible in History in which there was so earnest and general
+a desire to improve the condition of the great body of the people. In
+every circle of the community that healthful desire is astir. It unites
+in one object men of parties the most opposed; it affords the most
+attractive nucleus for public meetings; it has cleansed the statute-book
+from blood; it is ridding the world of the hangman. It animates the
+clergy of all sects in the remotest districts; it sets the squire on
+improving cottages and parcelling out allotments. Schools rise in every
+village; in books the lightest, the Grand Idea colours the page, and
+bequeaths the moral. The Government alone (despite the professions on
+which the present Ministry was founded) remains unpenetrated by the
+common genius of the age; but on that question, with all the subtleties
+it involves, and the experiments it demands,--not indeed according to
+the dreams of an insane philosophy, but according to the immutable laws
+which proportion the rewards of labour to the respect for property,--a
+Government must be formed at last.
+
+There is in this work a subtler question suggested, but not
+solved,--that question which perplexes us in the generous ardour of our
+early youth,--which, unsatisfactory as all metaphysics, we rather escape
+from than decide as we advance in years; namely, make what laws we
+please, the man who lives within the pale can be as bad as the man
+without. Compare the Paul Clifford of the fiction with the William
+Brandon,--the hunted son with the honoured father, the outcast of the
+law with the dispenser of the law, the felon with the judge; and as at
+the last they front each other,--one on the seat of justice, the other
+at the convict's bar,--who can lay his hand on his heart and say that
+the Paul Clifford is a worse man than the William Brandon.
+
+There is no immorality in a truth that enforces this question; for it
+is precisely those offences which society cannot interfere with that
+society requires fiction to expose. Society is right, though youth is
+reluctant to acknowledge it. Society can form only certain regulations
+necessary for its self-defence,--the fewer the better,--punish those who
+invade, leave unquestioned those who respect them. But fiction follows
+truth into all the strongholds of convention; strikes through the
+disguise, lifts the mask, bares the heart, and leaves a moral wherever
+it brands a falsehood.
+
+Out of this range of ideas the mind of the Author has, perhaps, emerged
+into an atmosphere which he believes to be more congenial to Art. But he
+can no more regret that he has passed through it than he can regret that
+while he dwelt there his heart, like his years, was young. Sympathy with
+the suffering that seems most actual, indignation at the frauds which
+seem most received as virtues, are the natural emotions of youth,
+if earnest. More sensible afterwards of the prerogatives, as of the
+elements, of Art, the Author, at least, seeks to escape where the man
+may not, and look on the practical world through the serener one of the
+ideal.
+
+With the completion of this work closed an era in the writer's
+self-education. From "Pelham" to "Paul Clifford" (four fictions, all
+written at a very early age), the Author rather observes than imagines;
+rather deals with the ordinary surface of human life than attempts,
+however humbly, to soar above it or to dive beneath. From depicting
+in "Paul Clifford" the errors of society, it was almost the natural
+progress of reflection to pass to those which swell to crime in the
+solitary human heart,--from the bold and open evils that spring
+from ignorance and example, to track those that lie coiled in the
+entanglements of refining knowledge and speculative pride. Looking back
+at this distance of years, I can see as clearly as if mapped before
+me, the paths which led across the boundary of invention from "Paul
+Clifford" to "Eugene Aram." And, that last work done, no less clearly
+can I see where the first gleams from a fairer fancy broke upon my way,
+and rested on those more ideal images which I sought with a feeble
+hand to transfer to the "Pilgrims of the Rhine" and the "Last Days of
+Pompeii." We authors, like the Children in the Fable, track our journey
+through the maze by the pebbles which we strew along the path. From
+others who wander after us, they may attract no notice, or, if noticed,
+seem to them but scattered by the caprice of chance; but we, when
+our memory would retrace our steps, review in the humble stones the
+witnesses of our progress, the landmarks of our way.
+
+Kenelworth, 1848.
+
+
+
+
+PAUL CLIFFORD.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+Say, ye oppressed by some fantastic woes, Some jarring nerve that
+baffles your repose, Who press the downy couch while slaves advance With
+timid eye to read the distant glance, Who with sad prayers the weary
+doctor tease To name the nameless, ever-new disease, Who with mock
+patience dire complaints endure, Which real pain and that alone can
+cure, How would you bear in real pain to lie Despised, neglected, left
+alone to die? How would you bear to draw your latest breath Where all
+that's wretched paves the way to death?--Crabbe.
+
+It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at
+occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind
+which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies),
+rattling along the house-tops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame
+of the lamps that struggled against the darkness. Through one of the
+obscurest quarters of London, and among haunts little loved by the
+gentlemen of the police, a man, evidently of the lowest orders, was
+wending his solitary way. He stopped twice or thrice at different shops
+and houses of a description correspondent with the appearance of the
+quartier in which they were situated, and tended inquiry for some
+article or another which did not seem easily to be met with. All the
+answers he received were couched in the negative; and as he turned from
+each door he muttered to himself, in no very elegant phraseology, his
+disappointment and discontent. At length, at one house, the landlord, a
+sturdy butcher, after rendering the same reply the inquirer had hitherto
+received, added, "But if this vill do as vell, Dummie, it is quite at
+your sarvice!" Pausing reflectively for a moment, Dummie responded that
+he thought the thing proffered might do as well; and thrusting it into
+his ample pocket, he strode away with as rapid a motion as the wind and
+the rain would allow. He soon came to a nest of low and dingy buildings,
+at the entrance to which, in half-effaced characters, was written
+"Thames Court." Halting at the most conspicuous of these buildings, an
+inn or alehouse, through the half-closed windows of which blazed out in
+ruddy comfort the beams of the hospitable hearth, he knocked hastily at
+the door. He was admitted by a lady of a certain age, and endowed with a
+comely rotundity of face and person.
+
+"Hast got it, Dummie?" said she, quickly, as she closed the door on the
+guest.
+
+"Noa, noa! not exactly; but I thinks as 'ow--"
+
+"Pish, you fool!" cried the woman, interrupting him peevishly. "Vy,
+it is no use desaving me. You knows you has only stepped from my
+boosing-ken to another, and you has not been arter the book at all. So
+there's the poor cretur a raving and a dying, and you--"
+
+"Let I speak!" interrupted Dummie in his turn. "I tells you I vent
+first to Mother Bussblone's, who, I knows, chops the whiners morning and
+evening to the young ladies, and I axes there for a Bible; and she says,
+says she, 'I' as only a "Companion to the Halter," but you'll get a
+Bible, I think, at Master Talkins', the cobbler as preaches.' So I
+goes to Master Talkins, and he says, says he, 'I 'as no call for the
+Bible,--'cause vy? I 'as a call vithout; but mayhap you'll be a getting
+it at the butcher's hover the vay,--'cause vy? The butcher 'll be
+damned!' So I goes hover the vay, and the butcher says, says he, 'I 'as
+not a Bible, but I 'as a book of plays bound for all the vorld just like
+'un, and mayhap the poor cretur may n't see the difference.' So I takes
+the plays, Mrs. Margery, and here they be surely! And how's poor Judy?"
+
+"Fearsome! she'll not be over the night, I'm a thinking."
+
+"Vell, I'll track up the dancers!"
+
+So saying, Dummie ascended a doorless staircase, across the entrance
+of which a blanket, stretched angularly from the wall to the chimney,
+afforded a kind of screen; and presently he stood within a chamber which
+the dark and painful genius of Crabbe might have delighted to portray.
+The walls were whitewashed, and at sundry places strange figures and
+grotesque characters had been traced by some mirthful inmate, in such
+sable outline as the end of a smoked stick or the edge of a piece of
+charcoal is wont to produce. The wan and flickering light afforded by a
+farthing candle gave a sort of grimness and menace to these achievements
+of pictorial art, especially as they more than once received
+embellishments from portraits of Satan such as he is accustomed to be
+drawn. A low fire burned gloomily in the sooty grate, and on the hob
+hissed "the still small voice" of an iron kettle. On a round deal table
+were two vials, a cracked cup, a broken spoon of some dull metal, and
+upon two or three mutilated chairs were scattered various articles
+of female attire. On another table, placed below a high, narrow,
+shutterless casement (athwart which, instead of a curtain, a checked
+apron had been loosely hung, and now waved fitfully to and fro in the
+gusts of wind that made easy ingress through many a chink and cranny),
+were a looking-glass, sundry appliances of the toilet, a box of coarse
+rouge, a few ornaments of more show than value, and a watch, the regular
+and calm click of which produced that indescribably painful feeling
+which, we fear, many of our readers who have heard the sound in a
+sick-chamber can easily recall. A large tester-bed stood opposite to
+this table, and the looking-glass partially reflected curtains of
+a faded stripe, and ever and anon (as the position of the sufferer
+followed the restless emotion of a disordered mind) glimpses of the face
+of one on whom Death was rapidly hastening. Beside this bed now stood
+Dummie, a small, thin man dressed in a tattered plush jerkin, from
+which the rain-drops slowly dripped, and with a thin, yellow, cunning
+physiognomy grotesquely hideous in feature, but not positively villanous
+in expression. On the other side of the bed stood a little boy of about
+three years old, dressed as if belonging to the better classes, although
+the garb was somewhat tattered and discoloured. The poor child trembled
+violently, and evidently looked with a feeling of relief on the entrance
+of Dummie. And now there slowly, and with many a phthisical sigh,
+heaved towards the foot of the bed the heavy frame of the woman who had
+accosted Dummie below, and had followed him, haud passibus aequis, to
+the room of the sufferer; she stood with a bottle of medicine in her
+hand, shaking its contents up and down, and with a kindly yet timid
+compassion spread over a countenance crimsoned with habitual libations.
+This made the scene,--save that on a chair by the bedside lay a
+profusion of long, glossy, golden ringlets, which had been cut from
+the head of the sufferer when the fever had begun to mount upwards, but
+which, with a jealousy that portrayed the darling littleness of a vain
+heart, she had seized and insisted on retaining near her; and save that,
+by the fire, perfectly inattentive to the event about to take place
+within the chamber, and to which we of the biped race attach so awful
+an importance, lay a large gray cat, curled in a ball, and dozing
+with half-shut eyes, and ears that now and then denoted, by a gentle
+inflection, the jar of a louder or nearer sound than usual upon her
+lethargic senses. The dying woman did not at first attend to the
+entrance either of Dummie or the female at the foot of the bed, but she
+turned herself round towards the child, and grasping his arm fiercely,
+she drew him towards her, and gazed on his terrified features with a
+look in which exhaustion and an exceeding wanness of complexion were
+even horribly contrasted by the glare and energy of delirium.
+
+"If you are like him," she muttered, "I will strangle you,--I will! Ay,
+tremble, you ought to tremble when your mother touches you, or when
+he is mentioned. You have his eyes, you have! Out with them, out,--the
+devil sits laughing in them! Oh, you weep, do you, little one? Well,
+now, be still, my love; be hushed! I would not harm thee! Harm--O
+God, he is my child after all!" And at these words she clasped the boy
+passionately to her breast, and burst into tears.
+
+"Coom, now, coom," said Dummie, soothingly; "take the stuff, Judith, and
+then ve'll talk over the hurchin!"
+
+The mother relaxed her grasp of the boy, and turning towards the
+speaker, gazed at him for some moments with a bewildered stare; at
+length she appeared slowly to remember him, and said, as she raised
+herself on one hand, and pointed the other towards him with an inquiring
+gesture,--"Thou hast brought the book?"
+
+Dummie answered by lifting up the book he had brought from the honest
+butcher's.
+
+"Clear the room, then," said the sufferer, with that air of mock command
+so common to the insane. "We would be alone!"
+
+Dummie winked at the good woman at the foot of the bed; and she
+(though generally no easy person to order or to persuade) left, without
+reluctance, the sick chamber.
+
+"If she be a going to pray," murmured our landlady (for that office did
+the good matron hold), "I may indeed as well take myself off, for it's
+not werry comfortable like to those who be old to hear all that 'ere!"
+
+With this pious reflection, the hostess of the Mug,--so was the hostelry
+called,--heavily descended the creaking stairs. "Now, man," said the
+sufferer, sternly, "swear that you will never reveal,--swear, I say! And
+by the great God whose angels are about this night, if ever you break
+the oath, I will come back and haunt you to your dying day!"
+
+Dummie's face grew pale, for he was superstitiously affected by the
+vehemence and the language of the dying woman, and he answered, as he
+kissed the pretended Bible, that he swore to keep the secret, as much as
+he knew of it, which, she must be sensible, he said, was very little. As
+he spoke, the wind swept with a loud and sudden gust down the chimney,
+and shook the roof above them so violently as to loosen many of the
+crumbling tiles, which fell one after the other, with a crashing noise,
+on the pavement below. Dummie started in affright; and perhaps his
+conscience smote him for the trick he had played with regard to the
+false Bible. But the woman, whose excited and unstrung nerves led her
+astray from one subject to another with preternatural celerity, said,
+with an hysterical laugh, "See, Dummie, they come in state for me; give
+me the cap--yonder--and bring the looking-glass!"
+
+Dummie obeyed; and the woman, as she in a low tone uttered something
+about the unbecoming colour of the ribbons, adjusted the cap on her
+head, and then, saying in a regretful and petulant voice, "Why should
+they have cut off my hair? Such a disfigurement!" bade Dummie desire
+Mrs. Margery once more to ascend to her.
+
+Left alone with her child, the face of the wretched mother softened as
+she regarded him, and all the levities and all the vehemences--if we
+may use the word--which, in the turbulent commotion of her delirium, had
+been stirred upward to the surface of her mind, gradually now sank as
+death increased upon her, and a mother's anxiety rose to the natural
+level from which it had been disturbed and abased. She took the child
+to her bosom, and clasping him in her arms, which grew weaker with every
+instant, she soothed him with the sort of chant which nurses sing over
+their untoward infants; but her voice was cracked and hollow, and as she
+felt it was so, the mother's eyes filled with tears. Mrs. Margery now
+reentered; and turning towards the hostess with an impressive calmness
+of manner which astonished and awed the person she addressed, the dying
+woman pointed to the child and said,--
+
+"You have been kind to me, very kind, and may God bless you for it! I
+have found that those whom the world calls the worst are often the most
+human. But I am not going to thank you as I ought to do, but to ask of
+you a last and exceeding favour. Protect my child till he grows up.
+You have often said you loved him,--you are childless yourself,--and a
+morsel of bread and a shelter for the night, which is all I ask of you
+to give him, will not impoverish more legitimate claimants."
+
+Poor Mrs. Margery, fairly sobbing, vowed she would be a mother to the
+child, and that she would endeavour to rear him honestly; though a
+public-house was not, she confessed, the best place for good examples.
+
+"Take him," cried the mother, hoarsely, as her voice, failing her
+strength, rattled indistinctly, and almost died within her. "Take him,
+rear him as you will, as you can; any example, any roof, better than--"
+Here the words were inaudible. "And oh, may it be a curse and a--Give me
+the medicine; I am dying."
+
+The hostess, alarmed, hastened to comply; but before she returned to the
+bedside, the sufferer was insensible,--nor did she again recover speech
+or motion. A low and rare moan only testified continued life, and within
+two hours that ceased, and the spirit was gone. At that time our good
+hostess was herself beyond the things of this outer world, having
+supported her spirits during the vigils of the night with so many
+little liquid stimulants that they finally sank into that torpor
+which generally succeeds excitement. Taking, perhaps, advantage of the
+opportunity which the insensibility of the hostess afforded him, Dummie,
+by the expiring ray of the candle that burned in the death-chamber,
+hastily opened a huge box (which was generally concealed under the bed,
+and contained the wardrobe of the deceased), and turned with irreverent
+hand over the linens and the silks, until quite at the bottom of the
+trunk he discovered some packets of letters; these he seized, and buried
+in the conveniences of his dress. He then, rising and replacing the box,
+cast a longing eye towards the watch on the toilet-table, which was of
+gold; but he withdrew his gaze, and with a querulous sigh observed to
+himself: "The old blowen kens of that, 'od rat her! but, howsomever,
+I'll take this: who knows but it may be of sarvice. Tannies to-day may
+be smash to-morrow!" [Meaning, what is of no value now may be precious
+hereafter.] and he laid his coarse hand on the golden and silky tresses
+we have described. "'T is a rum business, and puzzles I; but mum's the
+word for my own little colquarren [neck]."
+
+With this brief soliloquy Dummie descended the stairs and let himself
+out of the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+     Imagination fondly stoops to trace
+     The parlor splendours of that festive place.
+               Deserted Village.
+
+There is little to interest in a narrative of early childhood, unless,
+indeed, one were writing on education. We shall not, therefore, linger
+over the infancy of the motherless boy left to the protection of Mrs.
+Margery Lobkins, or, as she was sometimes familiarly called, Peggy, or
+Piggy, Lob. The good dame, drawing a more than sufficient income from
+the profits of a house which, if situated in an obscure locality,
+enjoyed very general and lucrative repute, and being a lone widow
+without kith or kin, had no temptation to break her word to the
+deceased, and she suffered the orphan to wax in strength and
+understanding until the age of twelve,--a period at which we are now
+about to reintroduce him to our readers.
+
+The boy evinced great hardihood of temper, and no inconsiderable
+quickness of intellect. In whatever he attempted, his success was rapid,
+and a remarkable strength of limb and muscle seconded well the dictates
+of an ambition turned, it must be confessed, rather to physical than
+mental exertion. It is not to be supposed, however, that his boyish life
+passed in unbroken tranquillity. Although Mrs. Lobkins was a good woman
+on the whole, and greatly attached to her protegee, she was violent and
+rude in temper, or, as she herself more flatteringly expressed it,
+"her feelings were unkimmonly strong;" and alternate quarrel and
+reconciliation constituted the chief occupations of the protegee's
+domestic life. As, previous to his becoming the ward of Mrs. Lobkins, he
+had never received any other appellation than "the child," so the duty
+of christening him devolved upon our hostess of the Mug; and after some
+deliberation, she blessed him with the name of Paul. It was a name of
+happy omen, for it had belonged to Mrs. Lobkins's grandfather, who had
+been three times transported and twice hanged (at the first occurrence
+of the latter description, he had been restored by the surgeons, much
+to the chagrin of a young anatomist who was to have had the honour of
+cutting him up). The boy did not seem likely to merit the distinguished
+appellation he bore, for he testified no remarkable predisposition to
+the property of other people. Nay, although he sometimes emptied the
+pockets of any stray visitor to the coffee-room of Mrs. Lobkins, it
+appeared an act originating rather in a love of the frolic than a desire
+of the profit; for after the plundered person had been sufficiently
+tormented by the loss, haply, of such utilities as a tobacco-box or
+a handkerchief; after he had, to the secret delight of Paul, searched
+every corner of the apartment, stamped, and fretted, and exposed himself
+by his petulance to the bitter objurgation of Mrs. Lobkins, our young
+friend would quietly and suddenly contrive that the article missed
+should return of its own accord to the pocket from which it had
+disappeared. And thus, as our readers have doubtless experienced when
+they have disturbed the peace of a whole household for the loss of some
+portable treasure which they themselves are afterwards discovered to
+have mislaid, the unfortunate victim of Paul's honest ingenuity, exposed
+to the collected indignation of the spectators, and sinking from the
+accuser into the convicted, secretly cursed the unhappy lot which not
+only vexed him with the loss of his property, but made it still more
+annoying to recover it.
+
+Whether it was that, on discovering these pranks, Mrs. Lobkins trembled
+for the future bias of the address they displayed, or whether she
+thought that the folly of thieving without gain required speedy and
+permanent correction, we cannot decide; but the good lady became at
+last extremely anxious to secure for Paul the blessings of a liberal
+education. The key of knowledge (the art of reading) she had, indeed,
+two years prior to the present date, obtained for him; but this far
+from satisfied her conscience,--nay, she felt that if she could not also
+obtain for him the discretion to use it, it would have been wise even
+to have withheld a key which the boy seemed perversely to apply to all
+locks but the right one. In a word, she was desirous that he should
+receive an education far superior to those whom he saw around him;
+and attributing, like most ignorant persons, too great advantages to
+learning, she conceived that in order to live as decorously as the
+parson of the parish, it was only necessary to know as much Latin.
+
+One evening in particular, as the dame sat by her cheerful fire, this
+source of anxiety was unusually active in her mind, and ever and anon
+she directed unquiet and restless glances towards Paul, who sat on
+a form at the opposite corner of the hearth, diligently employed in
+reading the life and adventures of the celebrated Richard Turpin. The
+form on which the boy sat was worn to a glassy smoothness, save only in
+certain places, where some ingenious idler or another had amused
+himself by carving sundry names, epithets, and epigrammatic niceties of
+language. It is said that the organ of carving upon wood is prominently
+developed on all English skulls; and the sagacious Mr. Combe has
+placed this organ at the back of the head, in juxtaposition to that
+of destructiveness, which is equally large among our countrymen, as
+is notably evinced upon all railings, seats, temples, and other
+things-belonging to other people.
+
+Opposite to the fireplace was a large deal table, at which Dummie,
+surnamed Dunnaker, seated near the dame, was quietly ruminating over a
+glass of hollands and water. Farther on, at another table in the corner
+of the room, a gentleman with a red wig, very rusty garments, and linen
+which seemed as if it had been boiled in saffron, smoked his pipe,
+apart, silent, and apparently plunged in meditation. This gentleman
+was no other than Mr. Peter MacGrawler, the editor of a magnificent
+periodical entitled "The Asiaeum," which was written to prove that
+whatever is popular is necessarily bad,--a valuable and recondite truth,
+which "The Asinaeum" had satisfactorily demonstrated by ruining
+three printers and demolishing a publisher. We need not add that Mr.
+MacGrawler was Scotch by birth, since we believe it is pretty well known
+that all periodicals of this country have, from time immemorial, been
+monopolized by the gentlemen of the Land of Cakes. We know not how it
+may be the fashion to eat the said cakes in Scotland, but here the good
+emigrators seem to like them carefully buttered on both sides. By the
+side of the editor stood a large pewter tankard; above him hung an
+engraving of the "wonderfully fat boar formerly in the possession of
+Mr. Fattem, grazier." To his left rose the dingy form of a thin, upright
+clock in an oaken case; beyond the clock, a spit and a musket were
+fastened in parallels to the wall. Below those twin emblems of war and
+cookery were four shelves, containing plates of pewter and delf, and
+terminating, centaur-like, in a sort of dresser. At the other side of
+these domestic conveniences was a picture of Mrs. Lobkins, in a scarlet
+body and a hat and plume. At the back of the fair hostess stretched the
+blanket we have before mentioned. As a relief to the monotonous surface
+of this simple screen, various ballads and learned legends were pinned
+to the blanket. There might you read in verses, pathetic and unadorned,
+how--
+
+     "Sally loved a sailor lad
+     As fought with famous Shovel!"
+
+There might you learn, if of two facts so instructive you were before
+unconscious, that--
+
+"Ben the toper loved his bottle,--Charley only loved the lasses!"
+
+When of these and various other poetical effusions you were somewhat
+wearied, the literary fragments in bumbler prose afforded you equal
+edification and delight. There might you fully enlighten yourself as to
+the "Strange and Wonderful News from Kensington, being a most full and
+true Relation how a Maid there is supposed to have been carried away by
+an Evil Spirit on Wednesday, 15th of April last, about Midnight."
+There, too, no less interesting and no less veracious, was that uncommon
+anecdote touching the chief of many-throned powers entitled "The Divell
+of Mascon; or, the true Relation of the Chief Things which an Unclean
+Spirit did and said at Mascon, in Burgundy, in the house of one
+Mr. Francis Pereaud: now made English by one that hath a Particular
+Knowledge of the Truth of the Story."
+
+Nor were these materials for Satanic history the only prosaic and
+faithful chronicles which the bibliothecal blanket afforded. Equally
+wonderful, and equally indisputable, was the account of "a young lady,
+the daughter of a duke, with three legs and the face of a porcupine."
+Nor less so "The Awful Judgment of God upon Swearers, as exemplified in
+the case of John Stiles, who Dropped down dead after swearing a Great
+Oath; and on stripping the unhappy man they found 'Swear not at all'
+written on the tail of his shirt!"
+
+Twice had Mrs. Lobkins heaved a long sigh, as her eyes turned from Paul
+to the tranquil countenance of Dummie Dunnaker, and now, re-settling
+herself in her chair, as a motherly anxiety gathered over her visage,--
+
+"Paul, my ben cull," said she, "what gibberish hast got there?"
+
+"Turpin, the great highwayman!" answered the young student, without
+lifting his eyes from the page, through which he was spelling his
+instructive way.
+
+"Oh! he be's a chip of the right block, dame!" said Mr. Dunnaker, as
+he applied his pipe to an illumined piece of paper. "He'll ride a 'oss
+foaled by a hacorn yet, I varrants!"
+
+To this prophecy the dame replied only with a look of indignation; and
+rocking herself to and fro in her huge chair, she remained for some
+moments in silent thought. At last she again wistfully eyed the hopeful
+boy, and calling him to her side, communicated some order, in a dejected
+whisper. Paul, on receiving it, disappeared behind the blanket, and
+presently returned with a bottle and a wineglass. With an abstracted
+gesture, and an air that betokened continued meditation, the good dame
+took the inspiring cordial from the hand of her youthful cupbearer,--
+
+"And ere a man had power to say 'Behold!' The jaws of Lobkins had
+devoured it up: So quick bright things come to confusion!"
+
+The nectarean beverage seemed to operate cheerily on the matron's
+system; and placing her hand on the boy's curly head, she said (like
+Andromache, dakruon gelasasa, or, as Scott hath it, "With a smile on her
+cheek, but a tear in her eye"),--
+
+"Paul, thy heart be good, thy heart be good; thou didst not spill a drop
+of the tape! Tell me, my honey, why didst thou lick Tom Tobyson?"
+
+"Because," answered Paul, "he said as how you ought to have been hanged
+long ago."
+
+"Tom Tobyson is a good-for-nought," returned the dame, "and deserves to
+shove the tumbler [Be whipped at the cart's tail]; I but oh, my child,
+be not too venturesome in taking up the sticks for a blowen,--it has
+been the ruin of many a man afore you; and when two men goes to quarrel
+for a 'oman, they doesn't know the natur' of the thing they quarrels
+about. Mind thy latter end, Paul, and reverence the old, without axing
+what they has been before they passed into the wale of years. Thou mayst
+get me my pipe, Paul,--it is upstairs, under the pillow."
+
+While Paul was accomplishing this errand, the lady of the Mug, fixing
+her eyes upon Mr. Dunnaker, said, "Dummie, Dummie, if little Paul should
+come to be scragged!"
+
+"Whish!" muttered Dummie, glancing over his shoulder at MacGrawler;
+"mayhap that gemman--" Here his voice became scarcely audible even to
+Mrs. Lobkins; but his whisper seemed to imply an insinuation that the
+illustrious editor of "The Asinaeum" might be either an informer, or one
+of those heroes on whom an informer subsists.
+
+Mrs. Lobkins's answer, couched in the same key, appeared to satisfy
+Dunnaker, for with a look of great contempt he chucked up his head and
+said, "Oho! that be all, be it!"
+
+Paul here reappeared with the pipe; and the dame, having filled the
+tube, leaned forward, and lighted the Virginian weed from the blower of
+Mr. Dunnaker. As in this interesting occupation the heads of the hostess
+and the guest approached each other, the glowing light playing cheerily
+on the countenance of each, there was an honest simplicity in the
+picture that would have merited the racy and vigorous genius of a
+Cruikshank. As soon as the Promethean spark had been fully communicated
+to the lady's tube, Mrs. Lobkins, still possessed by the gloomy idea she
+had conjured up, repeated,--
+
+"Ah, Dummie, if little Paul should be scragged!"
+
+Dummie, withdrawing the pipe from his mouth, heaved a sympathizing puff,
+but remained silent; and Mrs. Lobkins, turning to Paul, who stood with
+mouth open and ears erect at this boding ejaculation, said,--
+
+"Dost think, Paul, they'd have the heart to hang thee?"
+
+"I think they'd have the rope, dame!" returned the youth.
+
+"But you need not go for to run your neck into the noose!" said the
+matron; and then, inspired by the spirit of moralizing, she turned round
+to the youth, and gazing upon his attentive countenance, accosted him
+with the following admonitions:--
+
+"Mind thy kittychism, child, and reverence old age. Never steal,
+'specially when any one be in the way. Never go snacks with them as be
+older than you,--'cause why? The older a cove be, the more he cares for
+hisself, and the less for his partner. At twenty, we diddles the public;
+at forty, we diddles our cronies! Be modest, Paul, and stick to your
+sitivation in life. Go not with fine tobymen, who burn out like a candle
+wot has a thief in it,--all flare, and gone in a whiffy! Leave liquor to
+the aged, who can't do without it. Tape often proves a halter, and there
+be's no ruin like blue ruin! Read your Bible, and talk like a pious 'un.
+People goes more by your words than your actions. If you wants what is
+not your own, try and do without it; and if you cannot do without it,
+take it away by insinivation, not bluster. They as swindles does more
+and risks less than they as robs; and if you cheats toppingly, you may
+laugh at the topping cheat [Gallows]. And now go play."
+
+Paul seized his hat, but lingered; and the dame, guessing at the
+signification of the pause, drew forth and placed in the boy's hand the
+sum of five halfpence and one farthing.
+
+"There, boy," quoth she, and she stroked his head fondly when she spoke,
+"you does right not to play for nothing,--it's loss of time; but play
+with those as be less than yoursel', and then you can go for to beat 'em
+if they says you go for to cheat!"
+
+Paul vanished; and the dame, laying her hand on Dummie's shoulder,
+said,--
+
+"There be nothing like a friend in need, Dummie; and somehow or other, I
+thinks as how you knows more of the horigin of that 'ere lad than any of
+us!"
+
+"Me, dame!" exclaimed Dummie, with a broad gaze of astonishment.
+
+"Ah, you! you knows as how the mother saw more of you just afore she
+died than she did of 'ere one of us. Noar, now, noar, now! Tell us all
+about 'un. Did she steal 'un, think ye?"
+
+"Lauk, Mother Margery, dost think I knows? Vot put such a crotchet in
+your 'ead?"
+
+"Well!" said the dame, with a disappointed sigh, "I always thought as
+how you were more knowing about it than you owns. Dear, dear, I shall
+never forgit the night when Judith brought the poor cretur here,--you
+knows she had been some months in my house afore ever I see'd the
+urchin; and when she brought it, she looked so pale and ghostly that
+I had not the heart to say a word, so I stared at the brat, and it
+stretched out its wee little hands to me. And the mother frowned at it,
+and throwed it into my lap."
+
+"Ah! she was a hawful voman, that 'ere!" said Dummie, shaking his head.
+"But howsomever, the hurchin fell into good 'ands; for I be's sure you
+'as been a better mother to 'un than the raal 'un!"
+
+"I was always a fool about childer," rejoined Mrs. Lobkins; "and I
+thinks as how little Paul was sent to be a comfort to my latter end!
+Fill the glass, Dummie."
+
+"I 'as heard as 'ow Judith was once blowen to a great lord!" said
+Dummie.
+
+"Like enough!" returned Mrs. Lobkins,--"like enough! She was always a
+favourite of mine, for she had a spuret [spirit] as big as my own; and
+she paid her rint like a decent body, for all she was out of her sinses,
+or 'nation like it."
+
+"Ay, I knows as how you liked her,--'cause vy? 'T is not your vay to let
+a room to a voman! You says as how 't is not respectable, and you only
+likes men to wisit the Mug!"
+
+"And I doesn't like all of them as comes here!" answered the
+dame,--"'specially for Paul's sake; but what can a lone 'oman do? Many's
+the gentleman highwayman wot comes here, whose money is as good as the
+clerk's of the parish. And when a bob [shilling] is in my hand, what
+does it sinnify whose hand it was in afore?"
+
+"That's what I call being sinsible and practical," said Dummie,
+approvingly. "And after all, though you 'as a mixture like, I does not
+know a halehouse where a cove is better entertained, nor meets of a
+Sunday more illegant company, than the Mug!"
+
+Here the conversation, which the reader must know had been sustained
+in a key inaudible to a third person, received a check from Mr. Peter
+MacGrawler, who, having finished his revery and his tankard, now rose
+to depart. First, however, approaching Mrs. Lobkins, he observed that he
+had gone on credit for some days, and demanded the amount of his bill.
+Glancing towards certain chalk hieroglyphics inscribed on the wall at
+the other side of the fireplace, the dame answered that Mr. MacGrawler
+was indebted to her for the sum of one shilling and ninepence three
+farthings.
+
+After a short preparatory search in his waistcoat pockets, the critic
+hunted into one corner a solitary half-crown, and having caught it
+between his finger and thumb, he gave it to Mrs. Lobkins and requested
+change.
+
+As soon as the matron felt her hand anointed with what has been called
+by some ingenious Johnson of St. Giles's "the oil of palms," her
+countenance softened into a complacent smile; and when she gave the
+required change to Mr. MacGrawler, she graciously hoped as how he would
+recommend the Mug to the public.
+
+"That you may be sure of," said the editor of "The Asinaeum." "There is
+not a place where I am so much at home."
+
+With that the learned Scotsman buttoned his coat and went his way.
+
+"How spiteful the world be!" said Mrs. Lobkins, after a pause,
+"'specially if a 'oman keeps a fashionable sort of a public! When Judith
+died, Joe, the dog's-meat man, said I war all the better for it, and
+that she left I a treasure to bring up the urchin. One would think a
+thumper makes a man richer,--'cause why? Every man thumps! I got nothing
+more than a watch and ten guineas when Judy died, and sure that scarce
+paid for the burrel [burial]."
+
+"You forgits the two quids [Guineas] I giv' you for the hold box of
+rags,--much of a treasure I found there!" said Dummie, with sycophantic
+archness.
+
+"Ay," cried the dame, laughing, "I fancies you war not pleased with the
+bargain. I thought you war too old a ragmerchant to be so free with the
+blunt; howsomever, I supposes it war the tinsel petticoat as took you
+in!"
+
+"As it has mony a viser man than the like of I," rejoined Dummie, who
+to his various secret professions added the ostensible one of a
+rag-merchant and dealer in broken glass.
+
+The recollection of her good bargain in the box of rags opened our
+landlady's heart.
+
+"Drink, Dummie," said she, good-humouredly,--"drink; I scorns to score
+lush to a friend."
+
+Dummie expressed his gratitude, refilled his glass, and the hospitable
+matron, knocking out from her pipe the dying ashes, thus proceeded:
+
+"You sees, Dummie, though I often beats the boy, I loves him as much as
+if I war his raal mother,--I wants to make him an honour to his country,
+and an ixciption to my family!"
+
+"Who all flashed their ivories at Surgeons' Hall!" added the
+metaphorical Dummie.
+
+"True!" said the lady; "they died game, and I be n't ashamed of 'em. But
+I owes a duty to Paul's mother, and I wants Paul to have a long life. I
+would send him to school, but you knows as how the boys only corrupt one
+another. And so, I should like to meet with some decent man, as a tutor,
+to teach the lad Latin and vartue!"
+
+"My eyes!" cried Dummie; aghast at the grandeur of this desire.
+
+"The boy is 'cute enough, and he loves reading," continued the dame;
+"but I does not think the books he gets hold of will teach him the way
+to grow old."
+
+"And 'ow came he to read, anyhows?"
+
+"Ranting Rob, the strolling player, taught him his letters, and said
+he'd a deal of janius."
+
+"And why should not Ranting Rob tache the boy Latin and vartue?"
+
+"'Cause Ranting Rob, poor fellow, was lagged [Transported for burglary]
+for doing a panny!" answered the dame, despondently.
+
+There was a long silence; it was broken by Mr. Dummie. Slapping his
+thigh with the gesticulatory vehemence of a Ugo Foscolo, that gentleman
+exclaimed,--
+
+"I 'as it,--I 'as thought of a tutor for leetle Paul!"
+
+"Who's that? You quite frightens me; you 'as no marcy on my narves,"
+said the dame, fretfully.
+
+"Vy, it be the gemman vot writes," said Dummie, putting his finger to
+his nose,--"the gemman vot paid you so flashly!"
+
+"What! the Scotch gemman?"
+
+"The werry same!" returned Dummie.
+
+The dame turned in her chair and refilled her pipe. It was evident from
+her manner that Mr. Dunnaker's suggestion had made an impression on her.
+But she recognized two doubts as to its feasibility: one, whether the
+gentleman proposed would be adequate to the task; the other, whether he
+would be willing to undertake it.
+
+In the midst of her meditations on this matter, the dame was interrupted
+by the entrance of certain claimants on her hospitality; and Dummie soon
+after taking his leave, the suspense of Mrs. Lobkins's mind touching
+the education of little Paul remained the whole of that day and night
+utterly unrelieved.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+  I own that I am envious of the pleasure you will have in finding yourself
+  more learned than other boys,--even those who are older than yourself.
+  What honour this will do you!  What distinctions, what applauses will
+  follow wherever you go!
+  --LORD CHESTERFIELD: Letters to his Son.
+
+  Example, my boy,--example is worth a thousand precepts.
+  --MAXIMILIAN SOLEMN.
+
+Tarpeia was crushed beneath the weight of ornaments. The language of the
+vulgar is a sort of Tarpeia. We have therefore relieved it of as many
+gems as we were able, and in the foregoing scene presented it to the
+gaze of our readers simplex munditiis. Nevertheless, we could timidly
+imagine some gentler beings of the softer sex rather displeased with the
+tone of the dialogue we have given, did we not recollect how delighted
+they are with the provincial barbarities of the sister kingdom, whenever
+they meet them poured over the pages of some Scottish story-teller. As,
+unhappily for mankind, broad Scotch is not yet the universal language of
+Europe, we suppose our countrywomen will not be much more unacquainted
+with the dialect of their own lower orders than with that which breathes
+nasal melodies over the paradise of the North.
+
+It was the next day, at the hour of twilight, when Mrs. Margery Lobkins,
+after a satisfactory tete-a-tete with Mr. MacGrawler, had the happiness
+of thinking that she had provided a tutor for little Paul. The critic
+having recited to her a considerable portion of Propria qum Maribus, the
+good lady had no longer a doubt of his capacities for teaching; and
+on the other hand, when Mrs. Lobkins entered on the subject of
+remuneration, the Scotsman professed himself perfectly willing to teach
+any and every thing that the most exacting guardian could require. It
+was finally settled that Paul should attend Mr. MacGrawler two hours a
+day; that Mr. MacGrawler should be entitled to such animal comforts of
+meat and drink as the Mug afforded, and, moreover, to the weekly stipend
+of two shillings and sixpence,--the shillings for instruction in the
+classics, and the sixpence for all other humanities; or, as Mrs. Lobkins
+expressed it, "two bobs for the Latin, and a site for the vartue."
+
+Let not thy mind, gentle reader, censure us for a deviation from
+probability in making so excellent and learned a gentleman as Mr. Peter
+MacGrawler the familiar guest of the lady of the Mug. First, thou must
+know that our story is cast in a period antecedent to the present, and
+one in which the old jokes against the circumstances of author and of
+critic had their foundation in truth; secondly, thou must know that
+by some curious concatenation of circumstances neither bailiff nor
+bailiff's man was ever seen within the four walls continent of Mrs.
+Margery Lobkins; thirdly, the Mug was nearer than any other house
+of public resort to the abode of the critic; fourthly, it afforded
+excellent porter; and fifthly, O reader, thou dost Mrs. Margery Lobkins
+a grievous wrong if thou supposest that her door was only open to those
+mercurial gentry who are afflicted with the morbid curiosity to pry into
+the mysteries of their neighbours' pockets,--other visitors, of fair
+repute, were not unoften partakers of the good matron's hospitality;
+although it must be owned that they generally occupied the private room
+in preference to the public one. And sixthly, sweet reader (we grieve to
+be so prolix), we would just hint to thee that Mr. MacGrawler was one
+of those vast-minded sages who, occupied in contemplating morals in the
+great scale, do not fritter down their intellects by a base attention
+to minute details. So that if a descendant of Langfanger did sometimes
+cross the venerable Scot in his visit to the Mug, the apparition did not
+revolt that benevolent moralist so much as, were it not for the above
+hint, thy ignorance might lead thee to imagine.
+
+It is said that Athenodorus the Stoic contributed greatly by his
+conversation to amend the faults of Augustus, and to effect the change
+visible in that fortunate man after his accession to the Roman empire.
+If this be true, it may throw a new light on the character of Augustus,
+and instead of being the hypocrite, he was possibly the convert. Certain
+it is that there are few vices which cannot be conquered by wisdom; and
+yet, melancholy to relate, the instructions of Peter MacGrawler produced
+but slender amelioration in the habits of the youthful Paul. That
+ingenious stripling had, we have already seen, under the tuition of
+Ranting Bob, mastered the art of reading,--nay, he could even construct
+and link together certain curious pot-hooks, which himself and Mrs.
+Lobkins were wont graciously to term "writing." So far, then, the way of
+MacGrawler was smoothed and prepared.
+
+But, unhappily, all experienced teachers allow that the main difficulty
+is not to learn, but to unlearn; and the mind of Paul was already
+occupied by a vast number of heterogeneous miscellanies which stoutly
+resisted the ingress either of Latin or of virtue. Nothing could wean
+him from an ominous affection for the history of Richard Turpin; it
+was to him what, it has been said, the Greek authors should be to the
+Academician,--a study by day, and a dream by night. He was docile enough
+during lessons, and sometimes even too quick in conception for the
+stately march of Mr. MacGrawler's intellect. But it not unfrequently
+happened that when that gentleman attempted to rise, he found himself,
+like the Lady in "Comus," adhering to--
+
+        "A venomed seat Smeared with gums of glutinous heat;"
+
+or his legs had been secretly united under the table, and the tie was
+not to be broken without overthrow to the superior powers. These, and
+various other little sportive machinations wherewith Paul was wont to
+relieve the monotony of literature, went far to disgust the learned
+critic with his undertaking. But "the tape" and the treasury of Mrs.
+Lobkins re-smoothed, as it were, the irritated bristles of his mind, and
+he continued his labours with this philosophical reflection: "Why fret
+myself? If a pupil turns out well, it is clearly to the credit of his
+master; if not, to the disadvantage of himself." Of course, a similar
+suggestion never forced itself into the mind of Dr. Keate [A celebrated
+principal of Eton]. At Eton the very soul of the honest headmaster is
+consumed by his zeal for the welfare of the little gentlemen in stiff
+cravats.
+
+But to Paul, who was predestined to enjoy a certain quantum of
+knowledge, circumstances happened, in the commencement of the second
+year of his pupilage, which prodigiously accelerated the progress of his
+scholastic career.
+
+At the apartment of MacGrawler, Paul one morning encountered Mr.
+Augustus Tomlinson, a young man of great promise, who pursued the
+peaceful occupation of chronicling in a leading newspaper "Horrid
+Murders," "Enormous Melons," and "Remarkable Circumstances." This
+gentleman, having the advantage of some years' seniority over Paul,
+was slow in unbending his dignity; but observing at last the eager
+and respectful attention with which the stripling listened to a most
+veracious detail of five men being inhumanly murdered in Canterbury
+Cathedral by the Reverend Zedekiah Fooks Barnacle, he was touched by the
+impression he had created, and shaking Paul graciously by the hand, he
+told him there was a deal of natural shrewdness in his countenance, and
+that Mr. Augustus Tomlinson did not doubt but that he (Paul) might have
+the honour to be murdered himself one of these days. "You understand
+me," continued Mr. Augustus,--"I mean murdered in effigy,--assassinated
+in type,--while you yourself, unconscious of the circumstance, are
+quietly enjoying what you imagine to be your existence. We never kill
+common persons,--to say truth, our chief spite is against the Church; we
+destroy bishops by wholesale. Sometimes, indeed, we knock off a leading
+barrister or so, and express the anguish of the junior counsel at a loss
+so destructive to their interests. But that is only a stray hit, and the
+slain barrister often lives to become Attorney-General, renounce Whig
+principles, and prosecute the very Press that destroyed him. Bishops are
+our proper food; we send them to heaven on a sort of flying griffin,
+of which the back is an apoplexy, and the wings are puffs. The Bishop
+of---, whom we despatched in this manner the other day, being rather
+a facetious personage, wrote to remonstrate with us thereon, observing
+that though heaven was a very good translation for a bishop, yet that in
+such cases he preferred 'the original to the translation.' As we murder
+bishop, so is there another class of persons whom we only afflict with
+lethiferous diseases. This latter tribe consists of his Majesty and his
+Majesty's ministers. Whenever we cannot abuse their measures, we always
+fall foul on their health. Does the king pass any popular law, we
+immediately insinuate that his constitution is on its last legs. Does
+the minister act like a man of sense, we instantly observe, with great
+regret, that his complexion is remarkably pale. There is one manifest
+advantage in diseasinq people, instead of absolutely destroying them:
+the public may flatly contradict us in one case, but it never can in the
+other; it is easy to prove that a man is alive, but utterly impossible
+to prove that he is in health. What if some opposing newspaper take up
+the cudgels in his behalf, and assert that the victim of all Pandora's
+complaints, whom we send tottering to the grave, passes one half the day
+in knocking up a 'distinguished company' at a shooting-party, and the
+other half in outdoing the same 'distinguished company' after dinner?
+What if the afflicted individual himself write us word that he never
+was better in his life? We have only mysteriously to shake our heads
+and observe that to contradict is not to prove, that it is little likely
+that our authority should have been mistaken, and (we are very fond
+of an historical comparison), beg our readers to remember that when
+Cardinal Richelieu was dying, nothing enraged him so much as hinting
+that he was ill. In short, if Horace is right, we are the very princes
+of poets; for I dare say, Mr. MacGrawler, that you--and you, too, my
+little gentleman, perfectly remember the words of the wise old Roman,--
+
+     "'Ille per extentum funem mihi posse videtur
+     Ire poeta, meum qui pectus inaniter angit,
+     Irritat, mulcet, falsis terroribus implet.'"
+
+     ["He appears to me to be, to the fullest extent, a poet who
+     airily torments my breast, irritates, soothes, fills it with
+     unreal terrors."]
+
+Having uttered this quotation with considerable self-complacency,
+and thereby entirely completed his conquest over Paul, Mr. Augustus
+Tomlinson, turning to MacGrawler, concluded his business with that
+gentleman,--which was of a literary nature, namely, a joint composition
+against a man who, being under five-and-twenty, and too poor to give
+dinners, had had the impudence to write a sacred poem. The critics were
+exceedingly bitter at this; and having very little to say against the
+poem, the Court journals called the author a "coxcomb," and the liberal
+ones "the son of a pantaloon!"
+
+There was an ease, a spirit, a life about Mr. Augustus Tomlinson, which
+captivated the senses of our young hero; then, too, he was exceedingly
+smartly attired,--wore red heels and a bag,--had what seemed to Paul
+quite the air of a "man of fashion;" and, above all, he spouted the
+Latin with a remarkable grace!
+
+Some days afterwards, MacGrawler sent our hero to Mr. Tomlinson's
+lodgings, with his share of the joint abuse upon the poet.
+
+Doubly was Paul's reverence for Mr. Augustus Tomlinson increased by a
+sight of his abode. He found him settled in a polite part of the town,
+in a very spruce parlour, the contents of which manifested the universal
+genius of the inhabitant. It hath been objected unto us, by a most
+discerning critic, that we are addicted to the drawing of "universal
+geniuses." We plead Not Guilty in former instances; we allow the
+soft impeachment in the instance of Mr. Augustus Tomlinson. Over his
+fireplace were arranged boxing-gloves and fencing foils; on his table
+lay a cremona and a flageolet. On one side of the wall were shelves
+containing the Covent Garden Magazine, Burn's Justice, a pocket Horace,
+a Prayer-Book, Excerpta ex Tacito, a volume of plays, Philosophy made
+Easy, and a Key to all Knowledge. Furthermore, there were on another
+table a riding-whip and a driving-whip and a pair of spurs, and three
+guineas, with a little mountain of loose silver. Mr. Augustus was a
+tall, fair young man, with a freckled complexion, green eyes and red
+eyelids, a smiling mouth, rather under-jawed, a sharp nose, and
+a prodigiously large pair of ears. He was robed in a green damask
+dressing-gown; and he received the tender Paul most graciously.
+
+There was something very engaging about our hero. He was not only
+good-looking, and frank in aspect, but he had that appearance of
+briskness and intellect which belongs to an embryo rogue. Mr. Augustus
+Tomlinson professed the greatest regard for him,--asked him if he could
+box, made him put on a pair of gloves, and very condescendingly knocked
+him down three times successively. Next he played him, both upon his
+flageolet and his cremona, some of the most modish airs. Moreover, he
+sang him a little song of his own composing. He then, taking up the
+driving-whip, flanked a fly from the opposite wall, and throwing himself
+(naturally fatigued with his numerous exertions) on his sofa, observed,
+in a careless tone, that he and his friend Lord Dunshunner were
+universally esteemed the best whips in the metropolis. "I," quoth Mr.
+Augustus, "am the best on the road; but my lord is a devil at turning a
+corner."
+
+Paul, who had hitherto lived too unsophisticated a life to be aware of
+the importance of which a lord would naturally be in the eyes of Mr.
+Augustus Tomlinson, was not so much struck with the grandeur of the
+connection as the murderer of the journals had expected. He merely
+observed, by way of compliment, that Mr. Augustus and his companion
+seemed to be "rolling kiddies."
+
+A little displeased with this metaphorical remark,--for it may be
+observed that "rolling kiddy" is, among the learned in such lore, the
+customary expression for "a smart thief,"--the universal Augustus took
+that liberty to which by his age and station, so much superior to those
+of Paul, he imagined himself entitled, and gently reproved our hero for
+his indiscriminate use of flash phrases.
+
+"A lad of your parts," said he,--"for I see you are clever, by your
+eye,--ought to be ashamed of using such vulgar expressions. Have a
+nobler spirit, a loftier emulation, Paul, than that which distinguishes
+the little ragamuffins of the street. Know that in this country genius
+and learning carry everything before them; and if you behave yourself
+properly, you may, one day or another, be as high in the world as
+myself."
+
+At this speech Paul looked wistfully round the spruce parlour, and
+thought what a fine thing it would be to be lord of such a domain,
+together with the appliances of flageolet and cremona, boxing-gloves,
+books, fly-flanking flagellum, three guineas, with the little mountain
+of silver, and the reputation--shared only with Lord Dunshunner--of
+being the best whip in London.
+
+"Yes," continued Tomlinson, with conscious pride, "I owe my rise to
+myself. Learning is better than house and land. 'Doctrina sed vim,' etc.
+You know what old Horace says? Why, sir, you would not believe it; but
+I was the man who killed his Majesty the King of Sardinia in our
+yesterday's paper. Nothing is too arduous for genius. Fag hard, my
+boy, and you may rival (for the thing, though difficult, may not be
+impossible) Augustus Tomlinson!"
+
+At the conclusion of this harangue, a knock at the door being heard,
+Paul took his departure, and met in the hall a fine-looking person
+dressed in the height of the fashion, and wearing a pair of prodigiously
+large buckles in his shoes. Paul looked, and his heart swelled. "I may
+rival," thought he,--"those were his very words,--I may rival (for
+the thing, though difficult, is not impossible) Augustus Tomlinson!"
+Absorbed in meditation, he went silently home. The next day the memoirs
+of the great Turpin were committed to the flames, and it was noticeable
+that henceforth Paul observed a choicer propriety of words, that he
+assumed a more refined air of dignity, and that he paid considerably
+more attention than heretofore to the lessons of Mr. Peter MacGrawler.
+Although it must be allowed that our young hero's progress in the
+learned languages was not astonishing, yet an early passion for reading,
+growing stronger and stronger by application, repaid him at last with a
+tolerable knowledge of the mother-tongue. We must, however, add that his
+more favourite and cherished studies were scarcely of that nature which
+a prudent preceptor would have greatly commended. They lay chiefly among
+novels, plays, and poetry,--which last he affected to that degree
+that he became somewhat of a poet himself. Nevertheless these literary
+avocations, profitless as they seemed, gave a certain refinement to his
+tastes which they were not likely otherwise to have acquired at the Mug;
+and while they aroused his ambition to see something of the gay life
+they depicted, they imparted to his temper a tone of enterprise and of
+thoughtless generosity which perhaps contributed greatly to counteract
+those evil influences towards petty vice to which the examples
+around him must have exposed his tender youth. But, alas! a great
+disappointment to Paul's hope of assistance and companionship in his
+literary labours befell him. Mr. Augustus Tomlinson, one bright morning,
+disappeared, leaving word with his numerous friends that he was going
+to accept a lucrative situation in the North of England. Notwithstanding
+the shock this occasioned to the affectionate heart and aspiring temper
+of our friend Paul, it abated not his ardour in that field of science
+which it seemed that the distinguished absentee had so successfully
+cultivated. By little and little, he possessed himself (in addition to
+the literary stores we have alluded to) of all it was in the power of
+the wise and profound Peter MacGrawler to impart unto him; and at the
+age of sixteen he began (oh the presumption of youth!) to fancy himself
+more learned than his master.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+He had now become a young man of extreme fashion, and as much repandu in
+society as the utmost and most exigent coveter of London celebrity could
+desire. He was, of course, a member of the clubs, etc. He was, in
+short, of that oft-described set before whom all minor beaux sink into
+insignificance, or among whom they eventually obtain a subaltern grade,
+by a sacrifice of a due portion of their fortune.--Almack's Revisited.
+
+By the soul of the great Malebranche, who made "A Search after Truth,"
+and discovered everything beautiful except that which he searched
+for,--by the soul of the great Malebranche, whom Bishop Berkeley found
+suffering under an inflammation in the lungs, and very obligingly
+talked to death (an instance of conversational powers worthy the envious
+emulation of all great metaphysicians and arguers),--by the soul of that
+illustrious man, it is amazing to us what a number of truths there are
+broken up into little fragments, and scattered here and there through
+the world. What a magnificent museum a man might make of the precious
+minerals, if he would but go out with his basket under his arm, and his
+eyes about him! We ourselves picked up this very day a certain small
+piece of truth, with which we propose to explain to thee, fair reader, a
+sinister turn in the fortunes of Paul.
+
+"Wherever," says a living sage, "you see dignity, you may be sure
+there is expense requisite to support it." So was it with Paul. A
+young gentleman who was heir-presumptive to the Mug, and who enjoyed
+a handsome person with a cultivated mind, was necessarily of a certain
+station of society, and an object of respect in the eyes of the
+manoeuvring mammas of the vicinity of Thames Court. Many were the
+parties of pleasure to Deptford and Greenwich which Paul found himself
+compelled to attend; and we need not refer our readers to novels upon
+fashionable life to inform them that in good society the gentlemen
+always pay for the ladies! Nor was this all the expense to which his
+expectations exposed him. A gentleman could scarcely attend these
+elegant festivities without devoting some little attention to his dress;
+and a fashionable tailor plays the deuce with one's yearly allowance.
+
+We who reside, be it known to you, reader, in Little Brittany are not
+very well acquainted with the manners of the better classes in St.
+James's. But there was one great vice among the fine people about Thames
+Court which we make no doubt does not exist anywhere else,--namely,
+these fine people were always in an agony to seem finer than they were;
+and the more airs a gentleman or a lady gave him or her self, the more
+important they became. Joe, the dog's-meat man, had indeed got into
+society entirely from a knack of saying impertinent things to everybody;
+and the smartest exclusives of the place, who seldom visited any one
+where there was not a silver teapot, used to think Joe had a great deal
+in him because he trundled his cart with his head in the air, and one
+day gave the very beadle of the parish "the cut direct."
+
+Now this desire to be so exceedingly fine not only made the society
+about Thames Court unpleasant, but expensive. Every one vied with
+his neighbour; and as the spirit of rivalry is particularly strong
+in youthful bosoms, we can scarcely wonder that it led Paul into many
+extravagances. The evil of all circles that profess to be select is high
+play; and the reason is obvious: persons who have the power to bestow
+on another an advantage he covets would rather sell it than give it;
+and Paul, gradually increasing in popularity and ton, found himself, in
+spite of his classical education, no match for the finished, or,
+rather, finishing gentlemen with whom he began to associate. His first
+admittance into the select coterie of these men of the world was formed
+at the house of Bachelor Bill, a person of great notoriety among
+that portion of the elite which emphatically entitles itself "Flash."
+However, as it is our rigid intention in this work to portray at length
+no episodical characters whatsoever, we can afford our readers but a
+slight and rapid sketch of Bachelor Bill.
+
+This personage was of Devonshire extraction. His mother had kept the
+pleasantest public-house in town, and at her death Bill succeeded to her
+property and popularity. All the young ladies in the neighbourhood of
+Fiddler's Row, where he resided, set their caps at him: all the most
+fashionable prigs, or tobymen, sought to get him into their set; and the
+most crack blowen in London would have given her ears at any time for
+a loving word from Bachelor Bill. But Bill was a longheaded, prudent
+fellow, and of a remarkably cautious temperament. He avoided marriage
+and friendship; namely, he was neither plundered nor cornuted. He was a
+tall, aristocratic cove, of a devilish neat address, and very gallant,
+in an honest way, to the blowens. Like most single men, being very much
+the gentleman so far as money was concerned, he gave them plenty of
+"feeds," and from time to time a very agreeable hop. His bingo [Brandy]
+was unexceptionable; and as for his stark-naked [Gin], it was voted the
+most brilliant thing in nature. In a very short time, by his blows-out
+and his bachelorship,--for single men always arrive at the apex of haut
+ton more easily than married,--he became the very glass of fashion; and
+many were the tight apprentices, even at the west end of the town,
+who used to turn back in admiration of Bachelor Bill, when of a Sunday
+afternoon he drove down his varment gig to his snug little box on the
+borders of Turnham Green. Bill's happiness was not, however, wholly
+without alloy. The ladies of pleasure are always so excessively angry
+when a man does not make love to them, that there is nothing they will
+not say against him; and the fair matrons in the vicinity of Fiddler's
+Row spread all manner of unfounded reports against poor Bachelor
+Bill. By degrees, however,--for, as Tacitus has said, doubtless with
+a prophetic eye to Bachelor Bill, "the truth gains by delay,"--these
+reports began to die insensibly away; and Bill now waxing near to the
+confines of middle age, his friends comfortably settled for him that he
+would be Bachelor Bill all his life. For the rest, he was an excellent
+fellow,--gave his broken victuals to the poor, professed a liberal
+turn of thinking, and in all the quarrels among the blowens (your crack
+blowens are a quarrelsome set!) always took part with the weakest.
+Although Bill affected to be very select in his company, he was never
+forgetful of his old friends; and Mrs. Margery Lobkins having been very
+good to him when he was a little boy in a skeleton jacket, he invariably
+sent her a card to his soirees. The good lady, however, had not of late
+years deserted her chimney-corner. Indeed, the racket of fashionable
+life was too much for her nerves; and the invitation had become a
+customary form not expected to be acted upon, but not a whit the less
+regularly used for that reason. As Paul had now attained his sixteenth
+year, and was a fine, handsome lad, the dame thought he would make
+an excellent representative of the Mug's mistress; and that, for her
+protege, a ball at Bill's house would be no bad commencement of "Life
+in London." Accordingly, she intimated to the Bachelor a wish to that
+effect; and Paul received the following invitation from Bill:--
+
+"Mr. William Duke gives a hop and feed in a quiet way on Monday next,
+and hops Mr. Paul Lobkins will be of the party. N. B. Gentlemen is
+expected to come in pumps."
+
+When Paul entered, he found Bachelor Bill leading off the ball to the
+tune of "Drops of Brandy," with a young lady to whom, because she had
+been a strolling player, the Ladies Patronesses of Fiddler's Row
+had thought proper to behave with a very cavalier civility. The good
+Bachelor had no notion, as he expressed it, of such tantrums, and he
+caused it to be circulated among the finest of the blowens, that he
+expected all who kicked their heels at his house would behave decent and
+polite to young Mrs. Dot. This intimation, conveyed to the ladies with
+all that insinuating polish for which Bachelor Bill was so remarkable,
+produced a notable effect; and Mrs. Dot, being now led off by the flash
+Bachelor, was overpowered with civilities the rest of the evening.
+
+When the dance was ended, Bill very politely shook hands with Paul, and
+took an early opportunity of introducing him to some of the most "noted
+characters" of the town. Among these were the smart Mr. Allfair, the
+insinuating Henry Finish, the merry Jack Hookey, the knowing Charles
+Trywit, and various others equally noted for their skill in living
+handsomely upon their own brains, and the personals of other people. To
+say truth, Paul, who at that time was an honest lad, was less charmed
+than he had anticipated by the conversation of these chevaliers of
+industry. He was more pleased with the clever though self-sufficient
+remarks of a gentleman with a remarkably fine head of hair, and whom we
+would more impressively than the rest introduce to our reader under the
+appellation of Mr. Edward Pepper, generally termed Long Ned. As this
+worthy was destined afterwards to be an intimate associate of Paul, our
+main reason for attending the hop at Bachelor Bill's is to note, as the
+importance of the event deserves, the epoch of the commencement of their
+acquaintance.
+
+Long Ned and, Paul happened to sit next to each other at supper, and
+they conversed together so amicably that Paul, in the hospitality of his
+heart, expressed a hope that he should see Mr. Pepper at the Mug!
+
+"Mug,--Mug!" repeated Pepper, half shutting his eyes, with the air of
+a dandy about to be impertinent; "ah, the name of a chapel, is it not?
+There's a sect called Muggletonians, I think?"
+
+"As to that," said Paul, colouring at this insinuation against the Mug,
+"Mrs. Lobkins has no more religion than her betters; but the Mug is a
+very excellent house, and frequented by the best possible company."
+
+"Don't doubt it!" said Ned. "Remember now that I was once there, and saw
+one Dummie Dunnaker,--is not that the name? I recollect some years ago,
+when I first came out, that Dummie and I had an adventure together;
+to tell you the truth, it was not the sort of thing I would do now.
+But--would you believe it, Mr. Paul?--this pitiful fellow was quite rude
+to me the only time I ever met him since; that is to say, the only time
+I ever entered the Mug. I have no notion of such airs in a merchant,--a
+merchant of rags! Those commercial fellows are getting quite
+insufferable."
+
+"You surprise me," said Paul. "Poor Dummie is the last man to be rude;
+he is as civil a creature as ever lived."
+
+"Or sold a rag," said Ned. "Possibly! Don't doubt his amiable qualities
+in the least. Pass the bingo, my good fellow. Stupid stuff, this
+dancing!"
+
+"Devilish stupid!" echoed Harry Finish, across the table. "Suppose
+we adjourn to Fish Lane, and rattle the ivories! What say you, Mr.
+Lobkins?"
+
+Afraid of the "ton's stern laugh, which scarce the proud philosopher
+can scorn," and not being very partial to dancing, Paul assented to the
+proposition; and a little party, consisting of Harry Finish, Allfair,
+Long Ned, and Mr. Hookey, adjourned to Fish Lane, where there was a
+club, celebrated among men who live by their wits, at which "lush" and
+"baccy" were gratuitously sported in the most magnificent manner. Here
+the evening passed away very delightfully, and Paul went home without a
+"brad" in his pocket.
+
+From that time Paul's visits to Fish Lane became unfortunately
+regular; and in a very short period, we grieve to say, Paul became that
+distinguished character, a gentleman of three outs,--"out of pocket,
+out of elbows, and out of credit." The only two persons whom he found
+willing to accommodate him with a slight loan, as the advertisements
+signed X. Y. have it, were Mr. Dummie Dunnaker and Mr. Pepper, surnamed
+the Long. The latter, however, while he obliged the heir to the Mug,
+never condescended to enter that noted place of resort; and the former,
+whenever he good-naturedly opened his purse-strings, did it with a
+hearty caution to shun the acquaintance of Long Ned,--"a parson," said
+Dummie, "of wery dangerous morals, and not by no manner of means a fit
+'sociate for a young gemman of cracter like leetle Paul!" So earnest
+was this caution, and so especially pointed at Long Ned,--although
+the company of Mr. Allfair or Mr. Finish might be said to be no less
+prejudicial,--that it is probable that stately fastidiousness of manner
+which Lord Normanby rightly observes, in one of his excellent novels,
+makes so many enemies in the world, and which sometimes characterized
+the behaviour of Long Ned, especially towards the men of commerce, was
+a main reason why Dummie was so acutely and peculiarly alive to the
+immoralities of that lengthy gentleman. At the same time we must observe
+that when Paul, remembering what Pepper had said respecting his early
+adventure with Mr. Dunnaker, repeated it to the merchant, Dummie could
+not conceal a certain confusion, though he merely remarked, with a sort
+of laugh, that it was not worth speaking about; and it appeared evident
+to Paul that something unpleasant to the man of rags, which was not
+shared by the unconscious Pepper, lurked in the reminiscence of their
+past acquaintance. How beit, the circumstance glided from Paul's
+attention the moment afterwards; and he paid, we are concerned to
+say, equally little heed to the cautions against Ned with which Dummie
+regaled him.
+
+Perhaps (for we must now direct a glance towards his domestic concerns)
+one great cause which drove Paul to Fish Lane was the uncomfortable
+life he led at home. For though Mrs. Lobkins was extremely fond of her
+protege, yet she was possessed, as her customers emphatically remarked,
+"of the devil's own temper;" and her native coarseness never having been
+softened by those pictures of gay society which had, in many a novel and
+comic farce, refined the temperament of the romantic Paul, her manner of
+venting her maternal reproaches was certainly not a little revolting to
+a lad of some delicacy of feeling. Indeed, it often occurred to him
+to leave her house altogether, and seek his fortunes alone, after the
+manner of the ingenious Gil Blas or the enterprising Roderick Random;
+and this idea, though conquered and reconquered, gradually swelled and
+increased at his heart, even as swelleth that hairy ball found in the
+stomach of some suffering heifer after its decease. Among these projects
+of enterprise the reader will hereafter notice that an early vision of
+the Green Forest Cave, in which Turpin was accustomed, with a friend,
+a ham, and a wife, to conceal himself, flitted across his mind. At this
+time he did not, perhaps, incline to the mode of life practised by the
+hero of the roads; but he certainly clung not the less fondly to the
+notion of the cave.
+
+The melancholy flow of our hero's life was now, however, about to be
+diverted by an unexpected turn, and the crude thoughts of boyhood to
+burst, "like Ghilan's giant palm," into the fruit of a manly resolution.
+
+Among the prominent features of Mrs. Lobkins's mind was a sovereign
+contempt for the unsuccessful. The imprudence and ill-luck of Paul
+occasioned her as much scorn as compassion; and when for the third time
+within a week he stood, with a rueful visage and with vacant pockets,
+by the dame's great chair, requesting an additional supply, the tides of
+her wrath swelled into overflow.
+
+"Look you, my kinchin cove," said she,--and in order to give peculiar
+dignity to her aspect, she put on while she spoke a huge pair of tin
+spectacles,--"if so be as how you goes for to think as how I shall go
+for to supply your wicious necessities, you will find yourself planted
+in Queer Street. Blow me tight, if I gives you another mag."
+
+"But I owe Long Ned a guinea," said Paul; "and Dummie Dunnaker lent me
+three crowns. It ill becomes your heir apparent, my dear dame, to fight
+shy of his debts of honour."
+
+"Taradididdle, don't think for to wheedle me with your debts and your
+honour," said the dame, in a passion. "Long Ned is as long in the forks
+[fingers] as he is in the back; may Old Harry fly off with him! And as
+for Durnmie Dunnaker, I wonders how you, brought up such a swell, and
+blest with the wery best of hedications, can think of putting up with
+such wulgar 'sociates. I tells you what, Paul, you'll please to break
+with them, smack and at once, or devil a brad you'll ever get from Peg
+Lobkins." So saying, the old lady turned round in her chair, and helped
+herself to a pipe of tobacco.
+
+Paul walked twice up and down the apartment, and at last stopped
+opposite the dame's chair. He was a youth of high spirit; and though he
+was warm-hearted, and had a love for Mrs. Lobkins, which her care and
+affection for hire well deserved, yet he was rough in temper, and
+not constantly smooth in speech. It is true that his heart smote him
+afterwards, whenever he had said anything to annoy Mrs. Lobkins, and he
+was always the first to seek a reconciliation; but warm words produce
+cold respect, and sorrow for the past is not always efficacious in
+amending the future. Paul then, puffed up with the vanity of his genteel
+education, and the friendship of Long Ned (who went to Ranelagh, and
+wore silver clocked stockings), stopped opposite to Mrs. Lobkins's
+chair, and said with great solemnity,--
+
+"Mr. Pepper, madam, says very properly that I must have money to support
+myself like a gentleman; and as you won't give it me, I am determined,
+with many thanks for your past favours, to throw myself on the world,
+and seek my fortune."
+
+If Paul was of no oily and bland temper, Dame Margaret Lobkins, it has
+been seen, had no advantage on that score. (We dare say the reader has
+observed that nothing so enrages persons on whom one depends as any
+expressed determination of seeking independence.) Gazing therefore for
+one moment at the open but resolute countenance of Paul, while all the
+blood of her veins seemed gathering in fire and scarlet to her enlarging
+cheeks, Dame Lobkins said,--
+
+"Ifeaks, Master Pride-in-duds! seek your fortune yourself, will you?
+This comes of my bringing you up, and letting you eat the bread of
+idleness and charity, you toad of a thousand! Take that and be d--d
+to you!" and, suiting the action to the word, the tube which she had
+withdrawn from her mouth in order to utter her gentle rebuke whizzed
+through the air, grazed Paul's cheek, and finished its earthly career by
+coming in violent contact with the right eye of Duinmie Dunnaker, who at
+that exact moment entered the room.
+
+Paul had winced for a moment to avoid the missive; in the next he
+stood perfectly upright. His cheeks glowed, his chest swelled; and the
+entrance of Dummie Dunuaker, who was thus made the spectator of the
+affront he had received, stirred his blood into a deeper anger and a
+more bitter self-humiliation. All his former resolutions of departure,
+all the hard words, the coarse allusions, the practical insults he had
+at any time received, rushed upon him at once. He merely cast one look
+at the old woman, whose rage was now half subsided, and turned slowly
+and in silence to the door.
+
+There is often something alarming in an occurrence merely because it
+is that which we least expect. The astute Mrs. Lobkins, remembering
+the hardy temper and fiery passions of Paul, had expected some burst of
+rage, some vehement reply; and when she caught with one wandering eye
+his parting look, and saw him turn so passively and mutely to the door,
+her heart misgave her, she raised herself from her chair, and made
+towards him. Unhappily for her chance of reconciliation, she had that
+day quaffed more copiously of the bowl than usual; and the signs of
+intoxication visible in her uncertain gait, her meaningless eye, her
+vacant leer, her ruby cheek, all inspired Paul with feelings which at
+the moment converted resentment into something very much like aversion.
+He sprang from her grasp to the threshold.
+
+"Where be you going, you imp of the world?" cried the dame. "Get in with
+you, and say no more on the matter; be a bob-cull,--drop the bullies,
+and you shall have the blunt!"
+
+But Paul heeded not this invitation.
+
+"I will eat the bread of idleness and charity no longer," said he,
+sullenly. "Good-by; and if ever I can pay you what I have cost you, I
+will."
+
+He turned away as he spoke; and the dame, kindling with resentment at
+his unseemly return to her proffered kindness, hallooed after him, and
+bade that dark-coloured gentleman who keeps the fire-office below go
+along with him.
+
+Swelling with anger, pride, shame, and a half-joyous feeling of
+emancipated independence, Paul walked on, he knew not whither, with his
+head in the air, and his legs marshalling themselves into a military
+gait of defiance. He had not proceeded far before he heard his name
+uttered behind him; he turned, and saw the rueful face of Dummie
+Dunnaker.
+
+Very inoffensively had that respectable person been employed during the
+last part of the scene we have described in caressing his afflicted eye,
+and muttering philosophical observations on the danger incurred by all
+those who are acquainted with ladies of a choleric temperament; when
+Mrs. Lobkins, turning round after Paul's departure, and seeing the
+pitiful person of that Dummie Dunnaker, whose name she remembered
+Paul had mentioned in his opening speech, and whom, therefore, with
+an illogical confusion of ideas, she considered a party in the late
+dispute, exhausted upon him all that rage which it was necessary for her
+comfort that she should unburden somewhere.
+
+She seized the little man by the collar,--the tenderest of all places in
+gentlemen similarly circumstanced with regard to the ways of life,--and
+giving him a blow, which took effect on his other and hitherto undamaged
+eye, cried out,--
+
+"I'll teach you, you blood-sucker [that is, parasite], to sponge upon
+those as has expectations! I'll teach you to cozen the heir of the Mug,
+you snivelling, whey-faced ghost of a farthing rushlight! What! you'll
+lend my Paul three crowns, will you, when you knows as how you told
+me you could not pay me a pitiful tizzy? Oh, you're a queer one, I
+warrants; but you won't queer Margery Lobkins. Out of my ken, you cur of
+the mange!--out of my ken; and if ever I claps my sees on you again, or
+if ever I knows as how you makes a flat of my Paul, blow me tight but
+I'll weave you a hempen collar,--I'll hang you, you dog, I will. What!
+you will answer me, will you? Oh, you viper, budge and begone!"
+
+It was in vain that Dummie protested his innocence. A violent
+coup-de-pied broke off all further parlance. He made a clear house of
+the Mug; and the landlady thereof, tottering back to her elbow-chair,
+sought out another pipe, and, like all imaginative persons when
+the world goes wrong with them, consoled herself for the absence of
+realities by the creations of smoke.
+
+Meanwhile Dummie Dunnaker, muttering and murmuring bitter fancies,
+overtook Paul, and accused that youth of having been the occasion of
+the injuries he had just undergone. Paul was not at that moment in the
+humour best adapted for the patient bearing of accusations. He answered
+Mr. Dunnaker very shortly; and that respectable individual, still
+smarting under his bruises, replied with equal tartness. Words grew
+high, and at length Paul, desirous of concluding the conference,
+clenched his fist, and told the redoubted Dummie that he would "knock
+him down." There is something peculiarly harsh and stunning in those
+three hard, wiry, sturdy, stubborn monosyllables. Their very sound
+makes you double your fist if you are a hero, or your pace if you are
+a peaceable man. They produced an instant effect upon Dummie Dunnaker,
+aided as they were by the effect of an athletic and youthful figure,
+already fast approaching to the height of six feet, a flushed cheek,
+and an eye that bespoke both passion and resolution. The rag-merchant's
+voice sank at once, and with the countenance of a wronged Cassius he
+whimpered forth,--
+
+"Knock me down? O leetle Paul, vot wicked vhids are those! Vot! Dummie
+Dunnaker, as has dandled you on his knee mony's a time and oft! Vy, the
+cove's 'art is as 'ard as junk, and as proud as a gardener's dog vith
+a nosegay tied to his tail." This pathetic remonstrance softened Paul's
+anger.
+
+"Well, Dummie," said he, laughing, "I did not mean to hurt you, and
+there's an end of it; and I am very sorry for the dame's ill-conduct;
+and so I wish you a good-morning."
+
+"Vy, vere be you trotting to, leetle Paul?" said Dummie, grasping him by
+the tail of the coat.
+
+"The deuce a bit I know," answered our hero; "but I think I shall drop a
+call on Long Ned."
+
+"Avast there!" said Dummie, speaking under his breath; "if so be as you
+von't blab, I'll tell you a bit of a secret. I heered as 'ow Long Ned
+started for Hampshire this werry morning on a toby [Highway expedition]
+consarn!"
+
+"Ha!" said Paul, "then hang me if I know what to do!"
+
+As he uttered these words, a more thorough sense of his destitution (if
+he persevered in leaving the Mug) than he had hitherto felt rushed
+upon him; for Paul had designed for a while to throw himself on the
+hospitality of his Patagonian friend, and now that he found that friend
+was absent from London and on so dangerous an expedition, he was a
+little puzzled what to do with that treasure of intellect and wisdom
+which he carried about upon his legs. Already he had acquired sufficient
+penetration (for Charles Trywit and Harry Finish were excellent masters
+for initiating a man into the knowledge of the world) to perceive that a
+person, however admirable may be his qualities, does not readily find
+a welcome without a penny in his pocket. In the neighbourhood of Thames
+Court he had, indeed, many acquaintances; but the fineness of his
+language, acquired from his education, and the elegance of his air, in
+which he attempted to blend in happy association the gallant effrontery
+of Mr. Long Ned with the graceful negligence of Mr. Augustus Tomlinson,
+had made him many enemies among those acquaintances; and he was not
+willing--so great was our hero's pride--to throw himself on the chance
+of their welcome, or to publish, as it were, his exiled and crestfallen
+state. As for those boon companions who had assisted him in making a
+wilderness of his pockets, he had already found that that was the only
+species of assistance which they were willing to render him. In a word,
+he could not for the life of him conjecture in what quarter he should
+find the benefits of bed and board. While he stood with his finger
+to his lip, undecided and musing, but fully resolved at least on one
+thing,--not to return to the Mug,--little Dummie, who was a good-natured
+fellow at the bottom, peered up in his face, and said,--
+
+"Vy, Paul, my kid, you looks down in the chops; cheer up,--care killed a
+cat!"
+
+Observing that this appropriate and encouraging fact of natural history
+did not lessen the cloud upon Paul's brow, the acute Dummie Dunnaker
+proceeded at once to the grand panacea for all evils, in his own
+profound estimation.
+
+"Paul, my ben cull," said he, with a knowing wink, and nudging the young
+gentleman in the left side, "vot do you say to a drop o' blue ruin? or,
+as you likes to be conish [genteel], I does n't care if I sports you a
+glass of port!" While Dunnaker was uttering this invitation, a
+sudden reminiscence flashed across Paul: he bethought him at once of
+MacGrawler; and he resolved forthwith to repair to the abode of that
+illustrious sage, and petition at least for accommodation for the
+approaching night. So soon as he had come to this determination, he
+shook off the grasp of the amiable Dummie, and refusing with many thanks
+his hospitable invitation, requested him to abstract from the dame's
+house, and lodge within his own until called for, such articles of
+linen and clothing as belonged to Paul and could easily be laid hold of,
+during one of the matron's evening siestas, by the shrewd Dunnaker. The
+merchant promised that the commission should be speedily executed; and
+Paul, shaking hands with him, proceeded to the mansion of MacGrawler.
+
+We must now go back somewhat in the natural course of our narrative, and
+observe that among the minor causes which had conspired with the great
+one of gambling to bring our excellent Paul to his present situation,
+was his intimacy with MacGrawler; for when Paul's increasing years
+and roving habits had put an end to the sage's instructions, there was
+thereby lopped off from the preceptor's finances the weekly sum of two
+shillings and sixpence, as well as the freedom of the dame's cellar and
+larder; and as, in the reaction of feeling, and the perverse course of
+human affairs, people generally repent the most of those actions once
+the most ardently incurred, so poor Mrs. Lobkins, imagining that Paul's
+irregularities were entirely owing to the knowledge he had acquired from
+MacGrawler's instructions, grievously upbraided herself for her former
+folly in seeking for a superior education for her protege; nay, she even
+vented upon the sacred head of MacGrawler himself her dissatisfaction
+at the results of his instructions. In like manner, when a man who
+can spell comes to be hanged, the anti-educationists accuse the
+spelling-book of his murder. High words between the admirer of ignorant
+innocence and the propagator of intellectual science ensued, which ended
+in MacGrawler's final expulsion from the Mug.
+
+There are some young gentlemen of the present day addicted to the
+adoption of Lord Byron's poetry, with the alteration of new rhymes, who
+are pleased graciously to inform us that they are born to be the ruin of
+all those who love them,--an interesting fact, doubtless, but which they
+might as well keep to themselves. It would seem by the contents of this
+chapter as if the same misfortune were destined to Paul. The exile of
+MacGrawler, the insults offered to Dummie Dunnaker,--alike occasioned by
+him,--appear to sanction that opinion. Unfortunately, though Paul was a
+poet, he was not much of a sentimentalist; and he has never given us the
+edifying ravings of his remorse on those subjects. But MacGrawler, like
+Dunnaker, was resolved that our hero should perceive the curse of his
+fatality; and as he still retained some influence over the mind of
+his quondam pupil, his accusations against Paul, as the origin of
+his banishment, were attended with a greater success than were the
+complaints of Dummie Dunnaker on a similar calamity. Paul, who, like
+most people who are good for nothing, had an excellent heart, was
+exceedingly grieved at MacGrawler's banishment on his account; and he
+endeavoured to atone for it by such pecuniary consolations as he was
+enabled to offer. These MacGrawler (purely, we may suppose, from a
+benevolent desire to lessen the boy's remorse) scrupled not to accept;
+and thus, so similar often are the effects of virtue and of vice, the
+exemplary MacGrawler conspired with the unprincipled Long Ned and the
+heartless Henry Finish in producing that unenviable state of vacuity
+which now saddened over the pockets of Paul.
+
+As our hero was slowly walking towards the sage's abode, depending
+on his gratitude and friendship for a temporary shelter, one of those
+lightning flashes of thought which often illumine the profoundest abyss
+of affliction darted across his mind. Recalling the image of the critic,
+he remembered that he had seen that ornament of "The Asinaeum" receive
+sundry sums for his critical lucubrations.
+
+"Why," said Paul, seizing on that fact, and stopping short in the
+street,--"why should I not turn critic myself?"
+
+The only person to whom one ever puts a question with a tolerable
+certainty of receiving a satisfactory answer is one's self. The moment
+Paul started this luminous suggestion, it appeared to him that he had
+discovered the mines of Potosi. Burning with impatience to discuss with
+the great MacGrawler the feasibility of his project, he quickened
+his pace almost into a run, and in a very few minutes, having only
+overthrown one chimney-sweeper and two apple-women by the way, he
+arrived at the sage's door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+     Ye realms yet unrevealed to human sight,
+     Ye canes athwart the hapless hands that write,
+     Ye critic chiefs,-permit me to relate
+     The mystic wonders of your silent state!
+
+                       VIRGIL, AEneid, book vi.
+
+Fortune had smiled upon Mr. MacGrawler since he first undertook the
+tuition of Mrs. Lobkins's protege. He now inhabited a second-floor, and
+defied the sheriff and his evil spirits. It was at the dusk of evening
+that Paul found him at home and alone.
+
+Before the mighty man stood a pot of London porter; a candle, with an
+unregarded wick, shed its solitary light upon his labours; and an infant
+cat played sportively at his learned feet, beguiling the weary moments
+with the remnants of the spiral cap wherewith, instead of laurel, the
+critic had hitherto nightly adorned his brows.
+
+So soon as MacGrawler, piercing through the gloomy mist which hung about
+the chamber, perceived the person of the intruder, a frown settled upon
+his brow.
+
+"Have I not told you, youngster," he growled, "never to enter a
+gentleman's room without knocking? I tell you, sir, that manners are no
+less essential to human happiness than virtue; wherefore, never disturb
+a gentleman in his avocations, and sit yourself down without molesting
+the cat!"
+
+Paul, who knew that his respected tutor disliked any one to trace
+the source of the wonderful spirit which he infused into his critical
+compositions, affected not to perceive the pewter Hippocrene, and with
+many apologies for his want of preparatory politeness, seated himself as
+directed. It was then that the following edifying conversation ensued.
+
+"The ancients," quoth Paul, "were very great men, Mr. MacGrawler."
+
+"They were so, sir," returned the critic; "we make it a rule in our
+profession to assert that fact."
+
+"But, sir," said Paul, "they were wrong now and then."
+
+"Never, Ignoramus; never!"
+
+"They praised poverty, Mr. MacGrawler!" said Paul, with a sigh.
+
+"Hem!" quoth the critic, a little staggered; but presently recovering
+his characteristic, acumen, he observed, "It is true, Paul; but that was
+the poverty of other people."
+
+There was a slight pause. "Criticism," renewed Paul, "must be a most
+difficult art."
+
+"A-hem! And what art is there, sir, that is not difficult,--at least, to
+become master of?"
+
+"True," sighed Paul; "or else--"
+
+"Or else what, boy?" repeated Mr. MacGrawler, seeing that Paul
+hesitated, either from fear of his superior knowledge, as the critic's
+vanity suggested, or from (what was equally likely) want of a word to
+express his meaning.
+
+"Why, I was thinking, sir," said Paul, with that desperate courage which
+gives a distinct and loud intonation to the voice of all who set, or
+think they set, their fate upon a cast,--"I was thinking that I should
+like to become a critic myself!"
+
+"W-h-e-w!" whistled MacGrawler, elevating his eyebrows; "w-h-e-w! great
+ends have come of less beginnings!"
+
+Encouraging as this assertion was, coming as it did from the lips of so
+great a man and so great a critic, at the very moment too when nothing
+short of an anathema against arrogance and presumption was expected to
+issue from those portals of wisdom, yet such is the fallacy of all human
+hopes, that Paul's of a surety would have been a little less elated, had
+he, at the same time his ears drank in the balm of these gracious words,
+been able to have dived into the source whence they emanated.
+
+"Know thyself!" was a precept the sage MacGrawler had endeavoured to
+obey; consequently the result of his obedience was that even by himself
+he was better known than trusted. Whatever he might appear to others, he
+had in reality no vain faith in the infallibility of his own talents and
+resources; as well might a butcher deem himself a perfect anatomist
+from the frequent amputation of legs of mutton, as the critic of "The
+Asinaeum" have laid "the flattering unction to his soul" that he was
+really skilled in the art of criticism, or even acquainted with one of
+its commonest rules, because he could with all speed cut up and disjoint
+any work, from the smallest to the greatest, from the most superficial
+to the most superior; and thus it was that he never had the want of
+candour to deceive himself as to his own talents. Paul's wish therefore
+was no sooner expressed than a vague but golden scheme of future profit
+illumined the brain of MacGrawler,--in a word, he resolved that Paul
+should henceforward share the labour of his critiques; and that he,
+MacGrawler, should receive the whole profits in return for the honour
+thereby conferred on his coadjutor.
+
+Looking therefore at our hero with a benignant air, Mr. MacGrawler thus
+continued:--
+
+"Yes, I repeat,--great ends have come from less beginnings! Rome was not
+built in a day; and I, Paul, I myself was not always the editor of 'The
+Asinaeum.' You say wisely, criticism is a great science, a very great
+science; and it maybe divided into three branches,--namely, 'to tickle,
+to slash, and to plaster.' In each of these three I believe without
+vanity I am a profound adept! I will initiate you into all. Your labours
+shall begin this very evening. I have three works on my table; they must
+be despatched by tomorrow night. I will take the most arduous; I abandon
+to you the others. The three consist of a Romance, an Epic in twelve
+books, and an Inquiry into the Human Mind, in three volumes. I, Paul,
+will tickle the Romance; you this very evening shall plaster the Epic,
+and slash the Inquiry!"
+
+"Heavens, Mr. MacGrawler!" cried Paul, in consternation, "what do you
+mean? I should never be able to read an epic in twelve books, and I
+should fall asleep in the first page of the Inquiry. No, no, leave me
+the Romance, and take the other two under your own protection!"
+
+Although great genius is always benevolent, Mr. MacGrawler could not
+restrain a smile of ineffable contempt at the simplicity of his pupil.
+
+"Know, young gentleman," said he, solemnly, "that the Romance in
+question must be tickled; it is not given to raw beginners to conquer
+that great mystery of our science."
+
+"Before we proceed further, explain the words of the art," said Paul,
+impatiently.
+
+"Listen, then," rejoined MacGrawler; and as he spoke, the candle cast
+an awful glimmering on his countenance. "To slash is, speaking
+grammatically, to employ the accusative, or accusing case; you must cut
+up your book right and left, top and bottom, root and branch. To plaster
+a book is to employ the dative, or giving case; and you must bestow on
+the work all the superlatives in the language,--you must lay on your
+praise thick and thin, and not leave a crevice untrowelled. But to
+tickle, sir, is a comprehensive word, and it comprises all the infinite
+varieties that fill the interval between slashing and plastering. This
+is the nicety of the art, and you can only acquire it by practice; a few
+examples will suffice to give you an idea of its delicacy.
+
+"We will begin with the encouraging tickle: 'Although this work is
+full of faults,--though the characters are unnatural, the plot utterly
+improbable, the thoughts hackneyed, and the style ungrammatical,--yet we
+would by no means discourage the author from proceeding; and in the mean
+while we confidently recommend his work to the attention of the reading
+public."
+
+"Take, now, the advising tickle: 'There is a good deal of merit in these
+little volumes, although we must regret the evident haste in which they
+were written. The author might do better,--we recommend him a study of
+the best writers;' then conclude by a Latin quotation, which you may
+take from one of the mottoes in the 'Spectator.'
+
+"Now, young gentleman, for a specimen of the metaphorical tickle: 'We
+beg this poetical aspirant to remember the fate of Pyrenaeus, who,
+attempting to pursue the Muses, forgot that he had not the wings of the
+goddesses, flung himself from the loftiest ascent he could reach, and
+perished.'
+
+"This you see, Paul, is a loftier and more erudite sort of tickle, and
+may be reserved for one of the Quarterly Reviews. Never throw away a
+simile unnecessarily.
+
+"Now for a sample of the facetious tickle: 'Mr.---has obtained a
+considerable reputation! Some fine ladies think him a great philosopher,
+and he has been praised in our hearing by some Cambridge Fellows for his
+knowledge of fashionable society.'
+
+"For this sort of tickle we generally use the dullest of our tribe;
+and I have selected the foregoing example from the criticisms of a
+distinguished writer in 'The Asinaeum,' whom we call, par excellence,
+the Ass.
+
+"There is a variety of other tickles,--the familiar, the vulgar, the
+polite, the good-natured, the bitter; but in general all tickles may be
+supposed to signify, however disguised, one or other of these meanings:
+'This book would be exceedingly good if it were not exceedingly bad;'
+or, 'this book would be exceedingly bad if it were not exceedingly
+good.'
+
+"You have now, Paul, a general idea of the superior art required by the
+tickle?"
+
+Our hero signified his assent by a sort of hysterical sound between a
+laugh and a groan. MacGrawler continued:--
+
+"There is another grand difficulty attendant on this class of
+criticism.--it is generally requisite to read a few pages of the work;
+because we seldom tickle without extracting, and it requires some
+judgment to make the context agree with the extract. But it is not often
+necessary to extract when you slash or when you plaster; when you slash,
+it is better in general to conclude with: 'After what we have said, it
+is unnecessary to add that we cannot offend the taste of our readers by
+any quotation from this execrable trash.' And when you plaster, you may
+wind up with: 'We regret that our limits will not allow us to give any
+extracts from this wonderful and unrivalled work. We must refer our
+readers to the book itself.'
+
+"And now, sir, I think I have given you a sufficient outline of the
+noble science of Scaliger and MacGrawler. Doubtless you are reconciled
+to the task I have allotted you; and while I tickle the Romance, you
+will slash the Inquiry and plaster the Epic!"
+
+"I will do my best, sir!" said Paul, with that modest yet noble
+simplicity which becomes the virtuously ambitious; and MacGrawler
+forthwith gave him pen and paper, and set him down to his undertaking.
+
+He had the good fortune to please MacGrawler, who, after having made a
+few corrections in style, declared he evinced a peculiar genius in that
+branch of composition. And then it was that Paul, made conceited by
+praise, said, looking contemptuously in the face of his preceptor, and
+swinging his legs to and fro,--
+
+"And what, sir, shall I receive for the plastered Epic and the slashed
+Inquiry?"
+
+As the face of the school-boy who, when guessing, as he thinks rightly,
+at the meaning of some mysterious word in Cornelius Nepos, receiveth
+not the sugared epithet of praise, but a sudden stroke across the
+os humerosve [Face or shoulders] even so, blank, puzzled, and
+thunder-stricken, waxed the face of Mr. MacGrawler at the abrupt and
+astounding audacity of Paul.
+
+"Receive!" he repeated,--"receive! Why, you impudent, ungrateful puppy,
+would you steal the bread from your old master? If I can obtain for
+your crude articles an admission into the illustrious pages of 'The
+Asinaeum,' will you not be sufficiently paid, sir, by the honour? Answer
+me that. Another man, young gentleman, would have charged you a premium
+for his instructions; and here have I, in one lesson, imparted to you
+all the mysteries of the science, and for nothing! And you talk to me of
+'receive!--receive!' Young gentleman, in the words of the immortal bard,
+'I would as lief you had talked to me of ratsbane!'"
+
+"In fine, then, Mr. MacGrawler, I shall get nothing for my trouble?"
+said Paul.
+
+"To be sure not, sir; the very best writer in 'The Asinaeum' only gets
+three shillings an article!" Almost more than he deserves, the critic
+might have added; for he who writes for nobody should receive nothing!
+
+"Then, sir," quoth the mercenary Paul, profanely, and rising, he kicked
+with one kick the cat, the Epic, and the Inquiry to the other end of the
+room,--"then, sir, you may all go to the devil!"
+
+We do not, O gentle reader! seek to excuse this hasty anathema. The
+habits of childhood will sometimes break forth despite of the after
+blessings of education; and we set not up Paul for thine imitation as
+that model of virtue and of wisdom which we design thee to discover in
+MacGrawler.
+
+When that great critic perceived Paul had risen and was retreating in
+high dudgeon towards the door, he rose also, and repeating Paul's last
+words, said,--
+
+"'Go to the devil!' Not so quick, young gentleman,--festinca lente,--all
+in good time. What though I did, astonished at your premature request,
+say that you should receive nothing; yet my great love for you may
+induce me to bestir myself on your behalf. The 'Asinaeum,' I it is true,
+only gives three shillings an article in general; but I am its editor,
+and will intercede with the proprietors on your behalf. Yes, yes; I will
+see what is to be done. Stop a bit, my boy."
+
+Paul, though very irascible, was easily pacified; he reseated himself,
+and taking MacGrawler's hand, said,--
+
+"Forgive me for my petulance, my dear sir; but, to tell you the honest
+truth, I am very low in the world just at present, and must get money in
+some way or another,--in short, I must either pick pockets or write (not
+gratuitously) for 'The Asinaeum. '"
+
+And without further preliminary Paul related his present circumstances
+to the critic, declared his determination not to return to the Mug,
+and requested, at least, from the friendship of his old preceptor the
+accommodation of shelter for that night.
+
+MacGrawler was exceedingly disconcerted at hearing so bad an account of
+his pupil's finances as well as prospects, for he had secretly intended
+to regale himself that evening with a bowl of punch, for which he
+purposed that Paul should pay; but as he knew the quickness of
+parts possessed by the young gentleman, as also the great affection
+entertained for him by Mrs. Lobkins, who in all probability would
+solicit his return the next day, he thought it not unlikely that Paul
+would enjoy the same good fortune as that presiding over his feline
+companion, which, though it had just been kicked to the other end of the
+apartment, was now resuming its former occupation, unhurt, and no less
+merrily than before. He therefore thought it would be imprudent
+to discard his quondam pupil, despite of his present poverty; and,
+moreover, although the first happy project of pocketing all the profits
+derivable from Paul's industry was now abandoned, he still perceived
+great facility in pocketing a part of the same receipts. He therefore
+answered Paul very warmly, that he fully sympathized with him in his
+present melancholy situation; that, so far as he was concerned, he would
+share his last shilling with his beloved pupil, but that he regretted
+at that moment he had only eleven-pence halfpenny in his pocket; that he
+would, however, exert himself to the utmost in procuring an opening for
+Paul's literary genius; and that, if Paul liked to take the slashing and
+plastering part of the business on himself, he would willingly surrender
+it to him, and give him all the profits whatever they might be. En
+attendant, he regretted that a violent rheumatism prevented his giving
+up his own bed to his pupil, but that he might, with all the pleasure
+imaginable, sleep upon the rug before the fire. Paul was so affected by
+this kindness in the worthy man, that, though not much addicted to the
+melting mood, he shed tears of gratitude. He insisted, however, on not
+receiving the whole reward of his labours; and at length it was settled,
+though with a noble reluctance on the part of MacGrawler, that it should
+be equally shared between the critic and the critic's protege,--the half
+profits being reasonably awarded to MacGrawler for his instructions and
+his recommendation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+Bad events peep out o' the tail of good purposes.--Bartholomew Fair.
+
+IT was not long before there was a visible improvement in the pages
+of "The Asinaeum." The slashing part of that incomparable journal
+was suddenly conceived and carried on with a vigour and spirit which
+astonished the hallowed few who contributed to its circulation. It
+was not difficult to see that a new soldier had been enlisted in the
+service; there was something so fresh and hearty about the abuse that it
+could never have proceeded from the worn-out acerbity of an old slasher.
+To be sure, a little ignorance of ordinary facts, and an innovating
+method of applying words to meanings which they never were meant to
+denote, were now and then distinguishable in the criticisms of the new
+Achilles; nevertheless, it was easy to attribute these peculiarities
+to an original turn of thinking; and the rise of the paper on the
+appearance of a series of articles upon contemporary authors, written
+by this "eminent hand," was so remarkable that fifty copies--a number
+perfectly unprecedented in the annals of "The Asinaeum"--were absolutely
+sold in one week; indeed, remembering the principle on which it was
+founded, one sturdy old writer declared that the journal would soon do
+for itself and become popular. There was a remarkable peculiarity about
+the literary debutant who signed himself "Nobilitas:" he not only put
+old words to a new sense, but he used words which had never, among the
+general run of writers, been used before. This was especially remarkable
+in the application of hard names to authors. Once, in censuring a
+popular writer for pleasing the public and thereby growing rich, the
+"eminent hand" ended with "He who surreptitiously accumulates bustle
+[money] is, in fact, nothing better than a buzz gloak!" [Pickpocket].
+
+These enigmatical words and recondite phrases imparted a great air of
+learning to the style of the new critic; and from the unintelligible
+sublimity of his diction, it seemed doubtful whether he was a poet from
+Highgate or a philosopher from Konigsberg. At all events, the reviewer
+preserved his incognito, and while his praises were rung at no less
+than three tea-tables, even glory appeared to him less delicious than
+disguise.
+
+In this incognito, reader, thou hast already discovered Paul; and now
+we have to delight thee with a piece of unexampled morality in the
+excellent MacGrawler. That worthy Mentor, perceiving that there was an
+inherent turn for dissipation and extravagance in our hero, resolved
+magnanimously rather to bring upon himself the sins of treachery and
+malappropriation than suffer his friend and former pupil to incur those
+of wastefulness and profusion. Contrary therefore to the agreement
+made with Paul, instead of giving that youth the half of those profits
+consequent on his brilliant lucubrations, he imparted to him only one
+fourth, and, with the utmost tenderness for Paul's salvation, applied
+the other three portions of the same to his own necessities. The best
+actions are, alas! often misconstrued in this world; and we are now
+about to record a remarkable instance of that melancholy truth.
+
+One evening MacGrawler, having "moistened his virtue" in the same manner
+that the great Cato is said to have done, in the confusion which such a
+process sometimes occasions in the best regulated heads, gave Paul what
+appeared to him the outline of a certain article which he wished to be
+slashingly filled up, but what in reality was the following note from
+the editor of a monthly periodical:--
+
+SIR,--Understanding that my friend, Mr.---, proprietor of "The
+Asinaeum," allows the very distinguished writer whom you have introduced
+to the literary world, and who signs himself "Nobilitas," only five
+shillings an article, I beg, through you, to tender him double that sum.
+The article required will be of an ordinary length.
+
+I am, sir, etc.,
+
+Now, that very morning, MacGrawler had informed Paul of this offer,
+altering only, from the amiable motives we have already explained, the
+sum of ten shillings to that of four; and no sooner did Paul read
+the communication we have placed before the reader than, instead
+of gratitude to MacGrawler for his consideration of Paul's moral
+infirmities, he conceived against that gentleman the most bitter
+resentment. He did not, however, vent his feelings at once upon the
+Scotsman,--indeed, at that moment, as the sage was in a deep sleep
+under the table, it would have been to no purpose had he unbridled his
+indignation,--but he resolved without loss of time to quit the abode of
+the critic. "And, indeed," said he, soliloquizing, "I am heartily tired
+of this life, and shall be very glad to seek some other employment.
+Fortunately, I have hoarded up five guineas and four shillings; and with
+that independence in my possession, since I have forsworn gambling, I
+cannot easily starve."
+
+To this soliloquy succeeded a misanthropical revery upon the
+faithlessness of friends; and the meditation ended in Paul's making up a
+little bundle of such clothes, etc., as Dummie had succeeded in removing
+from the Mug, and which Paul had taken from the rag-merchant's abode one
+morning when Dummie was abroad.
+
+When this easy task was concluded, Paul wrote a short and upbraiding
+note to his illustrious preceptor, and left it unsealed on the table.
+He then, upsetting the ink-bottle on MacGrawler's sleeping countenance,
+departed from the house, and strolled away he cared not whither.
+
+The evening was gradually closing as Paul, chewing the cud of his bitter
+fancies, found himself on London Bridge. He paused there, and leaning
+over the bridge, gazed wistfully on the gloomy waters that rolled
+onward, caring not a minnow for the numerous charming young ladies
+who have thought proper to drown themselves in those merciless waves,
+thereby depriving many a good mistress of an excellent housemaid or an
+invaluable cook, and many a treacherous Phaon of letters beginning with
+"Parjured Villen," and ending with "Your affectionot but melancholy
+Molly."
+
+While thus musing, he was suddenly accosted by a gentleman in boots and
+spurs, having a riding-whip in one hand, and the other hand stuck in the
+pocket of his inexpressibles. The hat of the gallant was gracefully and
+carefully put on, so as to derange as little as possible a profusion of
+dark curls, which, streaming with unguents, fell low not only on either
+side of the face, but on the neck and even the shoulders of the owner.
+The face was saturnine and strongly marked, but handsome and
+striking. There was a mixture of frippery and sternness in its
+expression,--something between Madame Vestries and T. P. Cooke, or
+between "lovely Sally" and a "Captain bold of Halifax." The stature of
+this personage was remarkably tall, and his figure was stout, muscular,
+and well knit. In fine, to complete his portrait, and give our readers
+of the present day an exact idea of this hero of the past, we shall add
+that he was altogether that sort of gentleman one sees swaggering in
+the Burlington Arcade, with his hair and hat on one side, and a military
+cloak thrown over his shoulders; or prowling in Regent Street, towards
+the evening, whiskered and cigarred.
+
+Laying his hand on the shoulder of our hero, this gentleman said, with
+an affected intonation of voice,--
+
+"How dost, my fine fellow? Long since I saw you! Damme, but you look the
+worse for wear. What hast thou been doing with thyself?"
+
+"Ha!" cried our hero, returning the salutation of the stranger, "and is
+it Long Ned whom I behold? I am indeed glad to meet you; and I say, my
+friend, I hope what I heard of you is not true!"
+
+"Hist!" said Long Ned, looking round fearfully, and sinking his voice;
+"never talk of what you hear of gentlemen, except you wish to bring them
+to their last dying speech and confession. But come with me, my lad;
+there is a tavern hard by, and we may as well discuss matters over a
+pint of wine. You look cursed seedy, to be sure; but I can tell Bill the
+waiter--famous fellow, that Bill!--that you are one of my tenants, come
+to complain of my steward, who has just distrained you for rent, you
+dog! No wonder you look so worn in the rigging. Come, follow me. I can't
+walk with thee. It would look too like Northumberland House and the
+butcher's abode next door taking a stroll together."
+
+"Really, Mr. Pepper," said our hero, colouring, and by no means pleased
+with the ingenious comparison of his friend, "if you are ashamed of my
+clothes, which I own might be newer, I will not wound you with my--"
+
+"Pooh! my lad, pooh!" cried Long Ned, interrupting him; "never take
+offence. I never do. I never take anything but money, except, indeed,
+watches. I don't mean to hurt your feelings; all of us have been poor
+once. 'Gad, I remember when I had not a dud to my back; and now, you see
+me,--you see me, Paul! But come, 't is only through the streets you need
+separate from me. Keep a little behind, very little; that will do. Ay,
+that will do," repeated Long Ned, mutteringly to himself; "they'll take
+him for a bailiff. It looks handsome nowadays to be so attended; it
+shows one had credit once!"
+
+Meanwhile Paul, though by no means pleased with the contempt expressed
+for his personal appearance by his lengthy associate, and impressed with
+a keener sense than ever of the crimes of his coat and the vices of
+his other garment,--"Oh, breathe not its name!"--followed doggedly
+and sullenly the strutting steps of the coxcombical Mr. Pepper. That
+personage arrived at last at a small tavern, and arresting a waiter
+who was running across the passage into the coffee-room with a dish of
+hung-beef, demanded (no doubt from a pleasing anticipation of a similar
+pendulous catastrophe) a plate of the same excellent cheer, to be
+carried, in company with a bottle of port, into a private apartment. No
+sooner did he find himself alone with Paul than, bursting into a
+loud laugh, Mr. Ned surveyed his comrade from head to foot through an
+eyeglass which he wore fastened to his button-hole by a piece of blue
+ribbon.
+
+"Well, 'gad now," said he, stopping ever and anon, as if to laugh the
+more heartily, "stab my vitals, but you are a comical quiz. I wonder
+what the women would say, if they saw the dashing Edward Pepper,
+Esquire, walking arm in arm with thee at Ranelagh or Vauxhall! Nay, man,
+never be downcast; if I laugh at thee, it is only to make thee look
+a little merrier thyself. Why, thou lookest like a book of my
+grandfather's called Burton's ''Anatomy of Melancholy;' and faith, a
+shabbier bound copy of it I never saw."
+
+"These jests are a little hard," said Paul, struggling between anger
+and an attempt to smile; and then recollecting his late literary
+occupations, and the many extracts he had taken from "Gleanings of the
+Belles Lettres," in order to impart elegance to his criticisms, he threw
+out his hand theatrically, and spouted with a solemn face,--
+
+       "'Of all the griefs that harass the distrest,
+       Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest!'"
+
+"Well, now, prithee forgive me," said Long Ned, composing his features,
+"and just tell me what you have been doing the last two months."
+
+"Slashing and plastering!" said Paul, with conscious pride.
+
+"Slashing and what? The boy's mad. What do you mean, Paul?"
+
+"In other words," said our hero, speaking very slowly, "know, O very
+Long Ned! that I have been critic to 'The Asinaeum.'"
+
+If Paul's comrade laughed at first, he now laughed ten times more
+merrily than ever. He threw his full length of limb upon a neighbouring
+sofa, and literally rolled with cachinnatory convulsions; nor did his
+risible emotions subside until the entrance of the hung-beef restored
+him to recollection. Seeing, then, that a cloud lowered over Paul's
+countenance, he went up to him with something like gravity, begged his
+pardon for his want of politeness, and desired him to wash away all
+unkindness in a bumper of port. Paul, whose excellent dispositions we
+have before had occasion to remark, was not impervious to his friend's
+apologies. He assured Long Ned that he quite forgave him for his
+ridicule of the high situation he (Paul) had enjoyed in the literary
+world; that it was the duty of a public censor to bear no malice, and
+that he should be very glad to take his share in the interment of the
+hung-beef.
+
+The pair now sat down to their repast; and Paul, who had fared but
+meagerly in that Temple of Athena over which MacGrawler presided, did
+ample justice to the viands before him. By degrees, as he ate and
+drank, his heart opened to his companion; and laying aside that Asinaeum
+dignity which he had at first thought it incumbent on him to assume, he
+entertained Pepper with all the particulars of the life he had lately
+passed. He narrated to him his breach with Dame Lobkins, his agreement
+with MacGrawler, the glory he had acquired, and the wrongs he had
+sustained; and he concluded, as now the second bottle made its
+appearance, by stating his desire of exchanging for some more active
+profession that sedentary career which he had so promisingly begun.
+
+This last part of Paul's confessions secretly delighted the soul of Long
+Ned; for that experienced collector of the highways--Ned was, indeed, of
+no less noble a profession--had long fixed an eye upon our hero, as
+one whom he thought likely to be an honour to that enterprising calling
+which he espoused, and an useful assistant to himself. He had not, in
+his earlier acquaintance with Paul, when the youth was under the roof
+and the surveillance of the practised and wary Mrs. Lobkins, deemed
+it prudent to expose the exact nature of his own pursuits, and had
+contented himself by gradually ripening the mind and the finances of
+Paul into that state when the proposition of a leap from a hedge would
+not be likely greatly to revolt the person to whom it was made. He now
+thought that time near at hand; and filling our hero's glass up to the
+brim, thus artfully addressed him:--
+
+"Courage, my friend! Your narration has given me a sensible pleasure;
+for curse me if it has not strengthened my favourite opinion,--that
+everything is for the best. If it had not been for the meanness of that
+pitiful fellow, MacGrawler, you might still be inspired with the paltry
+ambition of earning a few shillings a week and vilifying a parcel of
+poor devils in the what-d'ye-call it, with a hard name; whereas now, my
+good Paul, I trust I shall be able to open to your genius a new career,
+in which guineas are had for the asking,--in which you may wear fine
+clothes, and ogle the ladies at Ranelagh; and when you are tired of
+glory and liberty, Paul, why, you have only to make your bow to an
+heiress, or a widow with a spanking jointure, and quit the hum of men
+like a Cincinnatus!"
+
+Though Paul's perception into the abstruser branches of morals was not
+very acute,--and at that time the port wine had considerably confused
+the few notions he possessed upon "the beauty of virtue,"--yet he could
+not but perceive that Mr. Pepper's insinuated proposition was far from
+being one which the bench of bishops or a synod of moralists would
+conscientiously have approved. He consequently remained silent; and Long
+Ned, after a pause, continued:--
+
+"You know my genealogy, my good fellow? I was the son of Lawyer Pepper,
+a shrewd old dog, but as hot as Calcutta; and the grandson of Sexton
+Pepper, a great author, who wrote verses on tombstones, and kept a stall
+of religious tracts in Carlisle. My grandfather, the sexton, was the
+best temper of the family; for all of us are a little inclined to be hot
+in the mouth. Well, my fine fellow, my father left me his blessing,
+and this devilish good head of hair. I lived for some years on my own
+resources. I found it a particularly inconvenient mode of life, and of
+late I have taken to live on the public. My father and grandfather did
+it before me, though in a different line. 'T is the pleasantest plan
+in the world. Follow my example, and your coat shall be as spruce as my
+own. Master Paul, your health!"
+
+"But, O longest of mortals!" said Paul, refilling his glass, "though
+the public may allow you to eat your mutton off their backs for a short
+time, they will kick up at last, and upset you and your banquet; in
+other words (pardon my metaphor, dear Ned, in remembrance of the part
+I have lately maintained in 'The Asinaeum,' that most magnificent and
+metaphorical of journals!),--in other words, the police will nab thee
+at last; and thou wilt have the distinguished fate, as thou already hast
+the distinguishing characteristic, of Absalom!"
+
+"You mean that I shall be hanged," said Long Ned, "that may or may
+not be; but he who fears death never enjoys life. Consider, Paul, that
+though hanging is a bad fate, starving is a worse; wherefore fill your
+glass, and let us drink to the health of that great donkey, the people,
+and may we never want saddles to ride it!"
+
+"To the great donkey," cried Paul, tossing off his bumper; "may your
+(y)ears be as long! But I own to you, my friend, that I cannot enter
+into your plans. And, as a token of my resolution, I shall drink no
+more, for my eyes already begin to dance in the air; and if I listen
+longer to your resistless eloquence, my feet may share the same fate!"
+
+So saying, Paul rose; nor could any entreaty, on the part of his
+entertainer, persuade him to resume his seat.
+
+"Nay, as you will," said Pepper, affecting a nonchalant tone, and
+arranging his cravat before the glass,--"nay, as you will. Ned Pepper
+requires no man's companionship against his liking; and if the noble
+spark of ambition be not in your bosom, 't is no use spending my breath
+in blowing at what only existed in my too flattering opinion of your
+qualities. So then, you propose to return to MacGrawler (the scurvy old
+cheat!), and pass the inglorious remainder of your life in the mangling
+of authors and the murder of grammar? Go, my good fellow, go! scribble
+again and forever for MacGrawler, and let him live upon thy brains
+instead of suffering thy brains to--"
+
+"Hold!" cried Paul. "Although I may have some scruples which prevent my
+adoption of that rising line of life you have proposed to me, yet you
+are very much mistaken if you imagine me so spiritless as any longer to
+subject myself to the frauds of that rascal MacGrawler. No! My present
+intention is to pay my old nurse a visit. It appears to me passing
+strange that though I have left her so many weeks, she has never
+relented enough to track me out, which one would think would have been
+no difficult matter; and now, you see, that I am pretty well off, having
+five guineas and four shillings all my own, and she can scarcely think I
+want her money, my heart melts to her, and I shall go and ask pardon for
+my haste!"
+
+"Pshaw! sentimental," cried Long Ned, a little alarmed at the thought
+of Paul's gliding from those clutches which he thought had now so firmly
+closed upon him. "Why, you surely don't mean, after having once tasted
+the joys of independence, to go back to the boozing-ken, and bear all
+Mother Lobkins's drunken tantrums! Better have stayed with MacGrawler,
+of the two!"
+
+"You mistake me," answered Paul; "I mean solely to make it up with her,
+and get her permission to see the world. My ultimate intention is--to
+travel."
+
+"Right," cried Ned, "on the high-road,--and on horseback, I hope."
+
+"No, my Colossus of Roads! no. I am in doubt whether or not I shall
+enlist in a marching regiment, or--Give me your advice on it! I fancy I
+have a great turn for the stage, ever since I saw Garrick in 'Richard.'
+Shall I turn stroller? It must be a merry life."
+
+"Oh, the devil!" cried Ned. "I myself once did Cassio in a barn, and
+every one swore I enacted the drunken scene to perfection; but you have
+no notion what a lamentable life it is to a man of any susceptibility.
+No, my friend, no! There is only one line in all the old plays worthy
+thy attention,--
+
+"'Toby [The highway] or not toby, that is the question.'
+
+"I forget the rest!"
+
+"Well," said our hero, answering in the same jocular vein, "I confess
+I have 'the actor's high ambition.' It is astonishing how my heart beat
+when Richard cried out, 'Come bustle, bustle!' Yes, Pepper, avaunt!--
+
+"'A thousand hearts are great within my bosom.'"
+
+"Well, well," said Long Ned, stretching himself, "since you are so fond
+of the play, what say you to an excursion thither to-night? Garrick
+acts."
+
+"Done!" cried Paul.
+
+"Done!" echoed lazily Long Ned, rising with that blase air which
+distinguishes the matured man of the world from the enthusiastic
+tyro,-"done! and we will adjourn afterwards to the White Horse."
+
+"But stay a moment," said Paul; "if you remember, I owed you a guinea
+when I last saw you,--here it is!"
+
+"Nonsense," exclaimed Long Ned, refusing the money,--"nonsense! You
+want the money at present; pay me when you are richer. Nay, never be coy
+about it; debts of honour are not paid now as they used to be. We lads
+of the Fish Lane Club have changed all that. Well, well, if I must!"
+
+And Long Ned, seeing that Paul insisted, pocketed the guinea. When this
+delicate matter had been arranged,--"Come," said Pepper, "come, get your
+hat; but, bless me! I have forgotten one thing."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Why, my fine Paul, consider. The play is a bang-up sort of a place;
+look at your coat and your waistcoat, that's all!"
+
+Our hero was struck dumb with this arqumentum ad hominem. But Long Ned,
+after enjoying his perplexity, relieved him of it by telling him that
+he knew of an honest tradesman who kept a ready-made shop just by the
+theatre, and who could fit him out in a moment.
+
+In fact, Long Ned was as good as his word; he carried Paul to a tailor,
+who gave him for the sum of thirty shillings--half ready money, half
+on credit-a green coat with a tarnished gold lace, a pair of red
+inexpressibles, and a pepper-and-salt waistcoat. It is true, they were
+somewhat of the largest, for they had once belonged to no less a person
+than Long Ned himself; but Paul did not then regard those niceties of
+apparel, as he was subsequently taught to do by Gentleman George (a
+personage hereafter to be introduced to our reader), and he went to the
+theatre as well satisfied with himself as if he had been Mr. T---- or
+the Count de ----.
+
+Our adventurers are now quietly seated in the theatre; and we shall
+not think it necessary to detail the performances they saw, or the
+observations they made. Long Ned was one of those superior beings of the
+road who would not for the world have condescended to appear anywhere
+but in the boxes; and, accordingly, the friends procured a couple of
+places in the dress-tier. In the next box to the one our adventurers
+adorned they remarked, more especially than the rest of the audience, a
+gentleman and a young lady seated next each other; the latter, who was
+about thirteen years old, was so uncommonly beautiful that Paul,
+despite his dramatic enthusiasm, could scarcely divert his eyes from her
+countenance to the stage. Her hair, of a bright and fair auburn, hung
+in profuse ringlets about her neck, shedding a softer shade upon a
+complexion in which the roses seemed just budding as it were into blush.
+Her eyes, large, blue, and rather languishing than brilliant, were
+curtained by the darkest lashes; her mouth seemed literally girt with
+smiles, so numberless were the dimples that every time the full, ripe,
+dewy lips were parted rose into sight; and the enchantment of the
+dimples was aided by two rows of teeth more dazzling than the richest
+pearls that ever glittered on a bride. But the chief charm of the face
+was its exceeding and touching air of innocence and girlish softness;
+you might have gazed forever upon that first unspeakable bloom, that all
+untouched and stainless down, which seemed as if a very breath could mar
+it. Perhaps the face might have wanted animation; but perhaps, also, it
+borrowed from that want an attraction. The repose of the features was so
+soft and gentle that the eye wandered there with the same delight, and
+left it with the same reluctance, which it experiences in dwelling on
+or in quitting those hues which are found to harmonize the most with its
+vision. But while Paul was feeding his gaze on this young beauty, the
+keen glances of Long Ned had found an object no less fascinating in a
+large gold watch which the gentleman who accompanied the damsel ever
+and anon brought to his eye, as if he were waxing a little weary of the
+length of the pieces or the lingering progression of time.
+
+"What a beautiful face!" whispered Paul.
+
+"Is the face gold, then, as well as the back?" whispered Long Ned, in
+return.
+
+Our hero started, frowned, and despite the gigantic stature of his
+comrade, told him, very angrily, to find some other subject for jesting.
+Ned in his turn stared, but made no reply.
+
+Meanwhile Paul, though the lady was rather too young to fall in love
+with, began wondering what relationship her companion bore to her.
+Though the gentleman altogether was handsome, yet his features and the
+whole character of his face were widely different from those on
+which Paul gazed with such delight. He was not, seemingly, above
+five-and-forty, but his forehead was knit into many a line and furrow;
+and in his eyes the light, though searching, was more sober and staid
+than became his years. A disagreeable expression played about the
+mouth; and the shape of the face, which was long and thin, considerably
+detracted from the prepossessing effect of a handsome aquiline nose,
+fine teeth, and a dark, manly, though sallow complexion. There was a
+mingled air of shrewdness and distraction in the expression of his face.
+He seemed to pay very little attention to the play, or to anything about
+him; but he testified very considerable alacrity, when the play was
+over, in putting her cloak around his young companion, and in threading
+their way through the thick crowd that the boxes were now pouring forth.
+
+Paul and his companion silently, and each with very different motives
+from the other, followed them. They were now at the door of the theatre.
+
+A servant stepped forward and informed the gentleman that his carriage
+was a few paces distant, but that it might be some time before it could
+drive up to the theatre.
+
+"Can you walk to the carriage, my dear?" said the gentleman to his young
+charge; and she answering in the affirmative, they both left the house,
+preceded by the servant.
+
+"Come on!" said Long Ned, hastily, and walking in the same direction
+which the strangers had taken. Paul readily agreed. They soon overtook
+the strangers. Long Ned walked the nearest to the gentleman, and brushed
+by him in passing. Presently a voice cried, "Stop thief!" and Long Ned,
+saying to Paul, "Shift for yourself, run!" darted from our hero's side
+into the crowd, and vanished in a twinkling. Before Paul could recover
+his amaze, he found himself suddenly seized by the collar; he turned
+abruptly, and saw the dark face of the young lady's companion.
+
+"Rascal!" cried the gentleman, "my watch!"
+
+"Watch!" repeated Paul, bewildered, and only for the sake of the young
+lady refraining from knocking down his arrester,--"watch!"
+
+"Ay, young man!" cried a fellow in a great-coat, who now suddenly
+appeared on the other side of Paul; "this gentleman's watch. Please your
+honour," addressing the complainant, "I be a watch too; shall I take up
+this chap?"
+
+"By all means," cried the gentleman; "I would not have lost my watch
+for twice its value. I can swear I saw this fellow's companion snatch
+it from my fob. The thief's gone; but we have at least the accomplice. I
+give him in strict charge to you, watchman; take the consequences if you
+let him escape." The watchman answered, sullenly, that he did not want
+to be threatened, and he knew how to discharge his duty.
+
+"Don't answer me, fellow!" said the gentleman, haughtily; "do as I tell
+you!" And after a little colloquy, Paul found himself suddenly marched
+off between two tall fellows, who looked prodigiously inclined to eat
+him. By this time he had recovered his surprise and dismay. He did not
+want the penetration to see that his companion had really committed
+the offence for which he was charged; and he also foresaw that the
+circumstance might be attended with disagreeable consequences to
+himself. Under all the features of the case, he thought that an attempt
+to escape would not be an imprudent proceeding on his part; accordingly,
+after moving a few paces very quietly and very passively, he watched
+his opportunity, wrenched himself from the gripe of the gentleman on
+his left, and brought the hand thus released against the cheek of the
+gentleman on his right with so hearty a good will as to cause him to
+relinquish his hold, and retreat several paces towards the areas in a
+slanting position. But that roundabout sort of blow with the left fist
+is very unfavourable towards the preservation of a firm balance; and
+before Paul had recovered sufficiently to make an effectual bolt, he was
+prostrated to the earth by a blow from the other and undamaged watchman,
+which utterly deprived him of his senses; and when he recovered those
+useful possessions (which a man may reasonably boast of losing, since it
+is only the minority who have them to lose), he found himself stretched
+on a bench in the watchhouse.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+     Begirt with many a gallant slave,
+     Apparelled as becomes the brave,
+     Old Giaffir sat in his divan:
+  . . . . . . .
+     Much I misdoubt this wayward boy
+     Will one day work me more annoy.
+            Bride of Abydos.
+
+The learned and ingenious John Schweighaeuser (a name facile to spell
+and mellifluous to pronounce) hath been pleased, in that Appendix
+continens particulam doctrinae de mente humana, which closeth the volume
+of his "Opuscula Academica," to observe (we translate from memory) that,
+"in the infinite variety of things which in the theatre of the world
+occur to a man's survey, or in some manner or another affect his body
+or his mind, by far the greater part are so contrived as to bring to him
+rather some sense of pleasure than of pain or discomfort." Assuming that
+this holds generally good in well-constituted frames, we point out a
+notable example in the case of the incarcerated Paul; for although that
+youth was in no agreeable situation at the time present, and although
+nothing very encouraging smiled upon him from the prospects of the
+future, yet, as soon as he had recovered his consciousness, and given
+himself a rousing shake, he found an immediate source of pleasure in
+discovering, first, that several ladies and gentlemen bore him company
+in his imprisonment; and, secondly, in perceiving a huge jug of water
+within his reach, which, as his awaking sensation was that of burning
+thirst, he delightedly emptied at a draught. He then, stretching
+himself, looked around with a wistful earnestness, and discovered a back
+turned towards him, and recumbent on the floor, which at the very first
+glance appeared to him familiar. "Surely," thought he, "I know that
+frieze coat, and the peculiar turn of those narrow shoulders." Thus
+soliloquizing, he raised himself, and putting out his leg, he gently
+kicked the reclining form. "Muttering strange oaths," the form turned
+round, and raising itself upon that inhospitable part of the body in
+which the introduction of foreign feet is considered anything but an
+honour, it fixed its dull blue eyes upon the face of the disturber of
+its slumbers, gradually opening them wider and wider, until they seemed
+to have enlarged themselves into proportions fit for the swallowing of
+the important truth that burst upon them, and then from the mouth of the
+creature issued,--
+
+"Queer my glims, if that be n't little Paul!"
+
+"Ay, Dummie, here I am! Not been long without being laid by the heels,
+you see! Life is short; we must make the best use of our time!"
+
+Upon this, Mr. Dunnaker (it was no less respectable a person) scrambled
+up from the floor, and seating himself on the bench beside Paul, said in
+a pitying tone,--
+
+"Vy, laus-a-me! if you be n't knocked o' the head! Your poll's as bloody
+as Murphy's face ven his throat's cut!"
+
+     ["Murphy's face,"unlearned reader, appeareth, in Irish phrase,
+     to mean "pig's head."]
+
+"'T is only the fortune of war, Dummie, and a mere trifle; the heads
+manufactured at Thames Court are not easily put out of order. But tell
+me, how come you here?"
+
+"Vy, I had been lushing heavy vet--"
+
+"'Till you grew light in the head, eh,--and fell into the kennel?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Mine is a worse business than that, I fear;" and therewith Paul, in a
+lower voice, related to the trusty Dummie the train of accidents which
+had conducted him to his present asylum. Dummie's face elongated as
+he listened; however, when the narrative was over, he endeavoured such
+consolatory palliatives as occurred to him. He represented, first, the
+possibility that the gentleman might not take the trouble to appear;
+secondly, the certainty that no watch was found about Paul's person;
+thirdly, the fact that, even by the gentleman's confession, Paul had not
+been the actual offender; fourthly, if the worst came to the worst, what
+were a few weeks' or even months' imprisonment?
+
+"Blow me tight!" said Dummie, "if it be n't as good a vay of passing the
+time as a cove as is fond of snuggery need desire!"
+
+This observation had no comfort for Paul, who recoiled, with all
+the maiden coyness of one to whom such unions are unfamiliar, from a
+matrimonial alliance with the snuggery of the House of Correction.
+He rather trusted to another source for consolation. In a word, he
+encouraged the flattering belief that Long Ned, finding that Paul
+had been caught instead of himself, would have the generosity to come
+forward and exculpate him from the charge. On hinting this idea to
+Dummie, that accomplished "man about town" could not for some time
+believe that any simpleton could be so thoroughly unacquainted with the
+world as seriously to entertain so ridiculous a notion; and, indeed,
+it is somewhat remarkable that such a hope should ever have told its
+flattering tale to one brought up in the house of Mrs. Margaret Lobkins.
+But Paul, we have seen, had formed many of his notions from books; and
+he had the same fine theories of your "moral rogue" that possess the
+minds of young patriots when they first leave college for the House of
+Commons, and think integrity a prettier thing than office.
+
+Mr. Dunnaker urged Paul, seriously, to dismiss so vague and childish a
+fancy from his breast, and rather to think of what line of defence it
+would be best for him to pursue. This subject being at length exhausted,
+Paul recurred to Mrs. Lobkins, and inquired whether Dummie had lately
+honoured that lady with a visit.
+
+Mr. Dunnaker replied that he had, though with much difficulty, appeased
+her anger against him for his supposed abetment of Paul's excesses, and
+that of late she had held sundry conversations with Dummie respecting
+our hero himself. Upon questioning Dummie further, Paul learned the good
+matron's reasons for not evincing that solicitude for his return which
+our hero had reasonably anticipated. The fact was, that she, having no
+confidence whatsoever in his own resources independent of her, had not
+been sorry of an opportunity effectually, as she hoped, to humble
+that pride which had so revolted her; and she pleased her vanity by
+anticipating the time when Paul, starved into submission, would gladly
+and penitently re-seek the shelter of her roof, and, tamed as it were by
+experience, would never again kick against the yoke which her matronly
+prudence thought it fitting to impose upon him. She contented herself,
+then, with obtaining from Dummie the intelligence that our hero was
+under MacGrawler's roof, and therefore out of all positive danger to
+life and limb; and as she could not foresee the ingenious exertions of
+intellect by which Paul had converted himself into the "Nobilitas" of
+"The Asinaeum," and thereby saved himself from utter penury, she
+was perfectly convinced, from her knowledge of character, that the
+illustrious MacGrawler would not long continue that protection to the
+rebellious protege which in her opinion was his only preservative from
+picking pockets or famishing. To the former decent alternative she knew
+Paul's great and jejune aversion; and she consequently had little fear
+for his morals or his safety, in thus abandoning him for a while
+to chance. Any anxiety, too, that she might otherwise have keenly
+experienced was deadened by the habitual intoxication now increasing
+upon the good lady with age, and which, though at times she could be
+excited to all her characteristic vehemence, kept her senses for the
+most part plunged into a Lethean stupor, or, to speak more courteously,
+into a poetical abstraction from the things of the external world.
+
+"But," said Dummie, as by degrees he imparted the solution of the dame's
+conduct to the listening ear of his companion,--"but I hopes as how ven
+you be out of this 'ere scrape, leetle Paul, you vill take varning, and
+drop Meester Pepper's acquaintance (vich, I must say, I vas alvays a
+sorry to see you hencourage), and go home to the Mug, and fam grasp the
+old mort, for she has not been like the same cretur ever since you vent.
+She's a delicate-'arted 'oman, that Piggy Lob!"
+
+So appropriate a panegyric on Mrs. Margaret Lobkins might at another
+time have excited Paul's risible muscles; but at that moment he really
+felt compunction for the unceremonious manner in which he had left her,
+and the softness of regretful affection imbued in its hallowing colours
+even the image of Piggy Lob.
+
+In conversation of this intellectual and domestic description, the night
+and ensuing morning passed away, till Paul found himself in the awful
+presence of Justice Burnflat. Several cases were disposed of before his
+own; and among others Mr. Duminie Dunnaker obtained his release, though
+not without a severe reprimand for his sin of inebriety, which no doubt
+sensibly affected the ingenuous spirit of that noble character. At
+length Paul's turn came. He heard, as he took his station, a general
+buzz. At first he imagined it was at his own interesting appearance;
+but raising his eyes, he perceived that it was at the entrance of the
+gentleman who was to become his accuser.
+
+"Hush," said some one near him, "'t is Lawyer Brandon. Ah, he's a 'cute
+fellow! it will go hard with the person he complains of."
+
+There was a happy fund of elasticity of spirit about our hero; and
+though he had not the good fortune to have "a blighted heart,"--a
+circumstance which, by the poets and philosophers of the present day,
+is supposed to inspire a man with wonderful courage, and make him
+impervious to all misfortunes,--yet he bore himself up with wonderful
+courage under his present trying situation, and was far from
+overwhelmed, though he was certainly a little damped, by the observation
+he had just heard.
+
+Mr. Brandon was, indeed, a barrister of considerable reputation, and
+in high esteem in the world, not only for talent, but also for a great
+austerity of manners, which, though a little mingled with sternness and
+acerbity for the errors of other men, was naturally thought the more
+praiseworthy on that account; there being, as persons of experience
+are doubtless aware, two divisions in the first class of
+morality,--imprimis, a great hatred for the vices of one's neighbour;
+secondly, the possession of virtues in one's self.
+
+Mr. Brandon was received with great courtesy by Justice Burnflat; and
+as he came, watch in hand (a borrowed watch), saying that his time
+was worth five guineas a moment, the justice proceeded immediately to
+business.
+
+Nothing could be clearer, shorter, or more satisfactory than the
+evidence of Mr. Brandon. The corroborative testimony of the watchman
+followed; and then Paul was called upon for his defence. This
+was equally brief with the charge; but, alas! it was not equally
+satisfactory. It consisted in a firm declaration of his innocence.
+His comrade, he confessed, might have stolen the watch; but he humbly
+suggested that that was exactly the very reason why he had not stolen
+it.
+
+"How long, fellow," asked Justice Burnflat, "have you known your
+companion?"
+
+"About half a year."
+
+"And what is his name and calling?" Paul hesitated, and declined to
+answer.
+
+"A sad piece of business!" said the justice, in a melancholy tone, and
+shaking his head portentously.
+
+The lawyer acquiesced in the aphorism, but with great magnanimity
+observed that he did not wish to be hard upon the young man. His youth
+was in his favour, and his offence was probably the consequence of evil
+company. He suggested, therefore, that as he must be perfectly aware of
+the address of his friend, he should receive a full pardon if he would
+immediately favour the magistrate with that information. He concluded by
+remarking, with singular philanthropy, that it was not the punishment of
+the youth, but the recovery of his watch, that he desired.
+
+Justice Burnflat, having duly impressed upon our hero's mind the
+disinterested and Christian mercy of the complainant, and the
+everlasting obligation Paul was under to him for its display, now
+repeated, with double solemnity, those queries respecting the habitation
+and name of Long Ned which our hero had before declined to answer.
+
+Grieved are we to confess that Paul, ungrateful for and wholly untouched
+by the beautiful benignity of Lawyer Brandon, continued firm in his
+stubborn denial to betray his comrade; and with equal obduracy
+he continued to insist upon his own innocence and unblemished
+respectability of character.
+
+"Your name, young man?" quoth the justice. "Your name, you say, is
+Paul,--Paul what? You have many an alias, I'll be bound."
+
+Here the young gentleman again hesitated; at length he replied,--
+
+"Paul Lobkins, your worship."
+
+"Lobkins!" repeated the judge,--"Lobkins! Come hither, Saunders; have
+not we that name down in our black books?"
+
+"So, please your worship," quoth a little stout man, very useful in many
+respects to the Festus of the police, "there is one Peggy Lobkins, who
+keeps a public-house, a sort of flash ken, called the Mug, in Thames
+Court,--not exactly in our beat, your worship."
+
+"Ho, ho!" said Justice Burnflat; winking at Mr. Brandon, "we must
+sift this a little. Pray, Mr. Paul Lobkins, what relation is the good
+landlady of the Mug, in Thames Court, to yourself?"
+
+"None at all, sir," said Paul, hastily; "she's only a friend!"
+
+Upon this there was a laugh in the court.
+
+"Silence!" cried the justice. "And I dare say, Mr. Paul Lobkins,
+that this friend of yours will vouch for the respectability of your
+character, upon which you are pleased to value yourself?"
+
+"I have not a doubt of it, sir," answered Paul; and there was another
+laugh.
+
+"And is there any other equally weighty and praiseworthy friend of yours
+who will do you the like kindness?"
+
+Paul hesitated; and at that moment, to the surprise of the court,
+but above all to the utter and astounding surprise of himself, two
+gentlemen, dressed in the height of the fashion, pushed forward, and
+bowing to the justice, declared themselves ready to vouch for the
+thorough respectability and unimpeachable character of Mr. Paul Lobkins,
+whom they had known, they said, for many years, and for whom they had
+the greatest respect. While Paul was surveying the persons of these kind
+friends, whom he never remembered to have seen before in the course
+of his life, the lawyer, who was a very sharp fellow, whispered to
+the magistrate; and that dignitary nodding as in assent, and eying the
+new-comers, inquired the names of Mr. Lobkins's witnesses.
+
+"Mr. Eustace Fitzherbert" and "Mr. William Howard Russell," were the
+several replies.
+
+Names so aristocratic produced a general sensation. But the impenetrable
+justice, calling the same Mr. Saunders he had addressed before, asked
+him to examine well the countenances of Mr. Lobkins's friends.
+
+As the alguazil eyed the features of the memorable Don Raphael and
+the illustrious Manuel Morales, when the former of those accomplished
+personages thought it convenient to assume the travelling dignity of an
+Italian prince, son of the sovereign of the valleys which lie between
+Switzerland, the Milanese, and Savoy, while the latter was contented
+with being servant to Monseigneur le Prince; even so, with far more
+earnestness than respect; did Mr. Saunders eye the features of those
+high-born gentlemen, Messrs. Eustace Fitzherbert and William Howard
+Russell; but after a long survey he withdrew his eyes, made an
+unsatisfactory and unrecognizing gesture to the magistrate, and said,--
+
+"Please your worship, they are none of my flock; but Bill Troutling
+knows more of this sort of genteel chaps than I does."
+
+"Bid Bill Troutling appear!" was the laconic order.
+
+At that name a certain modest confusion might have been visible in the
+faces of Mr. Eustace Fitzherbert and Mr. William Howard Russell, had not
+the attention of the court been immediately directed to another case. A
+poor woman had been committed for seven days to the House of Correction
+on a charge of disrespectability. Her husband, the person most
+interested in the matter, now came forward to disprove the charge; and
+by help of his neighbours he succeeded.
+
+"It is all very true," said Justice Burnflat; "but as your wife, my good
+fellow, will be out in five days, it will be scarcely worth while to
+release her now."
+
+     [A fact, occurring in the month of January, 1830.  Vide
+     "The Morning Herald."]
+
+So judicious a decision could not fail of satisfying the husband; and
+the audience became from that moment enlightened as to a very remarkable
+truth,--namely, that five days out of seven bear a peculiarly small
+proportion to the remaining two; and that people in England have so
+prodigious a love for punishment that though it is not worth while to
+release an innocent woman from prison five days sooner than one would
+otherwise have done, it is exceedingly well worth while to commit her to
+prison for seven!
+
+When the husband, passing his rough hand across his eyes, and muttering
+some vulgar impertinence or another had withdrawn, Mr. Saunders said,--
+
+"Here be Bill Troutling, your worship!"
+
+"Oh, well," quoth the justice; "and now, Mr. Eustace Fitz---- Hallo,
+how's this! Where are Mr. William Howard Russell and his friend Mr.
+Eustace Fitzherbert?"
+
+       "Echo answered,--where?"
+
+Those noble gentlemen, having a natural dislike to be confronted with so
+low a person as Mr. Bill Troutling, had, the instant public interest was
+directed from them, silently disappeared from a scene where their rank
+in life seemed so little regarded. If, reader, you should be anxious
+to learn from what part of the world the transitory visitants appeared,
+know that they were spirits sent by that inimitable magician, Long Ned,
+partly to report how matters fared in the court; for Mr. Pepper, in
+pursuance of that old policy which teaches that the nearer the fox is
+to the hunters, the more chance he has of being overlooked, had,
+immediately on his abrupt departure from Paul, dived into a house in
+the very street where his ingenuity had displayed itself, and in which
+oysters and ale nightly allured and regaled an assembly that, to speak
+impartially, was more numerous than select. There had he learned how
+a pickpocket had been seized for unlawful affection to another man's
+watch; and there, while he quietly seasoned his oysters, had he, with
+his characteristic acuteness, satisfied his mind by the conviction that
+that arrested unfortunate was no other than Paul. Partly, therefore,
+as a precaution for his own safety, that he might receive early
+intelligence should Paul's defence make a change of residence expedient,
+and partly (out of the friendliness of fellowship) to back his companion
+with such aid as the favourable testimony of two well-dressed persons,
+little known "about town," might confer, he had despatched those
+celestial beings who had appeared under the mortal names of Eustace
+Fitzherbert and William Howard Russell to the imperial court of Justice
+Burnflat. Having thus accounted for the apparition (the disapparition
+requires no commentary) of Paul's "friends," we return to Paul himself.
+
+Despite the perils with which he was girt, our young hero fought out to
+the last; but the justice was not by any means willing to displease Mr.
+Brandon, and observing that an incredulous and biting sneer remained
+stationary on that gentleman's lip during the whole of Paul's defence,
+he could not but shape his decision according to the well-known
+acuteness of the celebrated lawyer. Paul was sentenced to retire for
+three months to that country-house situated at Bridewell, to which
+the ungrateful functionaries of justice often banish their most active
+citizens.
+
+As soon as the sentence was passed, Brandon, whose keen eyes saw no hope
+of recovering his lost treasure, declared that the rascal had perfectly
+the Old Bailey cut of countenance, and that he did not doubt but,
+if ever he lived to be a judge, he should also live to pass a very
+different description of sentence on the offender.
+
+So saying, he resolved to lose no more time, and very abruptly left
+the office, without any other comfort than the remembrance that, at
+all events, he had sent the boy to a place where, let him be ever so
+innocent at present, he was certain to come out as much inclined to be
+guilty as his friends could desire; joined to such moral reflection as
+the tragedy of Bombastes Furioso might have afforded to himself in that
+sententious and terse line,--
+
+       "Thy watch is gone,--watches are made to go."
+
+Meanwhile Paul was conducted in state to his retreat, in company with
+two other offenders,--one a middle-aged man, though a very old "file,"
+who was sentenced for getting money under false pretences, and the other
+a little boy who had been found guilty of sleeping under a colonnade; it
+being the especial beauty of the English law to make no fine-drawn and
+nonsensical shades of difference between vice and misfortune, and its
+peculiar method of protecting the honest being to make as many rogues as
+possible in as short a space of time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Common Sense. What is the end of punishment as regards the individual
+punished?
+
+Custom. To make him better!
+
+Common Sense. How do you punish young offenders who are (from their
+youth) peculiarly alive to example, and whom it is therefore more easy
+either to ruin or reform than the matured?
+
+Custom. We send them to the House of Correction, to associate with the
+d--dest rascals in the country!
+
+Dialogue between Common Sense and Custom.--Very scarce.
+
+As it was rather late in the day when Paul made his first entree at
+Bridewell, he passed that night in the "receiving-room." The next
+morning, as soon as he had been examined by the surgeon and clothed in
+the customary uniform, he was ushered, according to his classification,
+among the good company who had been considered guilty of that
+compendious offence, "a misdemeanour." Here a tall gentleman marched up
+to him, and addressed him in a certain language, which might be called
+the freemasonry of flash, and which Paul, though he did not comprehend
+verbatim, rightly understood to be an inquiry whether he was a thorough
+rogue and an entire rascal. He answered half in confusion, half in
+anger; and his reply was so detrimental to any favourable influence he
+might otherwise have exercised over the interrogator, that the latter
+personage, giving him a pinch in the ear, shouted out, "Ramp, ramp!" and
+at that significant and awful word, Paul found himself surrounded in a
+trice by a whole host of ingenious tormentors. One pulled this member,
+another pinched that; one cuffed him before, and another thrashed him
+behind. By way of interlude to this pleasing occupation, they stripped
+him of the very few things that in his change of dress he had retained.
+One carried off his handkerchief, a second his neckcloth, and a
+third, luckier than either, possessed himself of a pair of carnelian
+shirt-buttons, given to Paul as a gage d'amour by a young lady who
+sold oranges near the Tower. Happily, before this initiatory
+process--technically termed "ramping," and exercised upon all new-comers
+who seem to have a spark of decency in them--had reduced the bones
+of Paul, who fought tooth and nail in his defence, to the state of
+magnesia, a man of a grave aspect, who had hitherto plucked his oakum
+in quiet, suddenly rose, thrust himself between the victim and the
+assailants, and desired the latter, like one having authority, to leave
+the lad alone, and go and be d--d.
+
+This proposal to resort to another place for amusement, though uttered
+in a very grave and tranquil manner, produced that instantaneous
+effect which admonitions from great rogues generally work upon little.
+Messieurs the ravmpers ceased from their amusements; and the ringleader
+of the gang, thumping Paul heartily on the back, declared he was a
+capital fellow, and it was only a bit of a spree like, which he hoped
+had not given any offence.
+
+Paul, still clenching his fist, was about to answer in no pacific mood,
+when a turnkey, who did not care in the least how many men he locked up
+for an offence, but who did not at all like the trouble of looking after
+any one of his flock to see that the offence was not committed, now
+suddenly appeared among the set; and after scolding them for the
+excessive plague they were to him, carried off two of the poorest of the
+mob to solitary confinement. It happened, of course, that these two had
+not taken the smallest share in the disturbance. This scene over, the
+company returned to picking oakum; the tread-mill, that admirably just
+invention by which a strong man suffers no fatigue and a weak one loses
+his health for life, not having been then introduced into our excellent
+establishments for correcting crime. Bitterly and with many dark and
+wrathful feelings, in which the sense of injustice at punishment
+alone bore him up against the humiliations to which he was
+subjected,--bitterly and with a swelling heart, in which the thoughts
+that lead to crime were already forcing their way through a soil
+suddenly warmed for their growth, did Paul bend over his employment. He
+felt himself touched on the arm; he turned, and saw that the gentleman
+who had so kindly delivered him from his tormentors was now sitting next
+to him. Paul gazed long and earnestly upon his neighbour, struggling
+with the thought that he had beheld that sagacious countenance in
+happier times, although now, alas! it was altered not only by time
+and vicissitudes but by that air of gravity which the cares of manhood
+spread gradually over the face of the most thoughtless,--until all doubt
+melted away, and he exclaimed,--
+
+"Is that you, Mr. Tomlinson? How glad I am to see you here!"
+
+"And I," returned the quondam murderer for the newspapers, with a nasal
+twang, "should be very glad to see myself anywhere else."
+
+Paul made no answer; and Augustus continued,--
+
+"'To a wise man all places are the same,'--so it has been said. I don't
+believe it, Paul,--I don't believe it. But a truce to reflection! I
+remembered you the moment I saw you, though you are surprisingly grown.
+How is my friend MacGrawler?--still hard at work for 'The Asinaeum'?"
+
+"I believe so," said Paul, sullenly, and hastening to change the
+conversation; "but tell me, Mr. Tomlinson, how came you hither? I
+heard you had gone down to the North of England to fulfil a lucrative
+employment."
+
+"Possibly! The world always misrepresents the actions of those who are
+constantly before it."
+
+"It is very true," said Paul; "and I have said the same thing myself
+a hundred times in 'The Asinaeum,' for we were never too lavish of our
+truths in that magnificent journal. 'T is astonishing what a way we made
+three ideas go."
+
+"You remind me of myself and my newspaper labours," rejoined Augustus
+Tomlinson. "I am not quite sure that I had so many as three ideas to
+spare; for, as you say, it is astonishing how far that number may go,
+properly managed. It is with writers as with strolling players,--the
+same three ideas that did for Turks in one scene do for Highlanders in
+the next; but you must tell me your history one of these days, and you
+shall hear mine."
+
+"I should be excessively obliged to you for your confidence," said Paul,
+"and I doubt not but your life must be excessively entertaining. Mine,
+as yet, has been but insipid. The lives of literary men are not fraught
+with adventure; and I question whether every writer in 'The Asinaeum'
+has not led pretty nearly the same existence as that which I have
+sustained myself."
+
+In conversation of this sort our newly restored friends passed the
+remainder of the day, until the hour of half-past four, when the
+prisoners are to suppose night has begun, and be locked up in their
+bedrooms. Tomlinson then, who was glad to re-find a person who had known
+him in his beaux jours, spoke privately to the turnkey; and the result
+of the conversation was the coupling Paul and Augustus in the same
+chamber, which was a sort of stone box, that generally accommodated
+three, and was--for we have measured it, as we would have measured the
+cell of the prisoner of Chillon--just eight feet by six.
+
+We do not intend, reader, to indicate, by broad colours and in long
+detail, the moral deterioration of our hero; because we have found, by
+experience, that such pains on our part do little more than make thee
+blame our stupidity instead of lauding our intention. We shall therefore
+only work out our moral by subtle hints and brief comments; and we shall
+now content ourselves with reminding thee that hitherto thou hast seen
+Paul honest in the teeth of circumstances. Despite the contagion of the
+Mug, despite his associates in Fish Lane, despite his intimacy with Long
+Ned, thou hast seen him brave temptation, and look forward to some other
+career than that of robbery or fraud. Nay, even in his destitution, when
+driven from the abode of his childhood, thou hast observed how, instead
+of resorting to some more pleasurable or libertine road of life, he
+betook himself at once to the dull roof and insipid employments of
+MacGrawler, and preferred honestly earning his subsistence by the sweat
+of his brain to recurring to any of the numerous ways of living on
+others with which his experience among the worst part of society must
+have teemed, and which, to say the least of them, are more alluring to
+the young and the adventurous than the barren paths of literary labour.
+Indeed, to let thee into a secret, it had been Paul's daring ambition
+to raise himself into a worthy member of the community. His present
+circumstances, it may hereafter be seen, made the cause of a great
+change in his desires; and the conversation he held that night with the
+ingenious and skilful Augustus went more towards fitting him for the
+hero of this work than all the habits of his childhood or the scenes of
+his earlier youth. Young people are apt, erroneously, to believe that it
+is a bad thing to be exceedingly wicked. The House of Correction is so
+called, because it is a place where so ridiculous a notion is invariably
+corrected. The next day Paul was surprised by a visit from Mrs. Lobkins,
+who had heard of his situation and its causes from the friendly
+Dummie, and who had managed to obtain from Justice Burnflat an order of
+admission. They met, Pyramus and Thisbe like, with a wall, or rather
+an iron gate, between them; and Mrs. Lobkins, after an ejaculation of
+despair at the obstacle, burst weepingly into the pathetic reproach,--
+
+"O Paul, thou hast brought thy pigs to a fine market!"
+
+"'T is a market proper for pigs, dear dame," said Paul, who, though with
+a tear in his eye, did not refuse a joke as bitter as it was inelegant;
+"for, of all others, it is the spot where a man learns to take care of
+his bacon."
+
+"Hold your tongue!" cried the dame, angrily. "What business has you to
+gabble on so while you are in limbo?"
+
+"Ah, dear dame," said Paul, "we can't help these rubs and stumbles on
+our road to preferment!"
+
+"Road to the scragging-post!" cried the dame. "I tells you, child,
+you'll live to be hanged in spite of all my care and 'tention to you,
+though I hedicated you as a scholard, and always hoped as how you would
+grow up to be an honour to your--"
+
+"King and country," interrupted Paul. "We always say, honour to king and
+country, which means getting rich and paying taxes. 'The more taxes a
+man pays, the greater honour he is to both,' as Augustus says. Well,
+dear dame, all in good time."
+
+"What! you is merry, is you? Why does not you weep? Your heart is as
+hard as a brickbat. It looks quite unnatural and hyena-like to be so
+devil-me-careish!" So saying, the good dame's tears gushed forth with
+the bitterness of a despairing Parisina.
+
+"Nay, nay," said Paul, who, though he suffered far more intensely, bore
+the suffering far more easily than his patroness, "we cannot mend the
+matter by crying. Suppose you see what can be done for me. I dare say
+you may manage to soften the justice's sentence by a little 'oil of
+palms;' and if you can get me out before I am quite corrupted,--a day or
+two longer in this infernal place will do the business,--I promise you
+that I will not only live honestly myself, but with people who live in
+the same manner."
+
+"Buss me, Paul," said the tender Mrs. Lobkins, "buss me--Oh! but I
+forgits the gate. I'll see what can be done. And here, my lad, here's
+summat for you in the mean while,--a drop o' the cretur, to preach
+comfort to your poor stomach. Hush! smuggle it through, or they'll see
+you."
+
+Here the dame endeavoured to push a stone bottle through the bars of the
+gate; but, alas! though the neck passed through, the body refused, and
+the dame was forced to retract the "cretur." Upon this, the kind-hearted
+woman renewed her sobbings; and so absorbed was she in her grief that
+seemingly quite forgetting for what purpose she had brought the bottle,
+she applied it to her own mouth, and consoled herself with that elixir
+vitae which she had originally designed for Paul.
+
+This somewhat restored her; and after a most affecting scene the dame
+reeled off with the vacillating steps natural to woe, promising, as she
+went, that if love or money could shorten Paul's confinement, neither
+should be wanting. We are rather at a loss to conjecture the exact
+influence which the former of these arguments, urged by the lovely
+Margaret, might have had upon Justice Burnflat.
+
+When the good dame had departed, Paul hastened to repick his oakum and
+rejoin his friend. He found the worthy Augustus privately selling little
+elegant luxuries, such as tobacco, gin, and rations of daintier viands
+than the prison allowed; for Augustus, having more money than the rest
+of his companions, managed, through the friendship of the turnkey, to
+purchase secretly, and to resell at about four hundred per cent, such
+comforts as the prisoners especially coveted.
+
+     [A very common practice at the Bridewell.  The Governor at the
+     Coldbath-Fields, apparently a very intelligent and active man, every
+     way fitted for a most arduous undertaking, informed us, in the only
+     conversation we have had the honour to hold with him, that he
+     thought he had nearly or quite destroyed in his jurisdiction this
+     illegal method of commerce.]
+
+"A proof," said Augustus, dryly, to Paul, "that by prudence and exertion
+even in those places where a man cannot turn himself he may manage to
+turn a penny."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+     "Relate at large, my godlike guest," she said,
+     "The Grecian stratagems,--the town betrayed!"
+                             DRYDEN: Virgil, AEneid, book ii.
+
+     Descending thence, they 'scaped!--Ibid.
+
+A great improvement had taken place in the character of Augustus
+Tomlinson since Paul had last encountered that illustrious man. Then
+Augustus had affected the man of pleasure, the learned lounger about
+town, the all-accomplished Pericles of the papers, gayly quoting Horace,
+gravely flanking a fly from the leader of Lord Dunshunner. Now a more
+serious yet not a less supercilious air had settled upon his features;
+the pretence of fashion had given way to the pretence of wisdom;
+and from the man of pleasure Augustus Tomlinson had grown to the
+philosopher. With this elevation alone, too, he was not content: he
+united the philosopher with the politician; and the ingenious rascal was
+pleased especially to pique himself upon being "a moderate Whig"!
+
+"Paul," he was wont to observe, "believe me, moderate Whiggism is a most
+excellent creed. It adapts itself to every possible change, to every
+conceivable variety of circumstance. It is the only politics for us who
+are the aristocrats of that free body who rebel against tyrannical laws;
+for, hang it, I am none of your democrats. Let there be dungeons and
+turnkeys for the low rascals who whip clothes from the hedge where
+they hang to dry, or steal down an area in quest of a silver spoon;
+but houses of correction are not made for men who have received an
+enlightened education,--who abhor your petty thefts as much as a justice
+of peace. can do,--who ought never to be termed dishonest in their
+dealings, but, if they are found out, 'unlucky in their speculations'!
+A pretty thing, indeed, that there should be distinctions of rank among
+other members of the community, and none among us! Where's your boasted
+British Constitution, I should like to know, where are your privileges
+of aristocracy, if I, who am a gentleman born, know Latin, and have
+lived in the best society, should be thrust into this abominable place
+with a dirty fellow who was born in a cellar, and could never earn more
+at a time than would purchase a sausage? No, no! none of your levelling
+principles for me! I am liberal, Paul, and love liberty; but, thank
+Heaven, I despise your democracies!"
+
+Thus, half in earnest, half veiling a natural turn to sarcasm, would
+this moderate Whig run on for the hour together during those long
+nights, commencing at half-past four, in which he and Paul bore each
+other company.
+
+One evening, when Tomlinson was so bitterly disposed to be prolix that
+Paul felt himself somewhat wearied by his eloquence, our hero, desirous
+of a change in the conversation, reminded Augustus of his promise to
+communicate his history; and the philosophical Whig, nothing loath to
+speak of himself, cleared his throat, and began.
+
+"Never mind who was my father, nor what was my native place! My first
+ancestor was Tommy Linn (his heir became Tom Linn's son),--you have
+heard the ballad made in his praise,
+
+             "'Tommy Linn is a Scotchman born,
+               His head is bald and his beard is shorn;
+               He had a cap made of a hare skin,
+               An elder man is Tommy Limn!'
+
+"There was a sort of prophecy respecting my ancestor's descendants
+darkly insinuated in the concluding stanza of this ballad:--
+
+             "'Tommy Linn, and his wife, and his wife's mother,
+               They all fell into the fire together;
+               They that lay undermost got a hot skin,--
+
+               "We are not enough!" said Tommy Linn.'"
+
+"You see the prophecy: it is applicable both to gentlemen rogues and
+to moderate Whigs; for both are undermost in the world, and both are
+perpetually bawling out, 'We are not enough!'
+
+"I shall begin my own history by saying, I went to a North Country
+school, where I was noted for my aptness in learning; and my skill at
+'prisoner's base,'--upon my word I purposed no pun! I was intended for
+the Church. Wishing, betimes, to instruct myself in its ceremonies, I
+persuaded my schoolmaster's maidservant to assist me towards promoting
+a christening. My father did not like this premature love for the
+sacred rites. He took me home; and wishing to give my clerical ardour a
+different turn, prepared me for writing sermons by reading me a dozen a
+day. I grew tired of this, strange as it may seem to you. 'Father,'
+said I, one morning, 'it is no use talking; I will not go into the
+Church,--that's positive. Give me your blessing and a hundred pounds,
+and I'll go up to London and get a living instead of a curacy.' My
+father stormed; but I got the better at last. I talked of becoming a
+private tutor; swore I had heard nothing was so easy,--the only things
+wanted were pupils; and the only way to get them was to go to London
+and let my learning be known. My poor father,--well, he's gone, and I am
+glad of it now!" The speaker's voice faltered. "I got the better, I say,
+and I came to town, where I had a relation a bookseller. Through his
+interest, I wrote a book of Travels in Ethiopia for an earl's son, who
+wanted to become a lion; and a Treatise on the Greek Particle, dedicated
+to the prime minister, for a dean, who wanted to become a bishop,--Greek
+being, next to interest, the best road to the mitre. These two
+achievements were liberally paid; so I took a lodging in a first floor,
+and resolved to make a bold stroke for a wife. What do you think I
+did?--nay, never guess; it would be hopeless. First, I went to the best
+tailor, and had my clothes sewn on my back; secondly, I got the peerage
+and its genealogies by heart; thirdly, I marched one night, with the
+coolest deliberation possible, into the house of a duchess, who was
+giving an immense rout! The newspapers had inspired me with this idea. I
+had read of the vast crowds which a lady 'at home' sought to win to her
+house. I had read of staircases impassable, and ladies carried out in
+a fit; and common-sense told me how impossible it was that the fair
+receiver should be acquainted with the legality of every importation. I
+therefore resolved to try my chance, and--entered the body of Augustus
+Tomlinson, as a piece of stolen goods. Faith! the first night I was
+shy,--I stuck to the staircase, and ogled an old maid of quality, whom
+I had heard announced as Lady Margaret Sinclair. Doubtless she had never
+been ogled before; and she was evidently enraptured with my glances. The
+next night I read of a ball at the Countess of -------'s. My heart beat
+as if I were going to be whipped; but I plucked up courage, and repaired
+to her ladyship's. There I again beheld the divine Lady Margaret; and
+observing that she turned yellow, by way of a blush, when she saw me, I
+profited by the port I had drunk as an encouragement to my entree, and
+lounging up in the most modish way possible, I reminded her ladyship of
+an introduction with which I said I had once been honoured at the Duke
+of Dashwell's, and requested her hand for the next cotillion. Oh, Paul,
+fancy my triumph! The old damsel said, with a sigh, she remembered me
+very well, ha, ha, ha!--and I carried her off to the cotillion like
+another Theseus bearing away a second Ariadne. Not to be prolix on
+this part of my life, I went night after night to balls and routs, for
+admission to which half the fine gentlemen in London would have given
+their ears. And I improved my time so well with Lady Margaret, who was
+her own mistress and had L5,000,--a devilish bad portion for some, but
+not to be laughed at by me,--that I began to think when the happy day
+should be fixed. Meanwhile, as Lady Margaret introduced me to some
+of her friends, and my lodgings were in a good situation, I had been
+honoured with some real invitations. The only two questions I ever
+was asked were (carelessly), 'Was I the only son?' and on my veritable
+answer 'Yes!' 'What' (this was more warmly put),--'what was my county?'
+Luckily my county was a wide one,--Yorkshire; and any of its inhabitants
+whom the fair interrogators might have questioned about me could only
+have answered, I was not in their part of it.
+
+"Well, Paul, I grew so bold by success that the devil one day put it
+into my head to go to a great dinner-party at the Duke of Dashwell's. I
+went, dined,--nothing happened; I came away, and the next morning I read
+in the papers,--
+
+"'Mysterious affair--person lately going about--first houses--most
+fashionable parties--nobody knows--Duke of Dashwell's yesterday. Duke
+not like to make disturbance--as royalty present."
+
+"The journal dropped from my hands. At that moment the girl of the house
+gave me a note from Lady Margaret,--alluded to the paragraph; wondered
+who was 'The Stranger;' hoped to see me that night at Lord A-----'s,
+to whose party I said I had been asked; speak then more fully on those
+matters I had touched on!--in short, dear Paul, a tender epistle! All
+great men are fatalists,--I am one now; fate made me a madman. In the
+very face of this ominous paragraph I mustered up courage, and went that
+night to Lord A-----'s. The fact is, my affairs were in confusion,--I
+was greatly in debt. I knew it was necessary to finish my conquest over
+Lady Margaret as soon as possible; and Lord A-----'s seemed the best
+place for the purpose. Nay, I thought delay so dangerous, after the
+cursed paragraph, that a day might unmask me, and it would be better
+therefore not to lose an hour in finishing the play of 'The Stranger'
+with the farce of 'The Honey Moon.' Behold me then at Lord A-----'s,
+leading off Lady Margaret to the dance. Behold me whispering the
+sweetest of things in her ear. Imagine her approving my suit, and gently
+chiding me for talking of Gretna Green. Conceive all this, my dear
+fellow, and just at the height of my triumph, dilate the eyes of your
+imagination, and behold the stately form of Lord A-----, my noble
+host, marching up to me, while a voice that, though low and quiet as an
+evening breeze, made my heart sink into my shoes, said, 'I believe, sir,
+you have received no invitation from Lady A-----?'
+
+"Not a word could I utter, Paul,--not a word. Had it been the highroad
+instead of a ballroom, I could have talked loudly enough; but I was
+under a spell. 'Ehem!' I faltered at last,--'e-h-e-m! Some mis-take,
+I--I--' There I stopped.
+
+"'Sir,' said the earl, regarding me with a grave sternness, 'you had
+better withdraw.'
+
+"'Bless me! what's all this?' cried Lady Margaret, dropping my palsied
+arm, and gazing on me as if she expected me to talk like a hero.
+
+"'Oh,' said I, 'eh-e-m, eh-e-m,--I will exp--lain to-morrow,--ehem,
+e-h-e-m.' I made to the door; all the eyes in the room seemed turned
+into burning-glasses, and blistered the very skin on my face. I heard
+a gentle shriek, as I left the apartment,--Lady Margaret fainting,
+I suppose! There ended my courtship and my adventures in 'the best
+society.'
+
+"I felt melancholy at the ill-success of my scheme. You must allow it
+was a magnificent project. What moral courage! I admire myself when I
+think of it. Without an introduction, without knowing a soul, to become,
+all by my own resolution, free of the finest houses in London, dancing
+with earls' daughters, and all but carrying off an earl's daughter
+myself as my wife. If I had, the friends must have done something
+for me; and Lady Margaret Tomlinson might perhaps have introduced the
+youthful genius of her Augustus to parliament or the ministry. Oh, what
+a fall was there! Yet, faith, ha, ha, ha! I could not help laughing,
+despite of my chagrin, when I remembered that for three months I had
+imposed on these 'delicate exclusives,' and been literally invited by
+many of them, who would not have asked the younger sons of their own
+cousins, merely because I lived in a good street, avowed myself an only
+child, and talked of my property in Yorkshire! Ha, ha! how bitter the
+mercenary dupes must have felt when the discovery was made! What a pill
+for the good matrons who had coupled my image with that of some
+filial Mary or Jane,--ha, ha, ha! The triumph was almost worth the
+mortification. However, as I said before, I fell melancholy on it,
+especially as my duns became menacing. So I went to consult with my
+cousin the bookseller. He recommended me to compose for the journals,
+and obtained me an offer. I went to work very patiently for a short
+time, and contracted some agreeable friendships with gentlemen whom I
+met at an ordinary in St. James's. Still, my duns, though I paid them by
+driblets, were the plague of my life. I confessed as much to one of
+my new friends. 'Come to Bath with me,' quoth he, 'for a week, and you
+shall return as rich as a Jew.' I accepted the offer, and went to Bath
+in my friend's chariot. He took the name of Lord Dunshunner, an Irish
+peer who had never been out of Tipperary, and was not therefore likely
+to be known at Bath. He took also a house for a year; filled it with
+wines, books, and a sideboard of plate. As he talked vaguely of setting
+up his younger brother to stand for the town at the next parliament,
+he bought these goods of the townspeople, in order to encourage their
+trade. I managed secretly to transport them to London and sell them; and
+as we disposed of them fifty per cent under cost price, our customers,
+the pawnbrokers, were not very inquisitive. We lived a jolly life
+at Bath for a couple of months, and departed one night, leaving our
+housekeeper to answer all interrogatories. We had taken the precaution
+to wear disguises, stuffed ourselves out, and changed the hues of our
+hair. My noble friend was an adept in these transformations; and though
+the police did not sleep on the business, they never stumbled on us. I
+am especially glad we were not discovered, for I liked Bath excessively;
+and I intend to return there some of these days, and retire from the
+world--on an heiress!
+
+"Well, Paul, shortly after this adventure I made your acquaintance. I
+continued ostensibly my literary profession, but only as a mask for the
+labours I did not profess. A circumstance obliged me to leave London
+rather precipitately. Lord Dunshunner joined me in Edinburgh. D---it,
+instead of doing anything there, we were done! The veriest urchin that
+ever crept through the High Street is more than a match for the most
+scientific of Englishmen. With us it is art; with the Scotch it is
+nature. They pick your pockets without using their fingers for it; and
+they prevent reprisal by having nothing for you to pick.
+
+"We left Edinburgh with very long faces, and at Carlisle we found it
+necessary to separate. For my part, I went as a valet to a nobleman who
+had just lost his last servant at Carlisle by a fever; my friend gave
+me the best of characters! My new master was a very clever man. He
+astonished people at dinner by the impromptus he prepared at breakfast;
+in a word, he was a wit. He soon saw, for he was learned himself, that
+I had received a classical education, and he employed me in the
+confidential capacity of finding quotations for him. I classed these
+alphabetically and under three heads,--'Parliamentary, Literary,
+Dining-out.' These were again subdivided into 'Fine,' 'Learned,' and
+'Jocular;' so that my master knew at once where to refer for genius,
+wisdom, and wit. He was delighted with my management of his intellects.
+In compliment to him, I paid more attention to politics than I had
+done before; for he was a 'great Whig,' and uncommonly liberal
+in everything--but money! Hence, Paul, the origin of my political
+principles; and I thank Heaven there is not now a rogue in England who
+is a better--that is to say, more of a moderate-Whig than your humble
+servant! I continued with him nearly a year. He discharged me for a
+fault worthy of my genius: other servants may lose the watch or the
+coat of their master; I went at nobler game, and lost him--his private
+character!"
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"Why, I was enamoured of a lady who would not have looked at me as Mr.
+Tomlinson; so I took my master's clothes and occasionally his carriage,
+and made love to my nymph as Lord. Her vanity made her indiscreet. The
+Tory papers got hold of it; and my master, in a change of ministers,
+was declared by George the Third to be 'too gay for a Chancellor of the
+Exchequer.' An old gentleman who had had fifteen children by a wife like
+a Gorgon, was chosen instead of my master; and although the new minister
+was a fool in his public capacity, the moral public were perfectly
+content with him, because of his private virtues!
+
+"My master was furious, made the strictest inquiry, found me out, and
+turned me out too!
+
+"A Whig not in place has an excuse for disliking the Constitution. My
+distress almost made me a republican; but, true to my creed, I
+must confess that I would only have levelled upwards. I especially
+disaffected the inequality of riches; I looked moodily on every carriage
+that passed; I even frowned like a second Catiline at the steam of a
+gentle man's kitchen! My last situation had not been lucrative; I had
+neglected my perquisites, in my ardour for politics. My master, too,
+refused to give me a character: who would take me without one?
+
+"I was asking myself this melancholy question one morning, when I
+suddenly encountered one of the fine friends I had picked up at my old
+haunt, the ordinary, in St. James's. His name was Pepper."
+
+"Pepper!" cried Paul.
+
+Without heeding the exclamation, Tomlinson continued:--"We went to a
+tavern and drank a bottle together. Wine made me communicative; it also
+opened my comrade's heart. He asked me to take a ride with him that
+night towards Hounslow. I did so, and found a purse."
+
+"How fortunate! Where?"
+
+"In a gentleman's pocket. I was so pleased with my luck that I went
+the same road twice a week, in order to see if I could pick up any more
+purses. Fate favoured me, and I lived for a long time the life of the
+blessed. Oh, Paul, you know not--you know not what a glorious life is
+that of a highwayman; but you shall taste it one of these days,--you
+shall, on my honour.
+
+"I now lived with a club of honest fellows. We called ourselves 'The
+Exclusives,'--for we were mighty reserved in our associates, and only
+those who did business on a grand scale were admitted into our set. For
+my part, with all my love for my profession, I liked ingenuity still
+better than force, and preferred what the vulgar call swindling, even to
+the highroad. On an expedition of this sort, I rode once into a country
+town, and saw a crowd assembled in one corner; I joined it, and my
+feelings!--beheld my poor friend Viscount Dunshunner just about to be
+hanged! I rode off as fast as I could,--I thought I saw Jack Ketch at my
+heels. My horse threw me at a hedge, and I broke my collar-bone. In the
+confinement that ensued gloomy ideas floated before me. I did not like
+to be hanged; so I reasoned against my errors, and repented. I recovered
+slowly, returned to town, and repaired to my cousin the bookseller. To
+say truth, I had played him a little trick: collected some debts of his
+by a mistake,--very natural in the confusion incident on my distresses.
+However, he was extremely unkind about it; and the mistake, natural as
+it was, had cost me his acquaintance.
+
+"I went now to him with the penitential aspect of the prodigal son; and,
+faith, he would have not made a bad representation of the fatted
+calf about to be killed on my return,--so corpulent looked he, and so
+dejected! 'Graceless reprobate!' he began, 'your poor father is dead!'
+I was exceedingly shocked; but--never fear, Paul, I am not about to be
+pathetic. My father had divided his fortune among all his children; my
+share was L500. The possession of this soon made my penitence seem much
+more sincere in the eyes of my good cousin; and after a very pathetic
+scene, he took me once more into favour. I now consulted with him as to
+the best method of laying out my capital and recovering my character. We
+could not devise any scheme at the first conference; but the second
+time I saw him, my cousin said with a cheerful countenance: 'Cheer up,
+Augustus, I have got thee a situation. Mr. Asgrave the banker will take
+thee as a clerk. He is a most worthy man; and having a vast deal of
+learning, he will respect thee for thy acquirements.' The same day I
+was introduced to Mr. Asgrave, who was a little man with a fine, bald,
+benevolent head; and after a long conversation which he was pleased to
+hold with me, I became one of his quill-drivers. I don't know how it
+was, but by little and little I rose in my master's good graces. I
+propitiated him, I fancy, by disposing of my L500 according to his
+advice; he laid it out for me, on what he said was famous security, on a
+landed estate. Mr. Asgrave was of social habits,--he had a capital house
+and excellent wines. As he was not very particular in his company, nor
+ambitious of visiting the great, he often suffered me to make one of
+his table, and was pleased to hold long arguments with me about the
+ancients. I soon found out that my master was a great moral philosopher;
+and being myself in weak health, sated with the ordinary pursuits of the
+world, in which my experience had forestalled my years, and naturally of
+a contemplative temperament, I turned my attention to the moral studies
+which so fascinated my employer. I read through nine shelves full of
+metaphysicians, and knew exactly the points in which those illustrious
+thinkers quarrelled with each other, to the great advance of the
+science. My master and I used to hold many a long discussion about the
+nature of good and evil; as, by help of his benevolent forehead and a
+clear dogged voice, he always seemed to our audience to be the wiser and
+better man of the two, he was very well pleased with our disputes. This
+gentleman had an only daughter,--an awful shrew, with a face like a
+hatchet but philosophers overcome personal defects; and thinking only
+of the good her wealth might enable me to do to my fellow-creatures, I
+secretly made love to her. You will say that was playing my master but
+a scurvy trick for his kindness. Not at all; my master himself had
+convinced me that there was no such virtue as gratitude. It was an error
+of vulgar moralists. I yielded to his arguments, and at length privately
+espoused his daughter. The day after this took place, he summoned me to
+his study. 'So, Augustus,' said he, very mildly, 'you have married my
+daughter: nay, never look confused; I saw a long time ago that you were
+resolved to do so, and I was very glad of it.'
+
+"I attempted to falter out something like thanks. 'Never interrupt me!'
+said he. 'I had two reasons for being glad,--first, because my daughter
+was the plague of my life, and I wanted some one to take her off my
+hands; secondly, because I required your assistance on a particular
+point, and I could not venture to ask it of any one but my son-in-law.
+In fine, I wish to take you into partnership!'
+
+"'Partnership!' cried I, falling on my knees. 'Noble, generous man!'
+
+"'Stay a bit,' continued my father-in-law. 'What funds do you think
+requisite for carrying on a bank? You look puzzled! Not a shilling! You
+will put in just as much as I do. You will put in rather more; for
+you once put in L500, which has been spent long ago. I don't put in a
+shilling of my own. I live on my clients, and I very willingly offer you
+half of them!'
+
+"Imagine, dear Paul, my astonishment, my dismay! I saw myself married to
+a hideous shrew,--son-in-law to a penniless scoundrel, and cheated out
+of my whole fortune! Compare this view of the question with that which
+had blazed on me when I contemplated being son-in-law to the rich
+Mr. Asgrave. I stormed at first. Mr. Asgrave took up Bacon 'On the
+Advancement of Learning,' and made no reply till I was cooled by
+explosion. You will perceive that when passion subsided, I necessarily
+saw that nothing was left for me but adopting my father-in-law's
+proposal. Thus, by the fatality which attended me at the very time I
+meant to reform, I was forced into scoundrelism, and I was driven into
+defrauding a vast number of persons by the accident of being son-in-law
+to a great moralist. As Mr. Asgrave was an indolent man, who passed his
+mornings in speculations on virtue, I was made the active partner.
+I spent the day at the counting-house; and when I came home for
+recreation, my wife scratched my eyes out."
+
+"But were you never recognized as 'the stranger' or 'the adventurer' in
+your new capacity?"
+
+"No; for of course I assumed, in all my changes, both aliases and
+disguises. And, to tell you the truth, my marriage so altered me that,
+what with a snuff-coloured coat and a brown scratch wig, with a pen in
+my right ear, I looked the very picture of staid respectability. My face
+grew an inch longer every day. Nothing is so respectable as a long face;
+and a subdued expression of countenance is the surest sign of commercial
+prosperity. Well, we went on splendidly enough for about a year.
+Meanwhile I was wonderfully improved in philosophy. You have no idea how
+a scolding wife sublimes and rarefies one's intellect. Thunder clears
+the air, you know! At length, unhappily for my fame (for I contemplated
+a magnificent moral history of man, which, had she lived a year longer,
+I should have completed), my wife died in child-bed. My father-in-law
+and I were talking over the event, and finding fault with civilization
+for the enervating habits by which women die of their children instead
+of bringing them forth without being even conscious of the circumstance,
+when a bit of paper, sealed awry, was given to my partner. He looked
+over it, finished the discussion, and then told me our bank had stopped
+payment. 'Now, Augustus,' said he, lighting his pipe with the bit of
+paper, 'you see the good of having nothing to lose.'
+
+"We did not pay quite sixpence in the pound; but my partner was thought
+so unfortunate that the British public raised a subscription for
+him, and he retired on an annuity, greatly respected and very much
+compassionated. As I had not been so well known as a moralist, and had
+not the prepossessing advantage of a bald, benevolent head, nothing was
+done for me, and I was turned once more on the wide world, to moralize
+on the vicissitudes of fortune. My cousin the bookseller was no more,
+and his son cut me. I took a garret in Warwick Court, and with a few
+books, my only consolation, I endeavoured to nerve my mind to the
+future. It was at this time, Paul, that my studies really availed me.
+I meditated much, and I became a true philosopher, namely, a practical
+one. My actions were henceforth regulated by principle; and at some time
+or other, I will convince you that the road of true morals never avoids
+the pockets of your neighbour. So soon as my mind had made the grand
+discovery which Mr. Asgrave had made before me, that one should live
+according to a system,--for if you do wrong, it is then your system
+that errs, not you,--I took to the road, without any of those stings of
+conscience which had hitherto annoyed me in such adventures. I formed
+one of a capital knot of 'Free Agents,' whom I will introduce to you
+some day or other, and I soon rose to distinction among them. But about
+six weeks ago, not less than formerly preferring byways to highways, I
+attempted to possess myself of a carriage, and sell it at discount. I
+was acquitted on the felony, but sent hither by Justice Burnflat on the
+misdemeanour. Thus far, my young friend, hath as yet proceeded the
+life of Augustus Tomlinson." The history of this gentleman made a deep
+impression on Paul. The impression was strengthened by the conversations
+subsequently holden with Augustus. That worthy was a dangerous and
+subtle persuader. He had really read a good deal of history, and
+something of morals; and he had an ingenious way of defending his
+rascally practices by syllogisms from the latter, and examples from the
+former. These theories he clenched, as it were, by a reference to
+the existing politics of the day. Cheaters of the public, on false
+pretences, he was pleased to term "moderate Whigs;" bullying demanders
+of your purse were "high Tories;" and thieving in gangs was "the effect
+of the spirit of party." There was this difference between Augustus
+Tomlinson and Long Ned,--Ned was the acting knave, Augustus the
+reasoning one; and we may see therefore, by a little reflection, that
+Tomlinson was a far more perilous companion than Pepper,--for showy
+theories are always more seductive to the young and clever than suasive
+examples, and the vanity of the youthful makes them better pleased by
+being convinced of a thing than by being enticed to it.
+
+A day or two after the narrative of Mr. Tomlinson, Paul was again
+visited by Mrs. Lobkins,--for the regulations against frequent visitors
+were not then so strictly enforced as we understand them to be now;
+and the good dame came to deplore the ill-success of her interview with
+Justice Burnflat.
+
+We spare the tender-hearted reader a detail of the affecting interview
+that ensued. Indeed, it was but a repetition of the one we have before
+narrated. We shall only say, as a proof of Paul's tenderness of heart,
+that when he took leave of the good matron, and bade "God bless her,"
+his voice faltered, and the tears stood in his eyes,--just as they were
+wont to do in the eyes of George the Third, when that excellent monarch
+was pleased graciously to encore "God save the King!"
+
+"I'll be hanged," soliloquized our hero, as he slowly bent his course
+towards the subtle Augustus,--"I'll be hanged (humph! the denunciation
+is prophetic), if I don't feel as grateful to the old lady for her care
+of me as if she had never ill-used me. As for my parents, I believe
+I have little to be grateful for or proud of in that quarter. My poor
+mother, by all accounts, seems scarcely to have had even the brute
+virtue of maternal tenderness; and in all human likelihood I shall never
+know whether I had one father or fifty. But what matters it? I rather
+like the better to be independent; and, after all, what do nine tenths
+of us ever get from our parents but an ugly name, and advice which, if
+we follow, we are wretched, and if we neglect, we are disinherited?"
+
+Comforting himself with these thoughts, which perhaps took their
+philosophical complexion from the conversations he had lately held with
+Augustus, and which broke off into the muttered air of--
+
+"Why should we quarrel for riches?"
+
+Paul repaired to his customary avocations.
+
+In the third week of our hero's captivity Tomlinson communicated to him
+a plan of escape that had occurred to his sagacious brain. In the yard
+appropriated to the amusements of the gentlemen "misdemeaning," there
+was a water-pipe that, skirting the wall, passed over the door through
+which every morning the pious captives passed in their way to the
+chapel. By this Tomlinson proposed to escape; for to the pipe which
+reached from the door to the wall, in a slanting and easy direction,
+there was a sort of skirting-board; and a dexterous and nimble man might
+readily, by the help of this board, convey himself along the pipe, until
+the progress of that useful conductor (which was happily very brief) was
+stopped by the summit of the wall, where it found a sequel in another
+pipe, that descended to the ground on the opposite side of the wall.
+Now, on this opposite side was the garden of the prison; in this garden
+was a watchman, and this watchman was the hobgoblin of Tomlinson's
+scheme,--"For suppose us safe in the garden," said he, "what shall we do
+with this confounded fellow?"
+
+"But that is not all," added Paul; "for even were there no watchman,
+there is a terrible wall, which I noted especially last week, when
+we were set to work in the garden, and which has no pipe, save a
+perpendicular one, that a man must have the legs of a fly to be able to
+climb!"
+
+"Nonsense!" returned Tomlinson; "I will show you how to climb the
+stubbornest wall in Christendom, if one has but the coast clear. It is
+the watchman, the watchman, we must--"
+
+"What?" asked Paul, observing his comrade did not conclude the sentence.
+
+It was some time before the sage Augustus replied; he then said in a
+musing tone,--
+
+"I have been thinking, Paul, whether it would be consistent with virtue,
+and that strict code of morals by which all my actions are regulated,
+to--slay the watchman!"
+
+"Good heavens!" cried Paul, horror-stricken.
+
+"And I have decided," continued Augustus, solemnly, without regard to
+the exclamation, "that the action would be perfectly justifiable!"
+
+"Villain!" exclaimed Paul, recoiling to the other end of the stone
+box--for it was night--in which they were cooped.
+
+"But," pursued Augustus, who seemed soliloquizing, and whose voice,
+sounding calm and thoughtful, like Young's in the famous monologue in
+"Hamlet," denoted that he heeded not the uncourteous interruption,--"but
+opinion does not always influence conduct; and although it may be
+virtuous to murder the watchman, I have not the heart to do it. I trust
+in my future history I shall not by discerning moralists be too severely
+censured for a weakness for which my physical temperament is alone to
+blame!"
+
+Despite the turn of the soliloquy, it was a long time before Paul could
+be reconciled to further conversation with Augustus; and it was only
+from the belief that the moralist had leaned to the jesting vein that he
+at length resumed the consultation.
+
+The conspirators did not, however, bring their scheme that night to any
+ultimate decision. The next day Augustus, Paul, and some others of the
+company were set to work in the garden; and Paul then observed that his
+friend, wheeling a barrow close by the spot where the watchman stood,
+overturned its contents. The watchman was good-natured enough to assist
+him in refilling the barrow; and Tomlinson profited so well by the
+occasion that that night he informed Paul that they would have nothing
+to dread from the watchman's vigilance. "He has promised," said
+Augustus, "for certain consi-de-ra-tions, to allow me to knock him down;
+he has also promised to be so much hurt as not to be able to move
+until we are over the wall. Our main difficulty now, then, is the first
+step,--namely, to climb the pipe unperceived!"
+
+"As to that," said Paul, who developed, through the whole of the scheme,
+organs of sagacity, boldness, and invention which charmed his friend,
+and certainly promised well for his future career,--"as to that, I think
+we may manage the first ascent with less danger than you imagine. The
+mornings of late have been very foggy; they are almost dark at the hour
+we go to chapel. Let you and I close the file: the pipe passes just
+above the door; our hands, as we have tried, can reach it; and a spring
+of no great agility will enable us to raise ourselves up to a footing on
+the pipe and the skirting-board.
+
+"The climbing then is easy; and what with the dense fog and our own
+quickness, I think we shall have little difficulty in gaining the
+garden. The only precautions we need use are, to wait for a very dark
+morning, and to be sure that we are the last of the file, so that no one
+behind may give the alarm--"
+
+"Or attempt to follow our example, and spoil the pie by a superfluous
+plum!" added Augustus. "You counsel admirably; and one of these days, if
+you are not hung in the mean while, will, I venture to auger, be a great
+logician."
+
+The next morning was clear and frosty; but the day after was, to use
+Tomlinson's simile, "as dark as if all the negroes of Africa had been
+stewed down into air." "You might have cut the fog with a knife," as
+the proverb says. Paul and Augustus could not even see how significantly
+each looked at the other.
+
+It was a remarkable trait of the daring temperament of the former, that,
+young as he was, it was fixed that he should lead the attempt. At the
+hour, then, for chapel the prisoners passed as usual through the door.
+When it came to Paul's turn he drew himself by his hands to the pipe,
+and then creeping along its sinuous course, gained the wall before he
+had even fetched his breath. Rather more clumsily, Augustus followed
+his friend's example. Once his foot slipped, and he was all but over.
+He extended his hands involuntarily, and caught Paul by the leg. Happily
+our hero had then gained the wall, to which he was clinging; and for
+once in a way, one rogue raised himself without throwing over another.
+Behold Tomlinson and Paul now seated for an instant on the wall to
+recover breath; the latter then,--the descent to the ground was not very
+great,--letting his body down by his hands, dropped into the garden.
+
+"Hurt?" asked the prudent Augustus, in a hoarse whisper, before he
+descended from his "bad eminence," being even willing--
+
+                   "To bear those ills he had,
+                    Than fly to others that he knew not of"
+
+"No!" without taking every previous precaution in his power, was the
+answer in the same voice, and Augustus dropped.
+
+So soon as this latter worthy had recovered the shock of his fall,
+he lost not a moment in running to the other end of the garden. Paul
+followed. By the way Tomlinson stopped at a heap of rubbish, and picked
+up an immense stone. When they came to the part of the wall they had
+agreed to scale, they found the watchman,--about whom they needed not,
+by the by, to have concerned themselves; for had it not been arranged
+that he was to have met them, the deep fog would have effectually
+prevented him from seeing them. This faithful guardian Augustus knocked
+down, not with a stone, but with ten guineas; he then drew forth from
+his dress a thickish cord, which he procured some days before from the
+turnkey, and fastening the stone firmly to one end, threw that end over
+the wall. Now the wall had (as walls of great strength mostly have) an
+overhanging sort of battlement on either side; and the stone, when
+flung over and drawn to the tether of the cord to which it was attached,
+necessarily hitched against this projection; and thus the cord was as
+it were fastened to the wall, and Tomlinson was enabled by it to draw
+himself up to the top of the barrier. He performed this feat with
+gymnastic address, like one who had often practised it; albeit the
+discreet adventurer had not mentioned in his narrative to Paul any
+previous occasion for the practice. As soon as he had gained the top of
+the wall, he threw down the cord to his companion, and, in consideration
+of Paul's inexperience in that manner of climbing, gave the fastening of
+the rope an additional security by holding it himself. With slowness and
+labour Paul hoisted himself up; and then, by transferring the stone to
+the other side of the wall, where it made of course a similar hitch, our
+two adventurers were enabled successively to slide down, and consummate
+their escape from the House of Correction.
+
+"Follow me now!" said Augustus, as he took to his heels; and Paul
+pursued him through a labyrinth of alleys and lanes, through which he
+shot and dodged with a variable and shifting celerity that, had not
+Paul kept close upon him, would very soon, combined with the fog, have
+snatched him from the eyes of his young ally. Happily the immaturity of
+the morning, the obscurity of the streets passed through, and above all,
+the extreme darkness of the atmosphere, prevented that detection and
+arrest which their prisoner's garb would otherwise have insured them. At
+length they found themselves in the fields; and skulking along hedges,
+and diligently avoiding the highroad, they continued to fly onward,
+until they had advanced several miles into "the bowels of the land."
+At that time "the bowels" of Augustus Tomlinson began to remind him of
+their demands; and he accordingly suggested the desirability of their
+seizing the first peasant they encountered, and causing him to exchange
+clothes with one of the fugitives, who would thus be enabled to enter
+a public-house and provide for their mutual necessities. Paul agreed
+to this proposition, and accordingly they watched their opportunity and
+caught a ploughman. Augustus stripped him of his frock, hat, and worsted
+stockings; and Paul, hardened by necessity and companionship, helped to
+tie the poor ploughman to a tree. They then continued their progress
+for about an hour, and, as the shades of evening fell around them,
+they discovered a public-house. Augustus entered, and returned in a few
+minutes laden with bread and cheese, and a bottle of beer. Prison fare
+cures a man of daintiness, and the two fugitives dined on these homely
+viands with considerable complacency. They then resumed their journey,
+and at length, wearied with exertion, they arrived at a lonely haystack,
+where they resolved to repose for an hour or two.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+          Unlike the ribald, whose licentious jest
+          Pollutes his banquet, and insults his guest,
+          From wealth and grandeur easy to descend,
+          Thou joy'st to lose the master in the friend.
+          We round thy board the cheerful menials see, Gay--
+          with the smile of bland equality;
+          No social care the gracious lord disdains;
+          Love prompts to love, and reverence reverence gains.
+
+          Translation of LUCAN to Paso,
+          Prefixed to the Twelfth Paper of "The Rambler."
+
+Coyly shone down the bashful stars upon our adventurers, as, after a
+short nap behind the haystack, they stretched themselves, and looking
+at each other, burst into an involuntary and hilarious laugh at the
+prosperous termination of their exploit.
+
+Hitherto they had been too occupied, first by their flight, then by
+hunger, then by fatigue, for self-gratulation; now they rubbed their
+hands, and joked like runaway schoolboys at their escape.
+
+By degrees their thoughts turned from the past to the future; and "Tell
+me, my dear fellow," said Augustus, "what you intend to do. I trust I
+have long ago convinced you that it is no sin 'to serve our friends'
+and to 'be true to our party;' and therefore, I suppose, you will decide
+upon taking to the road."
+
+"It is very odd," answered Paul, "that I should have any scruples left
+after your lectures on the subject; but I own to you frankly that,
+somehow or other, I have doubts whether thieving be really the honestest
+profession I could follow."
+
+"Listen to me, Paul," answered Augustus; and his reply is not unworthy
+of notice. "All crime and all excellence depend upon a good choice of
+words. I see you look puzzled; I will explain. If you take money from
+the public, and say you have robbed, you have indubitably committed a
+great crime; but if you do the same, and say you have been relieving
+the necessities of the poor, you have done an excellent action. If, in
+afterwards dividing this money with your companions, you say you have
+been sharing booty, you have committed an offence against the laws of
+your country; but if you observe that you have been sharing with your
+friends the gains of your industry, you have been performing one of
+the noblest actions of humanity. To knock a man on the head is neither
+virtuous nor guilty, but it depends upon the language applied to the
+action to make it murder or glory. Why not say, then, that you have
+testified the courage of a hero, rather than the atrocity of a ruffian?
+This is perfectly clear, is it not?"
+
+     [We observe in a paragraph from an American paper, copied without
+     comment into the "Morning Chronicle," a singular proof of the truth
+     of Tomlinson's philosophy!  "Mr. Rowland Stephenson," so runs the
+     extract, "the celebrated English banker, has just purchased a
+     considerable tract of land," etc.  Most philosophical of
+     paragraphists!  "Celebrated English banker!"--that sentence is a
+     better illustration of verbal fallacies than all Ben tham's
+     treatises put together.  "Celebrated!"  O Mercury, what a dexterous
+     epithet!]
+
+"It seems so," answered Paul.
+
+"It is so self-evident that it is the way all governments are carried
+on. Wherefore, my good Paul, we only do what all other legislators do.
+We are never rogues so long as we call ourselves honest fellows, and we
+never commit a crime so long as we can term it a virtue. What say you
+now?"
+
+Paul smiled, and was silent a few moments before he replied: "There is
+very little doubt but that you are wrong; yet if you are, so are all
+the rest of the world. It is of no use to be the only white sheep of the
+flock. Wherefore, my dear Tomlinson, I will in future be an excellent
+citizen, relieve the necessities of the poor, and share the gains of my
+industry with my friends."
+
+"Bravo!" cried Tomlinson. "And now that that is settled, the sooner you
+are inaugurated the better. Since the starlight has shone forth, I see
+that I am in a place I ought to be very well acquainted with; or, if you
+like to be suspicious, you may believe that I have brought you purposely
+in this direction. But first let me ask if you feel any great desire to
+pass the night by this haystack, or whether you would like a song and
+the punchbowl almost as much as the open air, with the chance of being
+eaten up in a pinch of hay by some strolling cow."
+
+"You may conceive my choice," answered Paul.
+
+"Well, then, there is an excellent fellow near here, who keeps a
+public-house, and is a firm ally and generous patron of the lads of the
+cross. At certain periods they hold weekly meetings at his house: this
+is one of the nights. What say you? Shall I introduce you to the club?"
+
+"I shall be very glad if they will admit me," returned Paul, whom many
+and conflicting thoughts rendered laconic.
+
+"Oh! no fear of that, under my auspices. To tell you the truth, though
+we are a tolerant set, we welcome every new proselyte with enthusiasm.
+But are you tired?"
+
+"A little; the house is not far, you say?"
+
+"About a mile off," answered Tomlinson. "Lean on me."
+
+Our wanderers now, leaving the haystack, struck across part of Finchley
+Common; for the abode of the worthy publican was felicitously situated,
+and the scene in which his guests celebrated their festivities was close
+by that on which they often performed their exploits.
+
+As they proceeded, Paul questioned his friend touching the name and
+character of "mine host;" and the all-knowing Augustus Tomlinson
+answered him, Quaker-like, by a question,--
+
+"Have you never heard of Gentleman George?"
+
+"What! the noted head of a flash public-house in the country? To be
+sure I have, often; my poor nurse, Dame Lobkins, used to say he was the
+best-spoken man in the trade!"
+
+"Ay, so he is still. In his youth, George was a very handsome fellow,
+but a little too fond of his lass and his bottle to please his
+father,--a very staid old gentleman, who walked about on Sundays in
+a bob-wig and a gold-headed cane, and was a much better farmer on
+week-days than he was head of a public-house. George used to be a
+remarkably smart-dressed fellow, and so he is to this day. He has a
+great deal of wit, is a very good whist-player, has a capital cellar,
+and is so fond of seeing his friends drunk, that he bought some time ago
+a large pewter measure in which six men can stand upright. The girls, or
+rather the old women, to which last he used to be much more civil of the
+two, always liked him; they say nothing is so fine as his fine speeches,
+and they give him the title of 'Gentleman George.' He is a nice,
+kind-hearted man in many things. Pray Heaven we shall have no cause to
+miss him when he departs! But, to tell you the truth, he takes more than
+his share of our common purse."
+
+"What! is he avaricious?"
+
+"Quite the reverse; but he's so cursedly fond of building, he invests
+all his money (and wants us to invest all ours) in houses; and there's
+one confounded dog of a bricklayer who runs him up terrible bills,--a
+fellow called 'Cunning Nat,' who is equally adroit in spoiling ground
+and improving ground rent."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Ah! thereby hangs a tale. But we are near the place now; you will see a
+curious set."
+
+As Tomlinson said this, the pair approached a house standing alone, and
+seemingly without any other abode in the vicinity. It was of curious
+and grotesque shape, painted white, with a Gothic chimney, a Chinese
+sign-post (on which was depicted a gentleman fishing, with the words
+"The Jolly Angler" written beneath), and a porch that would have been
+Grecian if it had not been Dutch. It stood in a little field, with a
+hedge behind it, and the common in front. Augustus stopped at the door;
+and while he paused, bursts of laughter rang cheerily within.
+
+"Ah, the merry boys!" he muttered; "I long to be with them;" and then
+with his clenched fist he knocked four times on the door. There was a
+sudden silence which lasted about a minute, and was broken by a voice
+within, asking who was there. Tomlinson answered by some cabalistic
+word; the door was opened, and a little boy presented himself.
+
+"Well, my lad," said Augustus, "and how is your master? Stout and
+hearty, if I may judge by his voice."
+
+"Ay, Master Tommy, ay, he's boosing away at a fine rate, in the
+back-parlour, with Mr. Pepper and Fighting Attie, and half-a-score more
+of them. He'll be woundy glad to see you, I'll be bound."
+
+"Show this gentleman into the bar," rejoined Augustus, "while I go and
+pay my respects to honest Geordie."
+
+The boy made a sort of a bow, and leading our hero into the bar,
+consigned him to the care of Sal, a buxom barmaid, who reflected
+credit on the taste of the landlord, and who received Paul with marked
+distinction and a gill of brandy.
+
+Paul had not long to play the amiable, before Tomlinson rejoined him
+with the information that Gentleman George would be most happy to see
+him in the back-parlour, and that he would there find an old friend in
+the person of Mr. Pepper.
+
+"What! is he here?" cried Paul. "The sorry knave, to let me be caged in
+his stead!"
+
+"Gently, gently; no misapplication of terms!" said Augustus. "That was
+not knavery; that was prudence, the greatest of all virtues, and the
+rarest. But come along, and Pepper shall explain to-morrow."
+
+Threading a gallery or passage, Augustus preceded our hero, opened a
+door, and introduced him into a long low apartment, where sat, round a
+table spread with pipes and liquor, some ten or a dozen men, while at
+the top of the table, in an armchair, presided Gentleman George. That
+dignitary was a portly and comely gentleman, with a knowing look, and a
+Welsh wig, worn, as the "Morning Chronicle" says of his Majesty's hat,
+"in a degage manner, on one side." Being afflicted with the gout, his
+left foot reclined on a stool; and the attitude developed, despite of a
+lamb's-wool stocking, the remains of an exceedingly good leg.
+
+As Gentleman George was a person of majestic dignity among the Knights
+of the Cross, we trust we shall not be thought irreverent in applying a
+few of the words by which the aforesaid "Morning Chronicle" depicted his
+Majesty on the day he laid the first stone of his father's monument to
+the description of Gentleman George.
+
+"He had on a handsome blue coat and a white waistcoat;" moreover, "he
+laughed most good-humouredly," as, turning to Augustus Tomlinson, he
+saluted him with,--
+
+"So this is the youngster you present to us? Welcome to the Jolly
+Angler! Give us thy hand, young sir; I shall be happy to blow a cloud
+with thee."
+
+"With all due submission," said Mr. Tomlinson, "I think it may first be
+as well to introduce my pupil and friend to his future companions."
+
+"You speak like a leary cove," cried Gentleman George, still squeezing
+our hero's hand; and turning round in his elbow-chair, he pointed to
+each member, as he severally introduced his guests to Paul.
+
+"Here," said he,--"here's a fine chap at my right hand" (the person thus
+designated was a thin military-looking figure, in a shabby riding-frock,
+and with a commanding, bold, aquiline countenance, a little the worse
+for wear),--"here's a fine chap for you! Fighting Attie we calls him;
+he's a devil on the road. 'Halt,--deliver,--must and shall,--can't and
+sha' n't,--do as I bid you, or go to the devil!' That's all Fighting
+Attie's palaver; and, 'Sdeath, it has a wonderful way of coming to the
+point! A famous cull is my friend Attie,--an old soldier,--has seen the
+world, and knows what is what; has lots of gumption, and devil a bit of
+blarney. Howsomever, the highflyers does n't like him; and when he takes
+people's money, he need not be quite so cross about it. Attie, let me
+introduce a new pal to you." Paul made his bow.
+
+"Stand at ease, man!" quoth the veteran, without taking the pipe from
+his mouth.
+
+Gentleman George then continued; and after pointing out four or five of
+the company (among whom our hero discovered, to his surprise, his old
+friends Mr. Eustace Fitzherbert and Mr. William Howard Russell), came,
+at length, to one with a very red face and a lusty frame of body. "That
+gentleman," said he, "is Scarlet Jem; a dangerous fellow for a press,
+though he says he likes robbing alone now, for a general press is not
+half such a good thing as it used to be formerly. You have no idea what
+a hand at disguising himself Scarlet Jem is. He has an old wig which he
+generally does business in; and you would not go for to know him again
+when he conceals himself under the wig. Oh, he's a precious rogue, is
+Scarlet Jem! As for the cove on t' other side," continued the host of
+the Jolly Angler, pointing to Long Ned, "all I can say of him, good,
+bad, or indifferent, is that he has an unkimmon fine head of hair; and
+now, youngster, as you knows him, s'pose you goes and sits by him, and
+he'll introduce you to the rest; for, split my wig!" (Gentleman George
+was a bit of a swearer) "if I be n't tired; and so here's to your
+health; and if so be as your name's Paul, may you always rob Peter [a
+portmanteau] in order to pay Paul!"
+
+This witticism of mine host's being exceedingly well received, Paul
+went, amidst the general laughter, to take possession of the vacant
+seat beside Long Ned. That tall gentleman, who had hitherto been
+cloud-compelling (as Homer calls Jupiter) in profound silence, now
+turned to Paul with the warmest cordiality, declared himself overjoyed
+to meet his old friend once more, and congratulated him alike on his
+escape from Bridewell and his admission to the councils of Gentleman
+George. But Paul, mindful of that exertion of "prudence" on the part
+of Mr. Pepper by which he had been left to his fate and the mercy of
+Justice Burnflat, received his advances very sullenly. This coolness so
+incensed Ned, who was naturally choleric, that he turned his back on
+our hero, and being of an aristocratic spirit, muttered something about
+"upstart, and vulgar clyfakers being admitted to the company of swell
+tobymen." This murmur called all Paul's blood into his cheek; for though
+he had been punished as a clyfaker (or pickpocket), nobody knew better
+than Long Ned whether or not he was innocent; and a reproach from him
+came therefore with double injustice and severity. In his wrath he
+seized Mr. Pepper by the ear, and telling him he was a shabby scoundrel,
+challenged him to fight.
+
+So pleasing an invitation not being announced sotto voce, but in a tone
+suited to the importance of the proposition, every one around heard it;
+and before Long Ned could answer, the full voice of Gentleman George
+thundered forth,--
+
+"Keep the peace there, you youngster! What! are you just admitted into
+our merry-makings, and must you be wrangling already? Harkye, gemmen,
+I have been plagued enough with your quarrels before now; and the first
+cove as breaks the present quiet of the Jolly Angler shall be turned out
+neck and crop,--sha' n't he, Attie?"
+
+"Right about, march!" said the hero.
+
+"Ay, that's the word, Attie," said Gentleman George. "And now, Mr.
+Pepper, if there be any ill blood 'twixt you and the lad there, wash it
+away in a bumper of bingo, and let's hear no more whatsomever about it."
+
+"I'm willing," cried Long Ned, with the deferential air of a courtier,
+and holding out his hand to Paul. Our hero, being somewhat abashed
+by the novelty of his situation and the rebuke of Gentleman George,
+accepted, though with some reluctance, the proffered courtesy.
+
+Order being thus restored, the conversation of the convivialists began
+to assume a most fascinating bias. They talked with infinite gout of
+the sums they had levied on the public, and the peculations they had
+committed for what one called the good of the community, and another,
+the established order,--meaning themselves. It was easy to see in what
+school the discerning Augustus Tomlinson had learned the value of words.
+
+There was something edifying in hearing the rascals! So nice was their
+language, and so honest their enthusiasm for their own interests, you
+might have imagined you were listening to a coterie of cabinet ministers
+conferring on taxes or debating on perquisites.
+
+"Long may the Commons flourish!" cried punning Georgie, filling
+his glass; "it is by the commons we're fed, and may they never know
+cultivation!"
+
+"Three times three!" shouted Long Ned; and the toast was drunk as Mr.
+Pepper proposed.
+
+"A little moderate cultivation of the commons, to speak frankly," said
+Augustus Tomlinson, modestly, "might not be amiss; for it would decoy
+people into the belief that they might travel safely; and, after all,
+a hedge or a barley-field is as good for us as a barren heath, where we
+have no shelter if once pursued!"
+
+"You talks nonsense, you spooney!" cried a robber of note, called
+Bagshot; who, being aged and having been a lawyer's footboy, was
+sometimes denominated "Old Bags." "You talks nonsense; these innowating
+ploughs are the ruin of us. Every blade of corn in a common is an
+encroachment on the constitution and rights of the gemmen highwaymen.
+I'm old, and may n't live to see these things; but, mark my words, a
+time will come when a man may go from Lunnun to Johnny Groat's without
+losing a penny by one of us; when Hounslow will be safe, and Finchley
+secure. My eyes, what a sad thing for us that'll be!"
+
+The venerable old man became suddenly silent, and the tears started
+to his eyes. Gentleman George had a great horror of blue devils, and
+particularly disliked all disagreeable subjects.
+
+"Thunder and oons, Old Bags!" quoth mine host of the Jolly Angler, "this
+will never do; we're all met here to be merry, and not to listen to your
+mullancolly taratarantarums. I says, Ned Pepper, s'pose you tips us a
+song, and I'll beat time with my knuckles."
+
+Long Ned, taking the pipe from his mouth, attempted, like Walter
+Scott's Lady Heron, one or two pretty excuses; these being drowned by a
+universal shout, the handsome purloiner gave the following song, to the
+tune of "Time has not thinned my flowing hair."
+
+                           LONG NED'S SONG.
+
+                    Oh, if my hands adhere to cash,
+                    My gloves at least are clean,
+                    And rarely have the gentry flash
+                    In sprucer clothes been seen.
+
+                    Sweet Public, since your coffers must
+                    Afford our wants relief,
+                    Oh!  soothes it not to yield the dust
+                    To such a charming thief?
+
+"'And John may laugh at mine,'--excellent!" cried Gentleman George,
+lighting his pipe, and winking at Attie; "I hears as how you be a famous
+fellow with the lasses."
+
+Ned smiled and answered, "No man should boast; but--" Pepper paused
+significantly, and then glancing at Attie, said, "Talking of lasses,
+it is my turn to knock down a gentleman for a song, and I knock down
+Fighting Attie."
+
+"I never sing," said the warrior.
+
+"Treason, treason!" cried Pepper. "It is the law, and you must obey the
+law; so begin."
+
+"It is true, Attie," said Gentleman George.
+
+There was no appeal from the honest publican's fiat; so, in a quick and
+laconic manner, it being Attie's favourite dogma that the least said is
+the soonest mended, the warrior sung as follows:--
+
+                           FIGHTING ATTIE'S SONG.
+
+                    Air: "He was famed for deeds of arms."
+
+                    I never robbed a single coach
+                    But with a lover's air;
+                    And though you might my course reproach,
+                    You never could my hair.
+
+                    Rise at six, dine at two,
+                    Rob your man without ado,
+                    Such my maxims; if you doubt
+                    Their wisdom, to the right-about!
+
+( Signing to a sallow gentleman on the same side of the table to send up
+the brandy bowl.)
+
+                    Pass round the bingo,--of a gun,
+                    You musty, dusky, husky son!
+                    John Bull, who loves a harmless joke,
+                    Is apt at me to grin;
+                    But why be cross with laughing folk,
+                    Unless they laugh and win?
+                    John Bull has money in his box;
+                    And though his wit's divine,
+                    Yet let me laugh at Johnny's locks,
+                    And John may laugh at mine
+
+     [Much of whatever amusement might be occasioned by the not (we
+     trust) ill-natured travesties of certain eminent characters in this
+     part of our work when first published, like all political allusions,
+     loses point and becomes obscure as the applications cease to be
+     familiar.  It is already necessary, perhaps, to say that Fighting
+     Attie herein typifies or illustrates the Duke of Wellington's abrupt
+     dismissal of Mr. Huskisson.]
+
+               THE SALLOW GENTLEMAN (in a hoarse voice).
+
+                  Attie, the bingo's now with me;
+                  I can't resign it yet, d' ye see!
+
+                       ATTIE (seizing the bowl).
+
+                  Resign, resign it,--cease your dust!
+    (Wresting it away and fiercely regarding the sallow gentleman.)
+                  You have resigned it, and you must.
+
+                             CHORUS.
+
+                  You have resigned it, and you must.
+
+While the chorus, laughing at the discomfited tippler, yelled forth the
+emphatic words of the heroic Attie, that personage emptied the brandy at
+a draught, resumed his pipe, and in as few words as possible called on
+Bagshot for a song. The excellent old highwayman, with great diffidence,
+obeyed the request, cleared his throat, and struck off with a ditty
+somewhat to the tune of "The Old Woman."
+
+                               OLD BAGS'S SONG.
+
+               Are the days then gone, when on Hounslow Heath
+               We flashed our nags,
+               When the stoutest bosoms quailed beneath
+               The voice of Bags?
+               Ne'er was my work half undone, lest I should be nabbed
+               Slow was old Bags, but he never ceased
+               Till the whole was grabbed.
+
+               CHORUS.  Till the whole was grabbed.
+
+               When the slow coach paused, and the gemmen stormed,
+               I bore the brunt;
+               And the only sound which my grave lips formed
+               Was "blunt,"--still "blunt"!
+
+               Oh, those jovial days are ne'er forgot!
+               But the tape lags--
+               When I be's dead, you'll drink one pot
+               To poor old Bags!
+
+               CHORUS.  To poor old Bags!
+
+"Ay, that we will, my dear Bagshot," cried Gentleman George,
+affectionately; but observing a tear in the fine old fellow's eye, he
+added: "Cheer up! What, ho! cheer up! Times will improve, and Providence
+may yet send us one good year, when you shall be as well off as ever.
+You shakes your poll. Well, don't be humdurgeoned, but knock down a
+gemman."
+
+Dashing away the drop of sensibility, the veteran knocked down Gentleman
+George himself.
+
+"Oh, dang it!" said George, with an air of dignity, "I ought to skip,
+since I finds the lush; but howsomever here goes."
+
+                          GENTLEMAN GEORGE'S SONG.
+
+                    Air: "Old King Cole."
+
+                    I be's the cove, the merry old cove,
+                    Of whose max all the rufflers sing;
+                    And a lushing cove, I thinks, by Jove,
+                    Is as great as a sober king!
+
+                    CHORUS. Is as great as a sober king!
+
+                    Whatever the noise as is made by the boys
+                    At the bar as they lush away,
+                    The devil a noise my peace alloys
+                    As long as the rascals pay!
+
+                    CHORUS.  As long as the rascals pay!
+
+                    What if I sticks my stones and my bricks
+                    With mortar I takes from the snobbish?
+                    All who can feel for the public weal
+                    Likes the public-house to be bobbish.
+
+                    CHORUS.  Likes the public-house to be bobbish.
+
+"There, gemmen!" said the publican, stopping short, "that's the pith of
+the matter, and split my wig but I'm short of breath now. So send round
+the brandy, Augustus; you sly dog, you keeps it all to yourself."
+
+By this time the whole conclave were more than half-seas over, or, as
+Augustus Tomlinson expressed it, "their more austere qualities were
+relaxed by a pleasing and innocent indulgence." Paul's eyes reeled, and
+his tongue ran loose. By degrees the room swam round, the faces of
+his comrades altered, the countenance of Old Bags assumed an awful and
+menacing air. He thought Long Ned insulted him, and that Old Bags took
+the part of the assailant, doubled his fist, and threatened to put the
+plaintiff's nob into chancery if he disturbed the peace of the meeting.
+Various other imaginary evils beset him. He thought he had robbed a
+mail-coach in company with Pepper; that Tomlinson informed against
+him, and that Gentleman George ordered him to be hanged; in short, he
+laboured under a temporary delirium, occasioned by a sudden reverse of
+fortune,--from water to brandy; and the last thing of which he retained
+any recollection, before he sank under the table, in company with Long
+Ned, Scarlet Jem, and Old Bags, was the bearing his part in the burden
+of what appeared to him a chorus of last dying speeches and confessions,
+but what in reality was a song made in honour of Gentleman George,
+and sung by his grateful guests as a finale of the festivities. It ran
+thus:--
+
+                    THE ROBBER'S GRAND TOAST.
+
+          A tumbler of blue ruin, fill, fill for me!
+          Red tape those as likes it may drain;
+          But whatever the lush, it a bumper must be,
+          If we ne'er drinks a bumper again!
+          Now--now in the crib, where a ruffler may lie,
+          Without fear that the traps should distress him,
+          With a drop in the mouth, and a drop in the eye,
+          Here's to Gentleman George,--God bless him!
+          God bless him, God bless him!
+          Here's to Gentleman George,--God bless him!
+
+          'Mong the pals of the prince I have heard it's the go,
+          Before they have tippled enough,
+          To smarten their punch with the best curagoa,
+          More conish to render the stuff.
+          I boast not such lush; but whoever his glass
+          Does not like, I'll be hanged if I press him!
+          Upstanding, my kiddies,--round, round let it pass!
+          Here's to Gentleman George,--God bless him!
+          God bless him, God bless him!
+          Here's to Gentleman George,-God bless him!
+
+          See, see, the fine fellow grows weak on his stumps;
+          Assist him, ye rascals, to stand!
+          Why, ye stir not a peg!  Are you all in the dumps?
+          Fighting Attie, go, lend him a hand!
+
+(The robbers crowd around Gentleman George, each, under pretence of
+supporting him, pulling him first one way and then another.)
+
+          Come, lean upon me,--at your service I am!
+          Get away from his elbow, you whelp!  him
+          You'll only upset,--them 'ere fellows but sham!
+          Here's to Gentleman George,--God help him!
+          God help him, God help him!
+          Here's to Gentleman George, God help him!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+               I boast no song in magic wonders rife;
+               But yet, O Nature! is there nought to prize,
+               Familiar in thy bosom scenes of life?
+               And dwells in daylight truth's salubrious skies
+               No form with which the soul may sympathize?
+               Young, innocent, on whose sweet forehead mild
+               The parted ringlet shone in simplest guise,
+               An inmate in the home of Albert smiled,
+               Or blessed his noonday walk,--she was his only child.
+
+                                   Gertrude of Wyoming.
+
+O time, thou hast played strange tricks with us; and we bless the stars
+that made us a novelist, and permit us now to retaliate. Leaving Paul to
+the instructions of Augustus Tomlinson and the festivities of the Jolly
+Angler, and suffering him, by slow but sure degrees, to acquire the
+graces and the reputation of the accomplished and perfect appropriator
+of other men's possessions, we shall pass over the lapse of years with
+the same heedless rapidity with which they have glided over us, and
+summon our reader to a very different scene from those which would be
+likely to greet his eyes, were he following the adventures of our new
+Telemachus. Nor wilt thou, dear reader, whom we make the umpire between
+ourself and those who never read,--the critics; thou who hast, in the
+true spirit of gentle breeding, gone with us among places where the
+novelty of the scene has, we fear, scarcely atoned for the coarseness,
+not giving thyself the airs of a dainty abigail,--not prating,
+lacquey-like, on the low company thou has met,--nor wilt thou, dear and
+friendly reader, have cause to dread that we shall weary thy patience by
+a "damnable iteration" of the same localities. Pausing for a moment to
+glance over the divisions of our story, which lies before us like a map,
+we feel that we may promise in future to conduct thee among aspects of
+society more familiar to thy habits; where events flow to their allotted
+gulf through landscapes of more pleasing variety and among tribes of a
+more luxurious civilization.
+
+Upon the banks of one of fair England's fairest rivers, and about fifty
+miles distant from London, still stands an old-fashioned abode, which we
+shall here term Warlock Manorhouse. It is a building of brick, varied by
+stone copings, and covered in great part with ivy and jasmine. Around
+it lie the ruins of the elder part of the fabric; and these are
+sufficiently numerous in extent and important in appearance to testify
+that the mansion was once not without pretensions to the magnificent.
+These remains of power, some of which bear date as far back as the
+reign of Henry the Third, are sanctioned by the character of the country
+immediately in the vicinity of the old manor-house. A vast tract of
+waste land, interspersed with groves of antique pollards, and here
+and there irregular and sinuous ridges of green mound, betoken to the
+experienced eye the evidence of a dismantled chase or park, which must
+originally have been of no common dimensions. On one side of the house
+the lawn slopes towards the river, divided from a terrace, which forms
+the most important embellishment of the pleasure-grounds, by that fence
+to which has been given the ingenious and significant name of "ha-ha!"
+A few scattered trees of giant growth are the sole obstacles that break
+the view of the river, which has often seemed to us, at that particular
+passage of its course, to glide with unusual calmness and serenity.
+On the opposite side of the stream there is a range of steep hills,
+celebrated for nothing more romantic than their property of imparting to
+the flocks that browse upon that short and seemingly stinted herbage a
+flavour peculiarly grateful to the lovers of that pastoral animal which
+changes its name into mutton after its decease. Upon these hills the
+vestige of human habitation is not visible; and at times, when no boat
+defaces the lonely smoothness of the river, and the evening has
+stilled the sounds of labour and of life, we know few scenes so utterly
+tranquil, so steeped in quiet, as that which is presented by the old,
+quaint-fashioned house and its antique grounds,--the smooth lawn, the
+silent, and (to speak truly, though disparagingly) the somewhat sluggish
+river, together with the large hills (to which we know, from simple
+though metaphysical causes, how entire an idea of quiet and immovability
+peculiarly attaches itself), and the white flocks,--those most peaceful
+of God's creatures,--that in fleecy clusters stud the ascent.
+
+In Warlock House, at the time we refer to, lived a gentleman of the name
+of Brandon. He was a widower, and had attained his fiftieth year without
+casting much regret on the past or feeling much anxiety for the
+future. In a word, Joseph Brandon was one of those careless, quiescent,
+indifferent men, by whom a thought upon any subject is never recurred to
+without a very urgent necessity. He was good-natured, inoffensive, and
+weak; and if he was not an incomparable citizen, he was at least an
+excellent vegetable. He was of a family of high antiquity, and formerly
+of considerable note. For the last four or five generations, however,
+the proprietors of Warlock House, gradually losing something alike from
+their acres and their consequence, had left to their descendants
+no higher rank than that of a small country squire. One had been a
+Jacobite, and had drunk out half-a-dozen farms in honour of Charley
+over the water; Charley over the water was no very dangerous person, but
+Charley over the wine was rather more ruinous. The next Brandon had been
+a fox-hunter, and fox-hunters live as largely as patriotic politicians.
+Pausanias tells us that the same people; who were the most notorious for
+their love of wine were also the most notorious for their negligence
+of affairs. Times are not much altered since Pausanias wrote, and the
+remark holds as good with the English as it did with the Phigalei. After
+this Brandon came one who, though he did not scorn the sportsman,
+rather assumed the fine gentleman. He married an heiress, who of
+course assisted to ruin him; wishing no assistance in so pleasing an
+occupation, he overturned her (perhaps not on purpose), in a new sort of
+carriage which he was learning to drive, and the good lady was killed
+on the spot. She left the fine gentleman two sons,--Joseph Brandon, the
+present thane,--and a brother some years younger. The elder, being of a
+fitting age, was sent to school, and somewhat escaped the contagion of
+the paternal mansion. But the younger Brandon, having only reached his
+fifth year at the time of his mother's decease, was retained at home.
+Whether he was handsome or clever or impertinent, or like his father
+about the eyes (that greatest of all merits), we know not; but the
+widower became so fond of him that it was at a late period and with
+great reluctance that he finally intrusted him to the providence of a
+school.
+
+Among harlots and gamblers and lords and sharpers, and gentlemen of
+the guards, together with their frequent accompaniments,--guards of the
+gentlemen, namely, bailiffs,--William Brandon passed the first stage of
+his boyhood. He was about thirteen when he was sent to school; and being
+a boy of remarkable talents, he recovered lost time so well that when
+at the age of nineteen he adjourned to the University, he had scarcely
+resided there a single term before he had borne off two of the highest
+prizes awarded to academical merit. From the University he departed
+on the "grand tour," at that time thought so necessary to complete the
+gentleman; he went in company with a young nobleman, whose friendship he
+had won at the University, stayed abroad more than two years, and on his
+return he settled down to the profession of the law.
+
+Meanwhile his father died, and his fortune, as a younger brother, being
+literally next to nothing, and the family estate (for his brother was
+not unwilling to assist him) being terribly involved, it was believed
+that he struggled for some years with very embarrassed and penurious
+circumstances. During this interval of his life, however, he was
+absent from London, and by his brother supposed to have returned to
+the Continent; at length, it seems, he profited by a renewal of his
+friendship with the young nobleman who had accompanied him abroad,
+reappeared in town, and obtained through his noble friend one or two
+legal appointments of reputable emolument. Soon afterwards he got
+a brief on some cause where a major had been raising a corps to his
+brother officer, with the better consent of the brother-officer's wife
+than of the brother officer himself. Brandon's abilities here, for the
+first time in his profession, found an adequate vent; his reputation
+seemed made at once, he rose rapidly in his profession, and, at the time
+we now speak of, he was sailing down the full tide of fame and wealth,
+the envy and the oracle of all young Templars and barristers, who,
+having been starved themselves for ten years, began now to calculate
+on the possibility of starving their clients. At an early period in
+his career he had, through the good offices of the nobleman we have
+mentioned, obtained a seat in the House of Commons; and though his
+eloquence was of an order much better suited to the bar than the senate,
+he had nevertheless acquired a very considerable reputation in the
+latter, and was looked upon by many as likely to win to the same
+brilliant fortunes as the courtly Mansfield,--a great man, whose
+political principles and urbane address Brandon was supposed especially
+to affect as his own model. Of unblemished integrity in public
+life,--for, as he supported all things that exist with the most
+unbending rigidity, he could not be accused of inconsistency,--William
+Brandon was (as we have said in a former place of unhappy memory to our
+hero) esteemed in private life the most honourable, the most moral, even
+the most austere of men; and his grave and stern repute on this score,
+joined to the dazzle of his eloquence and forensic powers, had baffled
+in great measure the rancour of party hostility, and obtained for him
+a character for virtues almost as high and as enviable as that which he
+had acquired for abilities.
+
+While William was thus treading a noted and an honourable career, his
+elder brother, who had married into a clergyman's family, and soon lost
+his consort, had with his only child, a daughter named Lucy, resided
+in his paternal mansion in undisturbed obscurity. The discreditable
+character and habits of the preceding lords of Warlock, which had sunk
+their respectability in the county as well as curtailed their property,
+had rendered the surrounding gentry little anxious to cultivate the
+intimacy of the present proprietor; and the heavy mind and retired
+manners of Joseph Brandon were not calculated to counterbalance the
+faults of his forefathers, nor to reinstate the name of Brandon in its
+ancient popularity and esteem. Though dull and little cultivated, the
+squire was not without his "proper pride;" he attempted not to intrude
+himself where he was unwelcome, avoided county meetings and county
+balls, smoked his pipe with the parson, and not unoften with the surgeon
+and the solicitor, and suffered his daughter Lucy to educate herself
+with the help of the parson's wife, and to ripen (for Nature was more
+favourable to her than Art) into the very prettiest girl that the whole
+county--we long to say the whole country--at that time could boast of.
+Never did glass give back a more lovely image than that of Lucy Brandon
+at the age of nineteen. Her auburn hair fell in the richest luxuriance
+over a brow never ruffled, and a cheek where the blood never slept; with
+every instant the colour varied, and at every variation that smooth,
+pure; virgin cheek seemed still more lovely than before. She had the
+most beautiful laugh that one who loved music could imagine,--silvery,
+low, and yet so full of joy! All her movements, as the old parson said,
+seemed to keep time to that laugh, for mirth made a great part of her
+innocent and childish temper; and yet the mirth was feminine, never
+loud, nor like that of young ladies who had received the last finish at
+Highgate seminaries. Everything joyous affected her, and at once,--air,
+flowers, sunshine, butterflies. Unlike heroines in general, she very
+seldom cried, and she saw nothing charming in having the vapours. But
+she never looked so beautiful as in sleep; and as the light breath came
+from her parted lips, and the ivory lids closed over those eyes which
+only in sleep were silent,--and her attitude in her sleep took that
+ineffable grace belonging solely to childhood, or the fresh youth into
+which childhood merges,--she was just what you might imagine a sleeping
+Margaret, before that most simple and gentle of all a poet's visions of
+womanhood had met with Faust, or her slumbers been ruffled with a dream
+of love.
+
+We cannot say much for Lucy's intellectual acquirements; she could,
+thanks to the parson's wife, spell indifferently well, and write a
+tolerable hand; she made preserves, and sometimes riddles,--it was more
+difficult to question the excellence of the former than to answer the
+queries of the latter. She worked to the admiration of all who knew her,
+and we beg leave to say that we deem that "an excellent thing in woman."
+She made caps for herself and gowns for the poor, and now and then she
+accomplished the more literary labour of a stray novel that had wandered
+down to the Manorhouse, or an abridgment of ancient history, in which
+was omitted everything but the proper names. To these attainments she
+added a certain modicum of skill upon the spinet, and the power of
+singing old songs with the richest and sweetest voice that ever made
+one's eyes moisten or one's heart beat.
+
+Her moral qualities were more fully developed than her mental. She was
+the kindest of human beings; the very dog that had never seen her before
+knew that truth at the first glance, and lost no time in making her
+acquaintance. The goodness of her heart reposed upon her face like
+sunshine, and the old wife at the lodge said poetically and truly of the
+effect it produced, that "one felt warm when one looked on her." If we
+could abstract from the description a certain chilling transparency, the
+following exquisite verses of a forgotten poet might express the purity
+and lustre of her countenance:--
+
+         "Her face was like the milky way i' the sky,
+          A meeting of gentle lights without a name."
+
+She was surrounded by pets of all kinds, ugly and handsome,--from Ralph
+the raven to Beauty the pheasant, and from Bob, the sheep-dog without a
+tail, to Beau, the Blenheim with blue ribbons round his neck; all things
+loved her, and she loved all things. It seemed doubtful at that time
+whether she would ever have sufficient steadiness and strength of
+character. Her beauty and her character appeared so essentially
+womanlike--soft yet lively, buoyant yet caressing--that you could
+scarcely place in her that moral dependence that you might in a
+character less amiable but less yieldingly feminine. Time, however, and
+circumstance, which alter and harden, were to decide whether the inward
+nature did not possess some latent and yet undiscovered properties.
+Such was Lucy Brandon in the year ----; and in that year, on a beautiful
+autumnal evening, we first introduce her personally to our readers.
+
+She was sitting on a garden-seat by the river side, with her father, who
+was deliberately conning the evening paper of a former week, and gravely
+seasoning the ancient news with the inspirations of that weed which
+so bitterly excited the royal indignation of our British Solomon. It
+happens, unfortunately for us,--for outward peculiarities are scarcely
+worthy the dignity to which comedy, whether in the drama or the
+narrative, aspires,--that Squire Brandon possessed so few distinguishing
+traits of mind that he leaves his delineator little whereby to designate
+him, save a confused and parenthetical habit of speech, by which he very
+often appeared to those who did not profit by long experience or close
+observation, to say exactly, and somewhat ludicrously, that which he did
+not mean to convey.
+
+"I say, Lucy," observed Mr. Brandon, but without lifting his eyes from
+the paper,--"I say, corn has fallen; think of that, girl, think of that!
+These times, in my opinion (ay, and in the opinion of wiser heads than
+mine, though I do not mean to say that I have not some experience in
+these matters, which is more than can be said of all our neighbours),
+are very curious and even dangerous."
+
+"Indeed, Papa!" answered Lucy.
+
+"And I say, Lucy, dear," resumed the squire, after a short pause, "there
+has been (and very strange it is, too, when one considers the crowded
+neighbourhood--Bless me! what times these are!) a shocking murder
+committed upon (the tobacco stopper,--there it is)--think, you know,
+girl,--just by Epping!--an old gentleman!"
+
+"Dear, how shocking! By whom?"
+
+"Ay, that's the question! The coroner's inquest has (what a blessing
+it is to live in a civilized country, where a man does not die without
+knowing the why and the wherefore!) sat on the body, and declared (it is
+very strange, but they don't seem to have made much discovery; for why?
+we knew as much before) that the body was found (it was found on the
+floor, Lucy) murdered; murderer or murderers (in the bureau, which was
+broken open, they found the money left quite untouched) unknown!"
+
+Here there was again a slight pause; and passing to another side of the
+paper, Mr. Brandon resumed, in a quicker tone,--"Ha! well, now this is
+odd! But he's a deuced clever fellow, Lucy! That brother of mine
+has (and in a very honourable manner, too, which I am sure is highly
+creditable to the family, though he has not taken too much notice of me
+lately,--a circumstance which, considering I am his elder brother, I am
+a little angry at) distinguished himself in a speech, remarkable, the
+paper says, for its great legal (I wonder, by the by, whether William
+could get me that agistment-money! 't is a heavy thing to lose; but
+going to law, as my poor father used to say, is like fishing for
+gudgeons [not a bad little fish; we can have some for supper] with,
+guineas) knowledge, as well as its splendid and overpowering (I do love
+Will for keeping up the family honour; I am sure it is more than I have
+done, heigh-ho!), eloquence!"
+
+"And on what subject has he been speaking, Papa?"
+
+"Oh, a very fine subject; what you call a (it is astonishing that
+in this country there should be such a wish for taking away people's
+characters, which, for my part, I don't see is a bit more entertaining
+than what you are always doing,--playing with those stupid birds)
+libel!"
+
+"But is not my uncle William coming down to see us? He promised to do
+so, and it made you quite happy--, Papa, for two days. I hope he will
+not disappoint you; and I am sure that it is not his fault if he ever
+seems to neglect you. He spoke of you to me, when I saw him, in the
+kindest and most affectionate manner. I do think, my dear father, that
+he loves you very much."
+
+"Ahem!" said the squire, evidently flattered, and yet not convinced.
+"My brother Will is a very acute fellow, and I make no--my dear little
+girl--question, but that (when you have seen as much of the world as I
+have, you will grow suspicious) he thought that any good word said of
+me to my daughter would (you see, Lucy, I am as clear-sighted as my
+neighbours, though I don't give myself all their airs; which I very well
+might do, considering my great-great-great-grandfather, Hugo Brandon,
+had a hand in detecting the gunpowder plot) he told to me again!"
+
+"Nay, but I am quite sure my uncle never spoke of you to me with that
+intention."
+
+"Possibly, my dear child; but when (the evenings are much shorter than
+they were!) did you talk with your uncle about me?
+
+"Oh, when staying with Mrs. Warner, in London; to be sure, it is six
+years ago, but I remember it perfectly. I recollect, in particular, that
+he spoke of you very handsomely to Lord Mauleverer, who dined with him
+one evening when I was there, and when my uncle was so kind as to
+take me to the play. I was afterwards quite sorry that he was so
+good-natured, as he lost (you remember I told you the story) a very
+valuable watch."
+
+"Ay, ay, I remember all about that, and so (how long friendship lasts
+with some people!) Lord Mauleverer dined with William! What a fine thing
+it is for a man (it is what I never did, indeed; I like being what they
+call 'Cock of the Walk'--let me see, now I think of it, Pillum comes
+to-night to play a hit at backgammon) to make friends with a great man
+early in (yet Will did not do it very early, poor fellow! He struggled
+first with a great deal of sorrow--hardship, that is) life! It is many
+years now since Will has been hand-and-glove with my ('t is a bit of a
+puppy) Lord Mauleverer. What did you think of his lordship?"
+
+"Of Lord Mauleverer? Indeed I scarcely observed him; but he seemed a
+handsome man, and was very polite. Mrs. Warner said he had been a very
+wicked person when he was young, but he seems good-natured enough now,
+Papa."
+
+"By the by," said the squire, "his lordship has just been made (this new
+ministry seems very unlike the old, which rather puzzles me; for I think
+it my duty, d'ye see, Lucy, always to vote for his Majesty's government,
+especially seeing that old Hugo Brandon had a hand in detecting the gun
+powder plot; and it is a little odd-at least, at first-to think that
+good now which one has always before been thinking abominable) Lord
+Lieutenant of the county."
+
+"Lord Mauleverer our Lord Lieutenant?"
+
+"Yes, child; and since his lordship is such a friend of my brother, I
+should think, considering especially what an old family in the county we
+are,--not that I wish to intrude myself where I am not thought as fine
+as the rest,--that he would be more attentive to us than Lord --------
+was; but that, my dear Lucy, puts me in mind of Pillum; and so, perhaps,
+you would like to walk to the parson's, as it is a fine evening. John
+shall come for you at nine o'clock with (the moon is not up then) the
+lantern."
+
+Leaning on his daughter's willing arm, the good old man then rose and
+walked homeward; and so soon as she had wheeled round his easy-chair,
+placed the backgammon board on the table, and wished the old gentleman
+an easy victory over his expected antagonist, the apothecary, Lucy tied
+down her bonnet, and took her way to the rectory.
+
+When she arrived at the clerical mansion and entered the drawing-room,
+she was surprised to find the parson's wife, a good, homely, lethargic
+old lady, run up to her, seemingly in a state of great nervous agitation
+and crying,--
+
+"Oh, my dear Miss Brandon! which way did you come? Did you meet nobody
+by the road? Oh, I am so frightened! Such an accident to poor dear Dr.
+Slopperton! Stopped in the king's highway, robbed of some tithe-money
+he had just received from Farmer Slowforth! If it had not been for that
+dear angel, good young man, God only knows whether I might not have been
+a disconsolate widow by this time!"
+
+While the affectionate matron was thus running on, Lucy's eye glancing
+round the room discovered in an armchair the round and oily little
+person of Dr. Slopperton, with a countenance from which all the
+carnation hues, save in one circular excrescence on the nasal member,
+that was left, like the last rose of summer, blooming alone, were faded
+into an aspect of miserable pallor. The little man tried to conjure up
+a smile while his wife was narrating his misfortune, and to mutter
+forth some syllable of unconcern; but he looked, for all his bravado,
+so exceedingly scared that Lucy would, despite herself, have laughed
+outright, had not her eye rested upon the figure of a young man who had
+been seated beside the reverend gentleman, but who had risen at Lucy's
+entrance, and who now stood gazing upon her intently, but with an air
+of great respect. Blushing deeply and involuntarily, she turned her eyes
+hastily away, and approaching the good doctor, made her inquiries into
+the present state of his nerves, in a graver tone than she had a
+minute before imagined it possible that she should have been enabled to
+command.
+
+"Ah! my good young lady," said the doctor, squeezing her hand, "I--may,
+I may say the church--for am I not its minister? was in imminent
+danger--but this excellent gentleman prevented the sacrilege, at least
+in great measure. I only lost some of my dues,--my rightful dues,--for
+which I console myself with thinking that the infamous and abandoned
+villain will suffer hereafter."
+
+"There cannot be the least doubt of that," said the young man. "Had
+he only robbed the mail-coach, or broken into a gentleman's house, the
+offence might have been expiable; but to rob a clergyman, and a rector
+too!--Oh, the sacrilegious dog!"
+
+"Your warmth does you honour, sir," said the doctor, beginning now
+to recover; "and I am very proud to have made the acquaintance of a
+gentleman of such truly religious opinions."
+
+"Ah!" cried the stranger, "my foible, sir,--if I may so speak,--is a
+sort of enthusiastic fervour for the Protestant Establishment. Nay,
+sir, I never come across the very nave of the church without feeling an
+indescribable emotion--a kind of sympathy, as it were--with--with--you
+understand me, sir--I fear I express myself ill."
+
+"Not at all, not at all!" exclaimed the doctor: "such sentiments are
+uncommon in one so young."
+
+"Sir, I learned them early in life from a friend and preceptor of mine,
+Mr. MacGrawler, and I trust they may continue with me to my dying day."
+
+Here the doctor's servant entered with (we borrow a phrase from the
+novel of ----------) "the tea-equipage;" and Mrs. Slopperton, betaking
+herself to its superintendence, inquired with more composure than
+hitherto had belonged to her demeanour, what sort of a looking creature
+the ruffian was.
+
+"I will tell you, my dear, I will tell you, Miss Lucy, all about it.
+I was walking home from Mr. Slowforth's, with his money in my pocket,
+thinking, my love, of buying you that topaz cross you wished to have."
+
+"Dear, good man!" cried Mrs. Slopperton; "what a fiend it must have been
+to rob so excellent a creature!"
+
+"And," resumed the doctor, "it also occurred to me that the Madeira was
+nearly out,--the Madeira, I mean, with the red seal; and I was thinking
+it might not be amiss to devote part of the money to buy six dozen more;
+and the remainder, my love, which would be about one pound eighteen, I
+thought I would divide--'for he that giveth to the poor lendeth to the
+Lord!'--among the thirty poor families on the common; that is, if they
+behaved well, and the apples in the back garden were not feloniously
+abstracted!"
+
+"Excellent, charitable man!" ejaculated Mrs. Slopperton. "While I was
+thus meditating, I lifted my eyes, and saw before me two men,--one
+of prodigious height, and with a great profusion of hair about his
+shoulders; the other was smaller, and wore his hat slouched over
+his face: it was a very large hat. My attention was arrested by the
+singularity of the tall person's hair, and while I was smiling at its
+luxuriance, I heard him say to his companion, 'Well, Augustus, as you
+are such a moral dog, he is in your line, not mine; so I leave him to
+you.' Little did I think those words related to me. No sooner were they
+uttered than the tall rascal leaped over a gate and disappeared; the
+other fellow, then marching up to me, very smoothly asked me the way to
+the church, and while I was explaining to him to turn first to the
+right and then to the left, and so on,--for the best way is, you know,
+exceedingly crooked,--the hypocritical scoundrel seized me by the
+collar, and cried out, 'Your money or your life!' I do assure you that
+I never trembled so much,--not, my dear Miss Lucy, so much for my own
+sake, as for the sake of the thirty poor families on the common, whose
+wants it had been my intention to relieve. I gave up the money,
+finding my prayers and expostulations were in vain; and the dog then,
+brandishing over my head an enormous bludgeon, said--what abominable
+language!--'I think, doctor, I shall put an end to an existence
+derogatory to your self and useless to others.' At that moment the young
+gentleman beside me sprang over the very gate by which the tall ruffian
+had disappeared, and cried, 'Hold, villain!' On seeing my deliverer,
+the coward started back, and plunged into a neighbouring wood. The good
+young gentleman pursued him for a few minutes, but then returning to my
+aid, conducted me home; and as we used to say at school,--
+
+                  "' Te rediisse incolumem gaudeo,'--
+
+which, being interpreted, means (sir, excuse a pun, I am sure so great a
+friend to the Church understands Latin) that I am very glad to get back
+safe to my tea. He! he! And now, Miss Lucy, you must thank that young
+gentleman for having saved the life of your pastoral teacher, which act
+will no doubt be remembered at the Great Day!"
+
+As Lucy, looking towards the stranger, said something in compliment,
+she observed a vague, and as it were covert smile upon his countenance,
+which immediately and as if by sympathy conjured one to her own. The
+hero of the adventure, however, in a very grave tone replied to her
+compliment, at the same time bowing profoundly,--
+
+"Mention it not, madam! I were unworthy of the name of a Briton and
+a man, could I pass the highway without relieving the distress or
+lightening the burden of a fellow-creature. And," continued the
+stranger, after a momentary pause, colouring while he spoke, and
+concluding in the high-flown gallantry of the day, "methinks it were
+sufficient reward, had I saved the whole church instead of one of its
+most valuable members, to receive the thanks of a lady whom I might
+reasonably take for one of those celestial beings to whom we have been
+piously taught that the Church is especially the care!"
+
+Though there might have been something really ridiculous in this
+overstrained compliment, coupled as it was with the preservation of Dr.
+Slopperton, yet, coming from the mouth of one whom Lucy thought the very
+handsomest person she had ever seen, it appeared to her anything but
+absurd; and for a very long time afterwards her heart thrilled with
+pleasure when she remembered that the cheek of the speaker had glowed,
+and his voice had trembled as he spoke it.
+
+The conversation now, turning from robbers in particular, dwelt upon
+robberies in general. It was edifying to hear the honest indignation
+with which the stranger spoke of the lawless depredators with whom the
+country, in that day of Macheaths, was infested.
+
+"A pack of infamous rascals!" said he, in a glow, "who attempt to
+justify their misdeeds by the example of honest men, and who say
+that they do no more than is done by lawyers and doctors, soldiers,
+clergymen, and ministers of State. Pitiful delusion, or rather shameless
+hypocrisy!"
+
+"It all comes of educating the poor," said the doctor. "The moment they
+pretend to judge the conduct of their betters, there's an end of all
+order! They see nothing sacred in the laws, though we hang the dogs ever
+so fast; and the very peers of the land, spiritual and temporal, cease
+to be venerable in their eyes."
+
+"Talking of peers," said Mrs. Slopperton, "I hear that Lord Mauleverer
+is to pass by this road to-night on his way to Mauleverer Park. Do you
+know his lordship, Miss Lucy: He is very intimate with your uncle."
+
+"I have only seen him once," answered Lucy.
+
+"Are you sure that his lordship will come this road?" asked the
+stranger, carelessly. "I heard something of it this morning, but did not
+know it was settled."
+
+"Oh, quite so!" rejoined Mrs. Slopperton. "His lordship's gentleman
+wrote for post-horses to meet his lordship at Wyburn, about three miles
+on the other side of the village, at ten o'clock to-night. His lordship
+is very impatient of delay."
+
+"Pray," said the doctor, who had not much heeded this turn in the
+conversation, and was now "on hospitable cares intent,"--"pray, sir, if
+not impertinent, are you visiting or lodging in the neighbourhood; or
+will you take a bed with us?"
+
+"You are extremely kind, my dear sir, but I fear I must soon wish you
+good-evening. I have to look after a little property I have some miles
+hence, which, indeed, brought me down into this part of the world."
+
+"Property!--in what direction, sir, if I may ask?" quoth the doctor; "I
+know the country for miles."
+
+"Do you, indeed? Where's my property, you say? Why, it is rather
+difficult to describe it, and it is, after all, a mere trifle; it is
+only some common-land near the highroad, and I came down to try the
+experiment of hedging and draining."
+
+"'T is a good plan, if one has capital, and does not require a speedy
+return."
+
+"Yes; but one likes a good interest for the loss of principal, and a
+speedy return is always desirable,--although, alas! it is often attended
+with risk!"
+
+"I hope, sir," said the doctor, "if you must leave us so soon, that your
+property will often bring you into our neighbourhood."
+
+"You overpower me with so much unexpected goodness," answered the
+stranger. "To tell you the truth, nothing can give me greater pleasure
+than to meet those again who have once obliged me."
+
+"Whom you have obliged, rather!" cried Mrs. Slopperton; and then added,
+in a loud whisper to Lucy, "How modest! but it is always so with true
+courage!"
+
+"I assure you, madam," returned the benevolent stranger, "that I never
+think twice of the little favours I render my fellow-men; my only hope
+is that they may be as forgetful as myself."
+
+Charmed with so much unaffected goodness of disposition, the doctor
+and Mrs. Slopperton now set up a sort of duet in praise of their guest:
+after enduring their commendations and compliments for some minutes with
+much grimace of disavowal and diffidence, the stranger's modesty seemed
+at last to take pain at the excess of their gratitude; and accordingly,
+pointing to the clock, which was within a few minutes to nine, he
+said,--
+
+"I fear, my respected host and my admired hostess, that I must now leave
+you; I have far to go."
+
+"But are you yourself not afraid of the highwaymen?" cried Mrs.
+Slopperton, interrupting him.
+
+"The highwaymen!" said the stranger, smiling; "no; I do not fear them;
+besides, I have little about me worth robbing."
+
+"Do you superintend your property yourself?" said the doctor, who farmed
+his own glebe and who, unwilling to part with so charming a guest,
+seized him now by the button.
+
+"Superintend it myself! why, not exactly. There is a bailiff, whose
+views of things don't agree with mine, and who now and then gives me a
+good deal of trouble."
+
+"Then why don't you discharge him altogether?"
+
+"Ah! I wish I could; but 't is a necessary evil. We landed proprietors,
+my dear sir, must always be plagued with some thing of the sort. For my
+part, I have found those cursed bailiffs would take away, if they
+could, all the little property one has been trying to accumulate. But,"
+abruptly changing his manner into one of great softness, "could I not
+proffer my services and my companionship to this young lady? Would she
+allow me to conduct her home, and indeed stamp this day upon my memory
+as one of the few delightful ones I have ever known?"
+
+"Thank you, dear sir," said Mrs. Slopperton, answering at once for Lucy;
+"it is very considerate of you.--And I am sure, my love, I could
+not think of letting you go home alone with old John, after such an
+adventure to the poor dear doctor."
+
+Lucy began an excuse which the good lady would not hear. But as the
+servant whom Mr. Brandon was to send with a lantern to attend his
+daughter home had not arrived, and as Mrs. Slopperton, despite her
+prepossessions in favour of her husband's deliverer, did not for a
+moment contemplate his accompanying, without any other attendance, her
+young friend across the fields at that unseasonable hour, the stranger
+was forced, for the present, to re-assume his seat. An open harpsichord
+at one end of the room gave him an opportunity to make some remark
+upon music; and this introducing an eulogium on Lucy's voice from Mrs.
+Slopperton, necessarily ended in a request to Miss Brandon to indulge
+the stranger with a song. Never had Lucy, who was not a shy girl,--she
+was too innocent to be bashful,--felt nervous hitherto in singing before
+a stranger; but now she hesitated and faltered, and went through a
+whole series of little natural affectations before she complied with
+the request. She chose a song composed somewhat after the old English
+school, which at that time was reviving into fashion. The song, though
+conveying a sort of conceit, was not, perhaps, altogether without
+tenderness; it was a favourite with Lucy, she scarcely knew why, and ran
+thus:--
+
+                              LUCY'S SONG.
+
+                    Why sleep, ye gentle flowers, ah, why,
+                    When tender eve is falling,
+                    And starlight drinks the happy sigh
+                    Of winds to fairies calling?
+                    Calling with low and plaining note,
+                    Most like a ringdove chiding,
+                    Or flute faint-heard from distant boat
+                    O'er smoothest waters gliding.
+                    Lo, round you steals the wooing breeze;
+                    Lo, on you falls the dew!
+                    O sweets, awake, for scarcely these
+                    Can charm while wanting you!
+                    Wake ye not yet, while fast below
+                    The silver time is fleeing?
+                    O heart of mine, those flowers but show
+                    Thine own contented being.
+                    The twilight but preserves the bloom,
+                    The sun can but decay
+                    The warmth that brings the rich perfume
+                    But steals the life away.
+                    O heart, enjoy thy present calm,
+                    Rest peaceful in the shade,
+                    And dread the sun that gives the balm
+                    To bid the blossom fade.
+
+When Lucy ended, the stranger's praise was less loud than either the
+doctor's or his lady's; but how far more sweet it was! And for the first
+time in her life Lucy made the discovery that eyes can praise as well
+as lips. For our part, we have often thought that that discovery is an
+epoch in life.
+
+It was now that Mrs. Slopperton declared her thorough conviction that
+the stranger himself could sing. He had that about him, she said, which
+made her sure of it.
+
+"Indeed, dear madam," said he, with his usual undefinable, half-frank,
+half-latent smile, "my voice is but so-so, and any memory so indifferent
+that even in the easiest passages I soon come to a stand. My best notes
+are in the falsetto; and as for my execution--But we won't talk of
+that."
+
+"Nay, nay; you are so modest," said Mrs. Slopperton. "I am sure you
+could oblige us if you would."
+
+"Your command," said the stranger, moving to the harpsichord, "is
+all-sufficient; and since you, madam," turning to Lucy, "have chosen
+a song after the old school, may I find pardon if I do the same? My
+selection is, to be sure, from a lawless song-book, and is supposed to
+be a ballad by Robin Hood, or at least one of his merry men,--a very
+different sort of outlaws from the knaves who attacked you, sir!"
+
+With this preface the stranger sung to a wild yet jovial air, with a
+tolerable voice, the following effusion:
+
+               THE LOVE OF OUR PROFESSION; OR THE ROBBER'S LIFE.
+
+               On the stream of the world, the robber's life
+               Is borne on the blithest wave;
+               Now it bounds into light in a gladsome strife,
+               Now it laughs in its hiding cave.
+
+               At his maiden's lattice he stays the rein;
+               How still is his courser proud
+               (But still as a wind when it hangs o'er the main
+               In the breast of the boding cloud),
+
+               With the champed bit and the archd crest,
+               And the eye of a listening deer,
+               Like valour, fretful most in rest,
+               Least chafed when in career.
+
+               Fit slave to a lord whom all else refuse
+               To save at his desperate need;
+               By my troth!  I think one whom the world pursues
+               Hath a right to a gallant steed.
+
+               "Away, my beloved, I hear their feet!
+               I blow thee a kiss, my fair,
+               And I promise to bring thee, when next we meet,
+               A braid for thy bonny hair.
+
+               Hurrah!  for the booty!--my steed, hurrah!
+               Thorough bush, thorough brake, go we;
+               And the coy moon smiles on our merry way,
+               Like my own love,--timidly."
+
+               The parson he rides with a jingling pouch,
+               How it blabs of the rifled poor!
+               The courtier he lolls in his gilded coach,
+               --How it smacks of a sinecure!
+
+               The lawyer revolves in his whirling chaise
+               Sweet thoughts of a mischief done;
+               And the lady that knoweth the card she plays
+               Is counting her guineas won!
+
+               "He, lady!--What, holla, ye sinless men!
+               My claim ye can scarce refuse;
+               For when honest folk live on their neighbours, then
+               They encroach on the robber's dues!"
+
+               The lady changed cheek like a bashful maid,
+               The lawyer talked wondrous fair,
+               The parson blasphemed, and the courtier prayed,
+               And the robber bore off his share.
+
+               "Hurrah! for the revel! my steed, hurrah!
+               Thorough bush, thorough brake, go we!
+               It is ever a virtue, when others pay,
+
+               To ruffle it merrily!"
+
+               Oh, there never was life like the robber's,
+               --so Jolly and bold and free!
+               And its end-why, a cheer from the crowd below,
+               And a leap from a leafless tree!
+
+This very moral lay being ended, Mrs. Slopperton declared it was
+excellent; though she confessed she thought the sentiments rather loose.
+Perhaps the gentleman might be induced to favour them with a song of a
+more refined and modern turn,--something sentimental, in short. Glancing
+towards Lucy, the stranger answered that he only knew one song of
+the kind Mrs. Slopperton specified, and it was so short that he could
+scarcely weary her patience by granting her request.
+
+At this moment the river, which was easily descried from the windows of
+the room, glimmered in the starlight; and directing his looks towards
+the water, as if the scene had suggested to him the verses he sung, he
+gave the following stanzas in a very low, sweet tone, and with a far
+purer taste, than, perhaps, would have suited the preceding and ruder
+song.
+
+                              THE WISH.
+
+               As sleeps the dreaming Eve below,
+               Its holiest star keeps ward above,
+               And yonder wave begins to glow,
+               Like friendship bright'ning into Love!
+
+               Ah, would thy bosom were that stream,
+               Ne'er wooed save by the virgin air!--
+               Ah, would that I were that star, whose beam
+               Looks down and finds its image there!
+
+Scarcely was the song ended, before the arrival of Miss Brandon's
+servant was announced; and her destined escort, starting up, gallantly
+assisted her with her cloak and her hood,--happy, no doubt, to escape in
+some measure the overwhelming compliments of his entertainers.
+
+"But," said the doctor, as he shook hands with his deliverer, "by what
+name shall I remember and" (lifting his reverend eyes) "pray for the
+gentleman to whom I am so much indebted?"
+
+"You are very kind," said the stranger; "my name is Clifford. Madam,"
+turning to Lucy, "may I offer my hand down the stairs?"
+
+Lucy accepted the courtesy; and the stranger was half-way down the
+staircase, when the doctor, stretching out his little neck, exclaimed,--
+
+"Good-evening, sir! I do hope we shall meet again."
+
+"Fear not!" said Mr. Clifford, laughing gayly; "I am too great a
+traveller to make that hope a matter of impossibility. Take care,
+madam,--one step more."
+
+The night was calm and tolerably clear, though the moon had not yet
+risen, as Lucy and her companion passed through the fields, with the
+servant preceding them at a little distance with the lantern.
+
+After a pause of some length, Clifford said, with a little hesitation,
+"Is Miss Brandon related to the celebrated barrister of her name?"
+
+"He is my uncle," said Lucy; "do you know him?"
+
+"Only your uncle?" said Clifford, with vivacity, and evading Lucy's
+question. "I feared--hem! hem!--that is, I thought he might have been a
+nearer relation." There was another, but a shorter pause, when Clifford
+resumed, in a low voice: "Will Miss Brandon think me very presumptuous
+if I say that a countenance like hers, once seen, can never be
+forgotten; and I believe, some years since, I had the honour to see her
+in London, at the theatre? It was but a momentary and distant glance
+that I was then enabled to gain; and yet," he added significantly, "it
+sufficed!"
+
+"I was only once at the theatre while in London, some years ago," said
+Lucy, a little embarrassed; "and indeed an unpleasant occurrence which
+happened to my uncle, with whom I was, is sufficient to make me remember
+it."
+
+"Ha! and what was it?"
+
+"Why, in going out of the play-house his watch was stolen by some
+dexterous pickpocket."
+
+"Was the rogue caught?" asked the stranger.
+
+"Yes; and was sent the next day to Bridewell. My uncle said he was
+extremely young, and yet quite hardened. I remember that I was foolish
+enough, when I heard of his sentence, to beg very hard that my uncle
+would intercede for him; but in vain."
+
+"Did you, indeed, intercede for him?" said the stranger, in so earnest
+a tone that Lucy coloured for the twentieth time that night, without
+seeing any necessity for the blush. Clifford continued, in a gayer
+tone: "Well, it is surprising how rogues hang together. I should not be
+greatly surprised if the person who despoiled your uncle were one of the
+same gang as the rascal who so terrified your worthy friend the doctor.
+But is this handsome old place your home?"
+
+"This is my home," answered Lucy; "but it is an old-fashioned, strange
+place; and few people, to whom it was not endeared by associations,
+would think it handsome."
+
+"Pardon me!" said Lucy's companion, stopping, and surveying with a look
+of great interest the quaint pile, which now stood close before them;
+its dark bricks, gable-ends, and ivied walls, tinged by the starry
+light of the skies, and contrasted by the river, which rolled in silence
+below. The shutters to the large oriel window of the room in which the
+squire usually sat were still unclosed, and the steady and warm light of
+the apartment shone forth, casting a glow even to the smooth waters of
+the river; at the same moment, too, the friendly bark of the house-dog
+was heard, as in welcome; and was followed by the note of the great
+bell, announcing the hour for the last meal of the old-fashioned and
+hospitable family.
+
+"There is a pleasure in this," said the stranger, unconsciously, and
+with a half-sigh; "I wish I had a home!"
+
+"And have you not a home?" said Lucy, with naivety. "As much as a
+bachelor can have, perhaps," answered Clifford, recovering without an
+effort his gayety and self-possession. "But you know we wanderers are
+not allowed the same boast as the more fortunate Benedicts; we send
+our hearts in search of a home, and we lose the one without gaining the
+other. But I keep you in the cold, and we are now at your door."
+
+"You will come in, of course!" said Miss Brandon, "and partake of our
+evening cheer."
+
+The stranger hesitated for an instant, and then said in a quick tone,--
+
+"No! many, many thanks; it is already late. Will Miss Brandon accept
+my gratitude for her condescension in permitting the attendance of one
+unknown to her?" As he thus spoke, Clifford bowed profoundly over the
+hand of his beautiful charge; and Lucy, wishing him good-night, hastened
+with a light step to her father's side.
+
+Meanwhile Clifford, after lingering a minute, when the door was closed
+on him, turned abruptly away; and muttering to himself, repaired with
+rapid steps to whatever object he had then in view.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+                              Up rouse ye then,
+                              My merry, merry men!
+                                            --JOANNA BAILLIE.
+
+When the moon rose that night, there was one spot upon which she palely
+broke, about ten miles distant from Warlock, which the forewarned
+traveller would not have been eager to pass, but which might not have
+afforded a bad study to such artists as have caught from the savage
+painter of the Apennines a love for the wild and the adventurous. Dark
+trees, scattered far and wide over a broken but verdant sward, made the
+background; the moon shimmered through the boughs as she came slowly
+forth from her pavilion of cloud, and poured a broader beam on two
+figures just advanced beyond the trees. More plainly brought into light
+by her rays than his companion, here a horseman, clad in a short cloak
+that barely covered the crupper of his steed, was looking to the priming
+of a large pistol which he had just taken from his holster. A slouched
+hat and a mask of black crape conspired with the action to throw a
+natural suspicion on the intentions of the rider. His horse, a beautiful
+dark gray, stood quite motionless, with arched neck, and its short
+ears quickly moving to and fro, demonstrative of that sagacious and
+anticipative attention which characterizes the noblest of all tamed
+animals; you would not have perceived the impatience of the steed, but
+for the white foam that gathered round the bit, and for an occasional
+and unfrequent toss of the head. Behind this horseman, and partially
+thrown into the dark shadow of the trees, another man, similarly clad,
+was busied in tightening the girths of a horse, of great strength and
+size. As he did so, he hummed, with no unmusical murmur, the air of a
+popular drinking-song.
+
+"'Sdeath, Ned!" said his comrade, who had for some time been plunged
+in a silent revery,--"'Sdeath! why can you not stifle your love for the
+fine arts at a moment like this? That hum of thine grows louder every
+moment; at last I expect it will burst out into a full roar. Recollect
+we are not at Gentleman George's now!"
+
+"The more's the pity, Augustus," answered Ned. "Soho, Little John;
+woaho, sir! A nice long night like this is made on purpose for drinking.
+Will you, sir? keep still then!"
+
+"Man never is, but always to be blest," said the moralizing Tomlinson;
+"you see you sigh for other scenes even when you have a fine night and
+the chance of a God-send before you."
+
+"Ay, the night is fine enough," said Ned, who was rather a grumbler,
+as, having finished his groom-like operation, he now slowly mounted.
+"D---it, Oliver! [The moon] looks out as broadly as if he were going
+to blab. For my part, I love a dark night, with a star here and there
+winking at us, as much as to say, 'I see you, my boys, but I won't say
+a word about it,' and a small, pattering, drizzling, mizzling rain, that
+prevents Little John's hoofs being heard, and covers one's retreat, as
+it were. Besides, when one is a little wet, it is always necessary to
+drink the more, to keep the cold from one's stomach when one gets home."
+
+"Or in other words," said Augustus, who loved a maxim from his very
+heart, "light wet cherishes heavy wet!"
+
+"Good!" said Ned, yawning. "Hang it, I wish the captain would come. Do
+you know what o'clock it is? Not far short of eleven, I suppose?"
+
+"About that! Hist, is that a carriage? No, it is only a sudden rise in
+the wind."
+
+"Very self-sufficient in Mr. Wind to allow himself to be raised without
+our help!" said Ned; "by the way, we are of course to go back to the Red
+Cave?"
+
+"So Captain Lovett says. Tell me, Ned, what do you think of the new
+tenant Lovett has put into the cave?"
+
+"Oh, I have strange doubts there," answered Ned, shaking the hairy
+honours of his head. "I don't half like it; consider the cave is our
+stronghold, and ought only to be known--"
+
+"To men of tried virtue," interrupted Tomlinson. "I agree with you; I
+must try and get Lovett to discard his singular protege, as the French
+say."
+
+"'Gad, Augustus, how came you by so much learning? You know all the
+poets by heart, to say nothing of Latin and French."
+
+"Oh, hang it, I was brought up, like the captain, to a literary way of
+life."
+
+"That's what makes you so thick with him, I suppose. He writes (and
+sings too) a tolerable song, and is certainly a deuced clever fellow.
+What a rise in the world he has made! Do you recollect what a poor sort
+of way he was in when you introduced him at Gentleman George's? and now
+he's the Captain Crank of the gang."
+
+"The gang! the company, you mean. Gang, indeed! One would think you were
+speaking of a knot of pickpockets. Yes, Lovett is a clever fellow; and,
+thanks to me, a very decent philosopher!" It is impossible to convey
+to our reader the grave air of importance with which Tomlinson made his
+concluding laudation. "Yes," said he, after a pause, "he has a
+bold, plain way of viewing things, and, like Voltaire, he becomes a
+philosopher by being a Man of Sense! Hist! see my horse's ears! Some one
+is coming, though I don't hear him! Keep watch!"
+
+The robbers grew silent; the sound of distant hoofs was indistinctly
+heard, and, as it came nearer, there was a crash of boughs, as if a
+hedge had been ridden through. Presently the moon gleamed picturesquely
+on the figure of a horseman, approaching through the copse in the rear
+of the robbers.
+
+Now he was half seen among the sinuosities of his forest path; now in
+full sight, now altogether hid; then his horse neighed impatiently; now
+he again came in sight, and in a moment more he had joined the pair!
+The new-corner was of a tall and sinewy frame, and in the first bloom
+of manhood. A frock of dark green, edged with a narrow silver lace, and
+buttoned from the throat to the middle, gave due effect to an upright
+mien, a broad chest, and a slender but rounded waist, that stood in no
+need of the compression of the tailor. A short riding-cloak, clasped
+across the throat with a silver buckle, hung picturesquely over one
+shoulder, while his lower limbs were cased in military boots, which,
+though they rose above the knee, were evidently neither heavy nor
+embarrassing to the vigorous sinews of the horseman. The caparisons of
+the steed--the bit, the bridle, the saddle, the holster--were according
+to the most approved fashion of the day; and the steed itself was in
+the highest condition, and of remarkable beauty. The horseman's air was
+erect and bold; a small but coal-black mustachio heightened the resolute
+expression of his short, curved lip; and from beneath the large hat
+which overhung his brow his long locks escaped, and waved darkly in the
+keen night air. Altogether, horseman and horse exhibited a gallant and
+even a chivalrous appearance, which the hour and the scene heightened to
+a dramatic and romantic effect.
+
+"Ha! Lovett."
+
+"How are you, my merry men?" were the salutations exchanged.
+
+"What news?" said Ned.
+
+"Brave news! look to it. My lord and his carriage will be by in ten
+minutes at most."
+
+"Have you got anything more out of the parson I frightened so
+gloriously?" asked Augustus.
+
+"No; more of that hereafter. Now for our new prey."
+
+"Are you sure our noble friend will be so soon at hand?" said Tomlinson,
+patting his steed, that now pawed in excited hilarity.
+
+"Sure! I saw him change horses; I was in the stable-yard at the time. He
+got out for half an hour, to eat, I fancy. Be sure that I played him a
+trick in the mean while."
+
+"What for?" asked Ned.
+
+"Self and servant."
+
+"The post-boys?"
+
+"Ay, I forgot them. Never mind, you, must frighten them."
+
+"Forwards!" cried Ned; and his horse sprang from his armed heel.
+
+"One moment," said Lovett; "I must put on my mask. Soho, Robin, soho!
+Now for it,--forwards!"
+
+As the trees rapidly disappeared behind them, the riders entered, at a
+hand gallop, on a broad tract of waste land interspersed with dikes and
+occasionally fences of hurdles, over which their horses bounded like
+quadrupeds well accustomed to such exploits.
+
+Certainly at that moment, what with the fresh air, the fitful moonlight
+now breaking broadly out, now lost in a rolling cloud, the exciting
+exercise, and that racy and dancing stir of the blood, which all action,
+whether evil or noble in its nature, raises in our veins; what with
+all this, we cannot but allow the fascination of that lawless life,--a
+fascination so great that one of the most noted gentlemen highwaymen of
+the day, one too who had received an excellent education and mixed in no
+inferior society, is reported to have said, when the rope was about his
+neck, and the good Ordinary was exhorting him to repent of his
+ill-spent life, "Ill-spent, you dog! 'Gad!" (smacking his lips) "it was
+delicious!"
+
+"Fie! fie! Mr. -------, raise your thoughts to Heaven!"
+
+"But a canter across the common--oh!" muttered the criminal; and his
+soul cantered off to eternity.
+
+So briskly leaped the heart of the leader of the three that, as they
+now came in view of the main road, and the distant wheel of a carriage
+whirred on the ear, he threw up his right hand with a joyous gesture,
+and burst into a boyish exclamation of hilarity and delight.
+
+"Whist, captain!" said Ned, checking his own spirits with a mock air of
+gravity, "let us conduct ourselves like gentlemen; it is only your low
+fellows who get into such confoundedly high spirits; men of the world
+like us should do everything as if their hearts were broken."
+
+"Melancholy ever cronies with Sublimity, and Courage is sublime," said
+Augustus, with the pomp of a maxim-maker.
+
+     [A maxim which would have pleased Madame de Stael, who thought that
+     philosophy consisted in fine sentiments.  In the "Life of Lord
+     Byron," just published by Mr. Moore, the distinguished biographer
+     makes a similar assertion to that of the sage Augustus: "When did
+     ever a sublime thought spring up in the soul that melancholy was not
+     to be found, however latent, in its neighbourhood?" Now, with due
+     deference to Mr. Moore, this is a very sickly piece of nonsense,
+     that has not even an atom of truth to stand on.  "God said, Let
+     there be light, and there was light!"--we should like to know where
+     lies the melancholy of that sublime sentence.  "Truth," says Plato,
+     "is the body of God, and light is his shadow."  In the name of
+     common-sense, in what possible corner in the vicinity of that lofty
+     image lurks the jaundiced face of this eternal bete noir of Mr.
+     Moore's?  Again, in that sublimest passage in the sublimest of the
+     Latin poets (Lucretius), which bursts forth in honour of Epicurus,
+     is there anything that speaks to us of sadness?  On the contrary, in
+     the three passages we have referred to, especially in the two first
+     quoted, there is something splendidly luminous and cheering.  Joy is
+     often a great source of the sublime; the suddenness of its ventings
+     would alone suffice to make it so.  What can be more sublime than
+     the triumphant Psalms of David, intoxicated as they are with an
+     almost delirium of transport?  Even in the gloomiest passages of the
+     poets, where we recognize sublimity, we do not often find
+     melancholy.  We are stricken by terror, appalled by awe, but seldom
+     softened into sadness.  In fact, melancholy rather belongs to
+     another class of feelings than those excited by a sublime passage or
+     those which engender its composition.  On one hand, in the loftiest
+     flights of Homer, Milton, and Shakspeare, we will challenge a critic
+     to discover this "green sickness" which Mr. Moore would convert
+     into the magnificence of the plague.  On the other hand, where is
+     the evidence that melancholy made the habitual temperaments of those
+     divine men?  Of Homer we know nothing; of Shakspeare and Milton, we
+     have reason to believe the ordinary temperament was constitutionally
+     cheerful.  The latter boasts of it.  A thousand instances, in
+     contradiction to an assertion it were not worth while to contradict,
+     were it not so generally popular, so highly sanctioned, and so
+     eminently pernicious to everything that is manly and noble in
+     literature, rush to our memory.  But we think we have already quoted
+     enough to disprove the sentence, which the illustrious biographer
+     has himself disproved in more than twenty passages, which, if he is
+     pleased to forget, we thank Heaven posterity never will.  Now we are
+     on the subject of this Life, so excellent in many respects, we
+     cannot but observe that we think the whole scope of its philosophy
+     utterly unworthy of the accomplished mind of the writer; the
+     philosophy consists of an unpardonable distorting of general truths,
+     to suit the peculiarities of an individual, noble indeed, but
+     proverbially morbid and eccentric.  A striking instance of this
+     occurs in the laboured assertion that poets make but sorry domestic
+     characters.  What!  because Lord Byron is said to have been a bad
+     husband, was (to go no further back for examples)--was Walter Scott
+     a bad husband, or was Campbell, or is Mr. Moore himself?  why, in
+     the name of justice, should it be insinuated that Milton was a bad
+     husband, when, as far as any one can judge of the matter, it was
+     Mrs. Milton who was the bad wife?  And why, oh! why should we be
+     told by Mr. Moore,--a man who, to judge by Captain Rock and the
+     Epicurean, wants neither learning nor diligence,--why are we to be
+     told, with peculiar emphasis, that Lord Bacon never married, when
+     Lord Bacon not only married, but his marriage was so advantageous as
+     to be an absolute epoch in his career?  Really, really, one begins
+     to believe that there is not such a thing as a fact in the world!]
+
+"Now for the hedge!" cried Lovett, unheeding his comrades; and his horse
+sprang into the road.
+
+The three men now were drawn up quite still and motionless by the side
+of the hedge. The broad road lay before them, curving out of sight on
+either side; the ground was hardening under an early tendency to frost,
+and the clear ring of approaching hoofs sounded on the ear of the
+robbers, ominous, haply, of the chinks of "more attractive metal" about,
+if Hope told no flattering tale, to be their own.
+
+Presently the long-expected vehicle made its appearance at the turn of
+the road, and it rolled rapidly on behind four fleet post-horses.
+
+"You, Ned, with your large steed, stop the horses; you, Augustus, bully
+the post-boys; leave me to do the rest," said the captain.
+
+"As agreed," returned Ned, laconically. "Now, look at me!" and the horse
+of the vain highwayman sprang from its shelter. So instantaneous were
+the operations of these experienced tacticians, that Lovett's orders
+were almost executed in a briefer time than it had cost him to give
+them.
+
+The carriage being stopped, and the post-boys white and trembling, with
+two pistols (levelled by Augustus and Pepper) cocked at their heads,
+Lovett, dismounting, threw open the door of the carriage, and in a very
+civil tone and with a very bland address accosted the inmate.
+
+"Do not be alarmed, my lord, you are perfectly safe; we only require
+your watch and purse."
+
+"Really," answered a voice still softer than that of the robber, while
+a marked and somewhat French countenance, crowned with a fur cap, peered
+forth at the arrester,--"Really, sir, your request is so modest that I
+were worse than cruel to refuse you. My purse is not very full, and you
+may as well have it as one of my rascally duns; but my watch I have a
+love for, and--"
+
+"I understand you, my lord," interrupted the highwayman. "What do you
+value your watch at?"
+
+"Humph! to you it may be worth some twenty guineas."
+
+"Allow me to see it!"
+
+"Your curiosity is extremely gratifying," returned the nobleman, as with
+great reluctance he drew forth a gold repeater, set, as was sometimes
+the fashion of that day, in precious stones. The highwayman looked
+slightly at the bauble.
+
+"Your lordship," said he, with great gravity, "was too modest in your
+calculation; your taste reflects greater credit on you. Allow me to
+assure you that your watch is worth fifty guinea's to us, at the least.
+To show you that I think so most sincerely, I will either keep it, and
+we will say no more on the matter; or I will return it to you upon your
+word of honour that you will give me a check for fifty guineas payable,
+by your real bankers, to 'bearer for self.' Take your choice; it is
+quite immaterial to me!"
+
+"Upon my honour, sir," said the traveller, with some surprise struggling
+to his features, "your coolness and self-possession are quite admirable.
+I see you know the world."
+
+"Your lordship flatters me!" returned Lovett, bowing. "How do you
+decide?"
+
+"Why, is it possible to write drafts without ink, pen, or paper?"
+
+Lovett drew back, and while he was searching in his pockets for writing
+implements, which he always carried about him, the traveller seized
+the opportunity, and suddenly snatching a pistol from the pocket of the
+carriage, levelled it full at the head of the robber. The traveller was
+an excellent and practised shot,--he was almost within arm's length
+of his intended victim,--his pistols were the envy of all his Irish
+friends. He pulled the trigger,--the powder flashed in the pan; and
+the highwayman, not even changing countenance, drew forth a small
+ink-bottle, and placing a steel pen in it, handed it to the nobleman,
+saying, with incomparable sang froid: "Would you like, my lord, to try
+the other pistol? If so, oblige me by a quick aim, as you must see the
+necessity of despatch. If not, here is the back of a letter, on which
+you can write the draft."
+
+The traveller was not a man apt to become embarrassed in anything
+save his circumstances; but he certainly felt a little discomposed and
+confused as he took the paper, and uttering some broken words, wrote the
+check. The highwayman glanced over it, saw it was written according to
+form, and then with a bow of cool respect, returned the watch, and shut
+the door of the carriage.
+
+Meanwhile the servant had been shivering in front, boxed up in that
+solitary convenience termed, not euphoniously, a dickey. Him the robber
+now briefly accosted.
+
+"What have you got about you belonging to your master?"
+
+"Only his pills, your honour! which I forgot to put in the--"
+
+"Pills!--throw them down to me!" The valet tremblingly extricated from
+his side-pocket a little box, which he threw down and Lovett caught in
+his hand.
+
+He opened the box, counted the pills,--"One, two, four, twelve,--aha!"
+He reopened the carriage door. "Are these your pills, my lord?"
+
+The wondering peer, who had begun to resettle himself in the corner of
+his carriage, answered that they were.
+
+"My lord, I see you are in a high state of fever; you were a little
+delirious just now when you snapped a pistol in your friend's face.
+Permit me to recommend you a prescription,--swallow off all these
+pills!"
+
+"My God!" cried the traveller, startled into earnestness; "what do you
+mean?--twelve of those pills would kill a man!"
+
+"Hear him!" said the robber, appealing to his comrades, who roared with
+laughter. "What, my lord, would you rebel against your doctor? Fie, fie!
+be persuaded."
+
+And with a soothing gesture he stretched the pill-box towards the
+recoiling nose of the traveller. But though a man who could as well as
+any one make the best of a bad condition, the traveller was especially
+careful of his health; and so obstinate was he where that was concerned,
+that he would rather have submitted to the effectual operation of
+a bullet than incurred the chance operation of an extra pill. He
+therefore, with great indignation, as the box was still extended towards
+him, snatched it from the hand of the robber, and flinging it across the
+road, said with dignity,--
+
+"Do your worst, rascals! But if you leave me alive, you shall repent the
+outrage you have offered to one of his Majesty's household!" Then, as if
+becoming sensible of the ridicule of affecting too much in his present
+situation, he added in an altered tone: "And now, for Heaven's sake,
+shut the door; and if you must kill somebody, there's my servant on the
+box,--he's paid for it."
+
+This speech made the robbers laugh more than ever; and Lovett, who liked
+a joke even better than a purse, immediately closed the carriage door,
+saying,--
+
+"Adieu, my lord; and let me give you a piece of advice: whenever you
+get out at a country inn, and stay half an hour while your horses are
+changing, take your pistols with you, or you may chance to have the
+charge drawn."
+
+With this admonition the robber withdrew; and seeing that the valet held
+out to him a long green purse, he said, gently shaking his head,--
+
+"Rogues should not prey on each other, my good fellow. You rob your
+master; so do we. Let each keep what he has got."
+
+Long Ned and Tomlinson then backing their horses, the carriage was
+freed; and away started the post-boys at a pace which seemed to show
+less regard for life than the robbers themselves had evinced.
+
+Meanwhile the captain remounted his steed, and the three confederates,
+bounding in gallant style over the hedge through which they had
+previously gained the road, galloped off in the same direction they had
+come; the moon ever and anon bringing into light their flying figures,
+and the sound of many a joyous peal of laughter ringing through the
+distance along the frosty air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+          What is here?--
+
+          Gold?
+
+          Thus much of this will make black white, foul fair.
+
+                                         Timon of Athens.
+
+          Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly drest,
+          Fresh as a bridegroom.
+
+                                         Henry the Fourth.
+
+          I do not know the man I should avoid
+          So soon as that spare Cassius!
+          He reads much.  He is a great observer; and he looks
+          Quite through the deeds of men.
+          Often he smiles; but smiles in such a sort,
+          As if he mocked himself or scorned his spirit,
+          That could be moved to smile at anything.
+
+                                         Julius Caesar.
+
+The next day, late at noon, as Lucy was sitting with her father, not as
+usual engaged either in work or in reading, but seemingly quite idle,
+with her pretty foot upon the squire's gouty stool, and eyes fixed on
+the carpet, while her hands (never were hands so soft and so small as
+Lucy's, though they may have been eclipsed in whiteness) were lightly
+clasped together and reposed listlessly on her knees,--the surgeon of
+the village abruptly entered with a face full of news and horror. Old
+Squire Brandon was one of those persons who always hear news, whatever
+it may be, later than any of their neighbours; and it was not till all
+the gossips of the neighbourhood had picked the bone of the matter quite
+bare, that he was now informed, through the medium of Mr. Pillum,
+that Lord Mauleverer had on the preceding night been stopped by three
+highwaymen in his road to his country-seat, and robbed to a considerable
+amount.
+
+The fame of the worthy Dr. Slopperton's maladventure having long ere
+this been spread far and wide, the whole neighbourhood was naturally
+thrown into great consternation. Magistrates were sent to, large dogs
+borrowed, blunderbusses cleaned, and a subscription made throughout the
+parish for the raising of a patrol. There seemed little doubt but that
+the offenders in either case were members of the same horde; and Mr.
+Pillum, in his own mind, was perfectly convinced that they meant to
+encroach upon his trade, and destroy all the surrounding householders
+who were worth the trouble.
+
+The next week passed in the most diligent endeavours, on the part of the
+neighbouring magistrates and yeomanry, to detect and seize the robbers;
+but their labours were utterly fruitless; and one justice of peace, who
+had been particularly active, was himself entirely "cleaned out" by an
+old gentleman who, under the name of Mr. Bagshot,--rather an ominous
+cognomen,--offered to conduct the unsuspicious magistrate to the very
+spot where the miscreants might be seized. No sooner, however, had he
+drawn the poor justice away from his comrades into a lonely part of
+the road than he stripped him to his shirt. He did not even leave his
+worship his flannel drawers, though the weather was as bitter as the
+dog-days of 1829.
+
+"It is not my way," said the hoary ruffian, when the justice petitioned
+at least for the latter article of attire,--"'t is not my way. I be 's
+slow about my work, but I does it thoroughly; so off with your rags, old
+un."
+
+This was, however, the only additional instance of aggression in the
+vicinity of Warlock Manor-house; and by degrees, as the autumn declined,
+and no further enormities were perpetrated, people began to look out
+for a new topic of conversation. This was afforded them by a piece of
+unexpected good fortune to Lucy Brandon:
+
+Mrs. Warner--an old lady to whom she was slightly related, and with whom
+she had been residing during her brief and only visit to London--died
+suddenly, and in her will declared Lucy to be her sole heiress. The
+property, which was in the Funds, and which amounted to L60,000, was to
+be enjoyed by Miss Brandon immediately on her attaining her twenty-first
+year; meanwhile the executors to the will were to pay to the young
+heiress the annual sum of L600. The joy which this news created in
+Warlock Manor-house may easily be conceived. The squire projected
+improvements here, and repairs there; and Lucy, poor girl, who had no
+idea of money for herself, beyond the purchase of a new pony, or a
+gown from London, seconded with affectionate pleasure all her father's
+suggestions, and delighted herself with the reflection that those fine
+plans, which were to make the Brandons greater than the Brandons ever
+were before, were to be realized by her own, own money! It was at this
+identical time that the surrounding gentry made a simultaneous and grand
+discovery,--namely, of the astonishing merits and great good-sense of
+Mr. Joseph Brandon. It was a pity, they observed, that he was of so
+reserved and shy a turn,--it was not becoming in a gentleman of so
+ancient a family; but why should they not endeavour to draw him from
+his retirement into those more public scenes which he was doubtless well
+calculated to adorn?
+
+Accordingly, as soon as the first month of mourning had expired, several
+coaches, chariots, chaises, and horses which had never been seen at
+Warlock Manor-house before, arrived there one after the other in the
+most friendly manner imaginable. Their owners admired everything,--the
+house was such a fine relic of old times!--for their parts they liked
+an oak staircase!--and those nice old windows!--and what a beautiful
+peacock!--and, Heaven save the mark! that magnificent chestnut-tree
+was worth a forest! Mr. Brandon was requested to make one of the county
+hunt, not that he any longer hunted himself, but that his name would
+give such consequence to the thing! Miss Lucy must come to pass a week
+with her dear friends the Honourable Misses Sansterre! Augustus, their
+brother, had such a sweet lady's horse! In short, the customary change
+which takes place in people's characters after the acquisition of a
+fortune took place in the characters of Mr. and Miss Brandon; and
+when people become suddenly amiable, it is no wonder that they should
+suddenly gain a vast accession of friends.
+
+But Lucy, though she had seen so little of the world, was not quite
+blind; and the squire, though rather obtuse, was not quite a fool.
+If they were not rude to their new visitors, they were by no means
+overpowered with gratitude at their condescension. Mr. Brandon declined
+subscribing to the hunt, and Miss Lucy laughed in the face of the
+Honourable Augustus Sansterre. Among their new guests, however, was one
+who to great knowledge of the world joined an extreme and even
+brilliant polish of manners, which at least prevented deceit from
+being disagreeable, if not wholly from being unseen this was the new
+lieutenant of the county, Lord Mauleverer.
+
+Though possessed of an immense property in that district, Lord
+Mauleverer had hitherto resided but little on his estates. He was one
+of those gay lords who are now somewhat uncommon in this country after
+mature manhood is attained, who live an easy and rakish life, rather
+among their parasites than their equals, and who yet, by aid of an
+agreeable manner, natural talents, and a certain graceful and light
+cultivation of mind (not the less pleasant for its being universally
+coloured with worldliness, and an amusing rather than offensive regard
+for self), never lose their legitimate station in society; who are
+oracles in dress, equipages, cookery, and beauty, and, having no
+character of their own, are able to fix by a single word a character
+upon any one else. Thus, while Mauleverer rather lived the dissolute
+life of a young nobleman, who prefers the company of agreeable demireps
+to that of wearisome duchesses, than maintained the decorous state
+befitting a mature age, and an immense interest in the country, he was
+quite as popular at court, where he held a situation in the household,
+as he was in the green-room, where he enchanted every actress on the
+right side of forty. A word from him in the legitimate quarters of power
+went further than an harangue from another; and even the prudes--at
+least, all those who had daughters--confessed that his lordship was a
+very interesting character. Like Brandon, his familiar friend, he had
+risen in the world (from the Irish baron to the English earl) without
+having ever changed his politics, which were ultra-Tory; and we need not
+observe that he was deemed, like Brandon, a model of public integrity.
+He was possessed of two places under government, six votes in the House
+of Commons, and eight livings in the Church; and we must add, in justice
+to his loyal and religious principles, that there was not in the three
+kingdoms a firmer friend to the existing establishments.
+
+Whenever a nobleman does not marry, people try to take away his
+character. Lord Mauleverer had never married. The Whigs had been
+very bitter on the subject; they even alluded to it in the House of
+Commons,--that chaste assembly, where the never-failing subject of
+reproach against Mr. Pitt was the not being of an amorous temperament;
+but they had not hitherto prevailed against the stout earl's celibacy.
+It is true that if he was devoid of a wife, he had secured to himself
+plenty of substitutes; his profession was that of a man of gallantry;
+and though he avoided the daughters, it was only to make love to the
+mothers. But his lordship had now attained a certain age, and it was
+at last circulated among his friends that he intended to look out for a
+Lady Mauleverer.
+
+"Spare your caresses," said his toady-in-chief to a certain duchess, who
+had three portionless daughters; "Mauleverer has sworn that he will not
+choose among your order. You know his high politics, and you will not
+wonder at his declaring himself averse in matrimony as in morals to a
+community of goods."
+
+The announcement of the earl's matrimonial design and the circulation of
+this anecdote set all the clergymen's daughters in England on a blaze
+of expectation; and when Mauleverer came to shire, upon obtaining the
+honour of the lieutenancy, to visit his estates and court the friendship
+of his neighbours, there was not an old-young lady of forty, who worked
+in broad-stitch and had never been to London above a week at a time, who
+did not deem herself exactly the sort of person sure to fascinate his
+lordship.
+
+It was late in the afternoon when the travelling-chariot of this
+distinguished person, preceded by two outriders, in the earl's undress
+livery of dark green, stopped at the hall door of Warlock House. The
+squire was at home, actually and metaphorically; for he never dreamed of
+denying himself to any one, gentle or simple. The door of the carriage
+being opened, there descended a small slight man, richly dressed (for
+lace and silk vestments were not then quite discarded, though gradually
+growing less the mode), and of an air prepossessing and distinguished
+rather than dignified. His years--for his countenance, though handsome,
+was deeply marked, and evinced the tokens of dissipation--seemed more
+numerous than they really were; and though not actually past middle age,
+Lord Mauleverer might fairly have received the unpleasing epithet of
+elderly. However, his step was firm, his gait upright, and his
+figure was considerably more youthful than his physiognomy. The first
+compliments of the day having passed, and Lord Mauleverer having
+expressed his concern that his long and frequent absence from the county
+had hitherto prevented his making the acquaintance of Mr. Brandon, the
+brother of one of his oldest and most esteemed friends, conversation
+became on both sides rather an effort. Mr. Brandon first introduced the
+subject of the weather, and the turnips; inquired whether his lordship
+was not very fond (for his part he used to be, but lately the rheumatism
+had disabled him; he hoped his lordship was not subject to that
+complaint) of shooting!
+
+Catching only the last words,--for, besides the awful complexity of the
+squire's sentences, Mauleverer was slightly affected by the aristocratic
+complaint of deafness,--the earl answered, with a smile,--
+
+"The complaint of shooting! Very good indeed, Mr. Brandon; it is seldom
+that I have heard so witty a phrase. No, I am not in the least troubled
+with that epidemic. It is a disorder very prevalent in this county."
+
+"My lord!" said the squire, rather puzzled; and then, observing that
+Mauleverer did not continue, he thought it expedient to start another
+subject.
+
+"I was exceedingly grieved to hear that your lordship, in travelling
+to Mauleverer Park (that is a very ugly road across the waste land; the
+roads in this country are in general pretty good,--for my own part, when
+I was a magistrate I was very strict in that respect), was robbed. You
+have not yet, I believe, detected (for my part, though I do not profess
+to be much of a politician, I do think that in affairs of robbery there
+is a great deal of remissness in the ministers) the villains!"
+
+"Our friend is disaffected!" thought the lord-lieutenant, imagining
+that the last opprobrious term was applied to the respectable personages
+specified in the parenthesis. Bowing with a polished smile to the
+squire, Mauleverer replied aloud, that he was extremely sorry that
+their conduct (meaning the ministers) did not meet with Mr. Brandon's
+approbation.
+
+"Well," thought the squire, "that is playing the courtier with a
+vengeance!--Meet with my approbation!" said he, warmly; "how could your
+lordship think me (for though I am none of your saints, I am, I hope, a
+good Christian; an excellent one, judging from your words, your lordship
+must be!) so partial to crime!"
+
+"I partial to crime!" returned Mauleverer, thinking he had stumbled
+unawares on some outrageous democrat, yet smiling as softly as usual;
+"you judge me harshly, Mr. Brandon! You must do me more justice, and you
+can only do that by knowing me better."
+
+Whatever unlucky answer the squire might otherwise have made was cut
+off by the entrance of Lucy; and the earl, secretly delighted at the
+interruption, rose to render her his homage, and to remind her of the
+introduction he had formerly been so happy as to obtain to her through
+the friendship of Mr. William Brandon,--a "friendship," said the gallant
+nobleman, "to which I have often before been indebted, but which was
+never more agreeably exerted on my behalf."
+
+Upon this Lucy, who though she had been so painfully bashful during
+her meeting with Mr. Clifford, felt no overpowering diffidence in the
+presence of so much greater a person, replied laughingly, and the earl
+rejoined by a second compliment. Conversation was now no longer an
+effort; and Mauleverer, the most consummate of epicures, whom even
+royalty trembled to ask without preparation, on being invited by the
+unconscious squire to partake of the family dinner, eagerly accepted
+the invitation. It was long since the knightly walls of Warlock had been
+honoured by the presence of a guest so courtly. The good squire heaped
+his plate with a profusion of boiled beef; and while the poor earl was
+contemplating in dismay the Alps upon Alps which he was expected to
+devour, the gray-headed butler, anxious to serve him with alacrity,
+whipped away the overloaded plate, and presently returned it, yet more
+astoundingly surcharged with an additional world of a composition
+of stony colour and sudorific aspect, which, after examining in mute
+attention for some moments, and carefully removing as well as he was
+able to the extreme edge of his plate, the earl discovered to be suet
+pudding.
+
+"You eat nothing, my lord," cried the squire; "let me give you--this is
+more underdone;" holding between blade and fork in middle air abhorrent
+fragment of scarlet, shaking its gory locks,--"another slice."
+
+Swift at the word dropped upon Mauleverer's plate the harpy finger and
+ruthless thumb of the gray-headed butler. "Not a morsel more," cried the
+earl, struggling with the murderous domestic. "My dear sir, excuse me; I
+assure you I have never ate such a dinner before,--never!"
+
+"Nay, now!" quoth the squire, expostulating, "you really (and this
+air is so keen that your lordship should indulge your appetite, if you
+follow the physician's advice) eat nothing!"
+
+Again Mauleverer was at fault.
+
+"The physicians are right, Mr. Brandon," said he, "very right, and I am
+forced to live abstemiously; indeed I do not know whether, if I were to
+exceed at your hospitable table, and attack all that you would bestow
+upon me, I should ever recover it. You would have to seek a new
+lieutenant for your charming county, and on the tomb of the last
+Mauleverer the hypocritical and unrelated heir would inscribe, 'Died of
+the visitation of Beef, John, Earl, etc.'"
+
+Plain as the meaning of this speech might have seemed to others, the
+squire only laughed at the effeminate appetite of the speaker, and
+inclined to think him an excellent fellow for jesting so good-humouredly
+on his own physical infirmity. But Lucy had the tact of her sex, and,
+taking pity on the earl's calamitous situation, though she certainly
+never guessed at its extent, entered with so much grace and ease
+into the conversation which he sought to establish between them, that
+Mauleverer's gentleman, who had hitherto been pushed aside by the zeal
+of the gray-headed butler, found an opportunity, when the squire was
+laughing and the butler staring, to steal away the overburdened plate
+unsuspected and unseen.
+
+In spite, however, of these evils of board and lodgement, Mauleverer was
+exceedingly well pleased with his visit; nor did he terminate it till
+the shades of night had begun to close, and the distance from his own
+residence conspired with experience to remind him that it was possible
+for a highwayman's audacity to attack the equipage even of Lord
+Mauleverer. He then reluctantly re-entered his carriage, and, bidding
+the postilions drive as fast as possible, wrapped himself in his
+roquelaire, and divided his thoughts between Lucy Brandon and the homard
+au gratin with which he proposed to console him self immediately on
+his return home. However, Fate, which mocks our most cherished hopes,
+ordained that on arriving at Mauleverer Park the owner should be
+suddenly afflicted with a loss of appetite, a coldness in the limbs, a
+pain in the chest, and various other ungracious symptoms of portending
+malady. Lord Mauleverer went straight to bed; he remained there for some
+days, and when he recovered his physicians ordered him to Bath. The Whig
+Methodists, who hated him, ascribed his illness to Providence; and his
+lordship was firmly of opinion that it should be ascribed to the beef
+and pudding. However this be, there was an end, for the present, to
+the hopes of young ladies of forty, and to the intended festivities at
+Mauleverer Park.
+
+"Good heavens!" said the earl, as his carriage wheels turned from his
+gates, "what a loss to country tradesmen may be occasioned by a piece of
+underdone beef, especially if it be boiled!"
+
+About a fortnight had elapsed since Mauleverer's meteoric visit to
+Warlock House, when the squire received from his brother the following
+epistle:--
+
+     MY DEAR JOSEPH,--You know my numerous avocations, and, amid the
+     press of business which surrounds me, will, I am sure, forgive me
+     for being a very negligent and remiss correspondent.  Nevertheless,
+     I assure you, no one can more sincerely sympathize in that good
+     fortune which has befallen my charming niece, and of which your last
+     letter informed me, than I do.  Pray give my best love to her, and
+     tell her how complacently I look forward to the brilliant sensation
+     she will create, when her beauty is enthroned upon that rank which,
+     I am quite sure, it will one day or other command.
+
+     You are not aware, perhaps, my dear Joseph, that I have for some
+     time been in a very weak and declining state of health.  The old
+     nervous complaint in my face has of late attacked me grievously, and
+     the anguish is sometimes so great that I am scarcely able to bear
+     it.  I believe the great demand which my profession makes upon a
+     frame of body never strong, and now beginning prematurely to feel
+     the infirmities of time, is the real cause of my maladies.  At last,
+     however, I must absolutely punish my pocket, and indulge my
+     inclinations by a short respite from toil.  The doctors--sworn
+     friends, you know, to the lawyers, since they make common cause
+     against mankind--have peremptorily ordered me to lie by, and to try
+     a short course of air, exercise, social amusements, and the waters
+     of Bath.  Fortunately this is vacation time, and I can afford to
+     lose a few weeks of emolument, in order, perhaps, to secure many
+     years of life.  I purpose, then, early next week, repairing to that
+     melancholy reservoir of the gay, where persons dance out of life and
+     are fiddled across the Styx.  In a word, I shall make one of the
+     adventurers after health who seek the goddess at King Bladud's pump-
+     room.  Will you and dear Lucy join me there?  I ask it of your
+     friendship, and I am quite sure that neither of you will shrink
+     aghast at the proposal of solacing your invalid relation.  At the
+     same time that I am recovering health, my pretty niece will be
+     avenging Pluto, by consigning to his dominions many a better and
+     younger hero in my stead.  And it will be a double pleasure to me to
+     see all the hearts, etc.--I break off, for what can I say on that
+     subject which the little coquette does not anticipate?  It is high
+     time that Lucy should see the world; and though there are many--at
+     Bath, above all places, to whom the heiress will be an object of
+     interested attentions, yet there are also many in that crowded city
+     by no means undeserving her notice.  What say you, dear Joseph?  But
+     I know already: you will not refuse to keep company with me in my
+     little holiday; and Lucy's eyes are already sparkling at the idea of
+     new bonnets, Milsom Street, a thousand adorers, and the pump-room.
+
+     Ever, dear Joseph, yours affectionately,
+
+                                   WILLIAM BRANDON.
+
+     P. S.  I find that my friend Lord Mauleverer is at Bath; I own that
+     is an additional reason to take me thither; by a letter from him,
+     received the other day, I see that he has paid you a visit, and he
+     now raves about his host and the heiress.  Ah, Miss Lucy, Miss Lucy!
+     are you going to conquer him whom all London has, for years more
+     than I care to tell (yet not many, for Mauleverer is still young),
+     assailed in vain?  Answer me!
+
+This letter created a considerable excitement in Warlock House. The old
+squire was extremely fond of his brother, and grieved to the heart to
+find that he spoke so discouragingly of his health. Nor did the
+squire for a moment hesitate at accepting the proposal to join his
+distinguished relative at Bath. Lucy also--who had for her uncle,
+possibly from his profuse yet not indelicate flattery, a very great
+regard and interest, though she had seen but little of him--urged the
+squire to lose no time in arranging matters for their departure, so as
+to precede the barrister, and prepare everything for his arrival. The
+father and daughter being thus agreed, there was little occasion for
+delay; an answer to the invalid's letter was sent by return of post, and
+on the fourth day from their receipt of the said epistle, the good old
+squire, his daughter, a country girl by way of abigail, the gray-headed
+butler, and two or three live pets, of the size and habits most
+convenient for travelling, were on their way to a city which at that
+time was gayer at least, if somewhat less splendid, than the metropolis.
+
+On the second day of their arrival at Bath, Brandon (as in future, to
+avoid confusion, we shall call the younger brother, giving to the elder
+his patriarchal title of squire) joined them.
+
+He was a man seemingly rather fond of parade, though at heart he
+disrelished and despised it. He came to their lodging, which had not
+been selected in the very best part of the town, in a carriage and six,
+but attended only by one favourite servant.
+
+They found him in better looks and better spirits than they had
+anticipated. Few persons, when he liked it, could be more agreeable than
+William Brandon; but at times there mixed with his conversation a bitter
+sarcasm, probably a habit acquired in his profession, or an occasional
+tinge of morose and haughty sadness, possibly the consequence of his
+ill-health. Yet his disorder, which was somewhat approaching to that
+painful affliction the tic douloureux, though of fits more rare in
+occurrence than those of that complaint ordinarily are, never seemed
+even for an instant to operate upon his mood, whatever that might be.
+That disease worked unseen; not a muscle of his face appeared to quiver;
+the smile never vanished from his mouth, the blandness of his voice
+never grew faint as with pain, and, in the midst of intense torture, his
+resolute and stern mind conquered every external indication; nor could
+the most observant stranger have noted the moment when the fit attacked
+or released him. There was something inscrutable about the man. You felt
+that you took his character upon trust, and not on your own knowledge.
+The acquaintance of years would have left you equally dark as to his
+vices or his virtues. He varied often, yet in each variation he was
+equally undiscoverable. Was he performing a series of parts, or was it
+the ordinary changes of a man's true temperament that you beheld in him?
+Commonly smooth, quiet, attentive, flattering in social intercourse,
+he was known in the senate and courts of law for a cold asperity, and a
+caustic venom,--scarcely rivalled even in those arenas of contention.
+It seemed as if the bitterer feelings he checked in private life,
+he delighted to indulge in public. Yet even there he gave not way to
+momentary petulance or gushing passion; all seemed with him systematic
+sarcasm or habitual sternness. He outraged no form of ceremonial or of
+society. He stung, without appearing conscious of the sting; and his
+antagonist writhed not more beneath the torture of his satire than the
+crushing contempt of his self-command. Cool, ready, armed and defended
+on all points, sound in knowledge, unfailing in observation, equally
+consummate in sophistry when needed by himself, and instantaneous
+in detecting sophistry in another; scorning no art, however painful;
+begrudging no labour, however weighty; minute in detail, yet not the
+less comprehending the whole subject in a grasp,--such was the legal and
+public character William Brandon had established, and such was the fame
+he joined to the unsullied purity of his moral reputation. But to his
+friends he seemed only the agreeable, clever, lively, and, if we may
+use the phrase innocently, the worldly man,--never affecting a superior
+sanctity, or an over-anxiety to forms, except upon great occasions; and
+rendering his austerity of manners the more admired, because he made it
+seem so unaccompanied by hypocrisy.
+
+"Well," said Brandon, as he sat after dinner alone with his relations,
+and had seen the eyes of his brother close in diurnal slumber, "tell
+me, Miss Lucy, what you think of Lord Mauleverer; do you find him
+agreeable?"
+
+"Very; too much so, indeed!"
+
+"Too much so! That is an uncommon fault, Lucy, unless you mean to
+insinuate that you find him too agreeable for your peace of mind."
+
+"Oh, no! there is little fear of that. All that I meant to express was
+that he seems to make it the sole business of his life to be agreeable,
+and that one imagines he had gained that end by the loss of certain
+qualities which one would have liked better."
+
+"Umph! and what are they?"
+
+"Truth, sincerity, independence, and honesty of mind."
+
+"My dear Lucy, it has been the professional study of my life to discover
+a man's character, especially so far as truth is concerned, in as short
+a time as possible; but you excel me in intuition, if you can tell
+whether there be sincerity in a courtier's character at the first
+interview you have with him."
+
+"Nevertheless, I am sure of my opinion," said Lucy, laughing; "and I
+will tell you one instance I observed among a hundred. Lord Mauleverer
+is rather deaf, and he imagined, in conversation, that my father said
+one thing--it was upon a very trifling subject, the speech of some
+member of parliament [the lawyer smiled],--when in reality he meant to
+say another. Lord Mauleverer, in the warmest manner in the world,
+chimed in with him, appeared thoroughly of his opinion, applauded his
+sentiments, and wished the whole country of his mind. Suddenly my father
+spoke; Lord Mauleverer bent down his ear, and found that the sentiments
+he had so lauded were exactly those my father the least favoured.
+No sooner did he make this discovery than he wheeled round
+again,--dexterously and gracefully, I allow; condemned all that he had
+before extolled, and extolled all that he had before abused!"
+
+"And is that all, Lucy?" said Brandon, with a keener sneer on his lip
+than the occasion warranted. "Why, that is what every one does; only
+some more gravely than others. Mauleverer in society, I at the bar, the
+minister in parliament, friend to friend, lover to mistress, mistress to
+lover,--half of us are employed in saying white is black, and the other
+half in swearing that black is white. There is only one difference, my
+pretty niece, between the clever man and the fool: the fool says what is
+false while the colours stare in his face and give him the lie; but the
+clever man takes as it were a brush and literally turns the black into
+white and the white into black before he makes the assertion, which is
+then true. The fool changes, and is a liar; the clever man makes the
+colours change, and is a genius. But this is not for your young years
+yet, Lucy."
+
+"But I can't see the necessity of seeming to agree with people," said
+Lucy, simply; "surely they would be just as well pleased if you differed
+from them civilly and with respect?"
+
+"No, Lucy," said Brandon, still sneering; "to be liked, it is not
+necessary to be anything but compliant. Lie, cheat, make every word a
+snare, and every act a forgery; but never contradict. Agree with people,
+and they make a couch for you in their hearts. You know the story of
+Dante and the buffoon. Both were entertained at the court of the vain
+pedant, who called himself Prince Scaliger,--the former poorly, the
+latter sumptuously. 'How comes it,' said the buffoon to the poet, 'that
+I am so rich and you so poor?' 'I shall be as rich as you,' was the
+stinging and true reply, 'whenever I can find a patron as like myself as
+Prince Scaliger is like you!'"
+
+"Yet my birds," said Lucy, caressing the goldfinch, which nestled to
+her bosom, "are not like me, and I love them. Nay, I often think I
+could love those better who differ from me the most. I feel it so in
+books,--when, for instance, I read a novel or a play; and you, uncle, I
+like almost in proportion to my perceiving in myself nothing in common
+with you."
+
+"Yes," said Brandon, "you have in common with me a love for old stories
+of Sir Hugo and Sir Rupert, and all the other 'Sirs' of our mouldered
+and bygone race. So you shall sing me the ballad about Sir John de
+Brandon, and the dragon he slew in the Holy Land. We will adjourn to the
+drawing-room, not to disturb your father."
+
+Lucy agreed, took her uncle's arm, repaired to the drawing-room, and
+seating herself at the harpsichord, sang to an inspiriting yet somewhat
+rude air the family ballad her uncle had demanded.
+
+It would have been amusing to note in the rigid face of the hardened and
+habitual man of peace and parchments a certain enthusiasm which ever
+and anon crossed his cheek, as the verses of the ballad rested on some
+allusion to the knightly House of Brandon and its old renown. It was an
+early prejudice, breaking out despite of himself,--a flash of character,
+stricken from the hard fossil in which it was imbedded. One would have
+supposed that the silliest of all prides (for the pride of money, though
+meaner, is less senseless), family pride, was the last weakness which
+at that time the callous and astute lawyer would have confessed, even to
+himself.
+
+"Lucy," said Brandon, as the song ceased, and he gazed on his beautiful
+niece with a certain pride in his aspect, "I long to witness your first
+appearance in the world. This lodging, my dear, is not fit--But pardon
+me! what I was about to say is this: your father and yourself are here
+at my invitation, and in my house you must dwell; you are my guests, not
+mine host and hostess. I have therefore already directed my servant to
+secure me a house and provide the necessary establishment; and I make
+no doubt, as he is a quick fellow, that within three days all will be
+ready. You must then be the magnet of my abode, Lucy; and meanwhile
+you must explain this to my brother, and--for you know his jealous
+hospitality--obtain his acquiescence."
+
+"But--" began Lucy.
+
+"But me no buts," said Brandon, quickly, but with an affectionate tone
+of wilfulness; "and now, as I feel very much fatigued with my journey,
+you must allow me to seek my own room."
+
+"I will conduct you to it myself," said Lucy, for she was anxious
+to show her father's brother the care and forethought which she had
+lavished on her arrangements for his comfort. Brandon followed her into
+an apartment which his eye knew at a glance had been subjected to that
+female superintendence which makes such uses from what men reject as
+insignificant; and he thanked her with more than his usual amenity, for
+the grace which had presided over, and the kindness which had dictated
+her preparations. As soon as he was left alone, he wheeled his armchair
+near the clear, bright fire, and resting his face upon his hand, in the
+attitude of a man who prepares himself as it were for the indulgence of
+meditation, he muttered,--
+
+"Yes! these women are, first, what Nature makes them, and that is good;
+next, what use make them, and that is evil! Now, could I persuade myself
+that we ought to be nice as to the use we put these poor puppets to, I
+should shrink from enforcing the destiny which I have marked for this
+girl. But that is a pitiful consideration, and he is but a silly player
+who loses his money for the sake of preserving his counters. So the
+young lady must go as another score to the fortunes of William Brandon.
+After all, who suffers? Not she. She will have wealth, rank, honour.
+I shall suffer, to yield so pretty and pure a gem to the coronet
+of--Faugh! How I despise that dog; but how I could hate, crush, mangle
+him, could I believe that he despised me! Could he do so? Umph! No,
+I have resolved myself that is impossible. Well, let me hope that
+matrimonial point will be settled; and now let me consider what next
+step I shall take for myself,--myself, ay, only myself! With me perishes
+the last male of Brandon; but the light shall not go out under a
+bushel."
+
+As he said this, the soliloquist sunk into a more absorbed and silent
+revery, from which he was disturbed by the entrance of his servant.
+Brandon, who was never a dreamer save when alone, broke at once from his
+reflections.
+
+"You have obeyed my orders, Barlow?" said he.
+
+"Yes, sir," answered the domestic. "I have taken the best house yet
+unoccupied; and when Mrs. Roberts [Brandon's housekeeper] arrives from
+London, everything will, I trust, be exactly to your wishes."
+
+"Good! And you gave my note to Lord Mauleverer?"
+
+"With my own hands, sir; his lordship will await you at home all
+to-morrow."
+
+"Very well! and now, Barlow, see that your room is within call [bells,
+though known, were not common at that day], and give out that I am gone
+to bed, and must not be disturbed. What's the hour?"
+
+"Just on the stroke of ten, sir."
+
+"Place on that table my letter-case and the inkstand. Look in, to
+help me to undress, at half-past one; I shall go to bed at that hour.
+And--stay--be sure, Barlow, that my brother believes me retired for the
+night. He does not know my habits, and will vex himself if he thinks I
+sit up so late in my present state of health."
+
+Drawing the table with its writing appurtenances near to his master, the
+servant left Brandon once more to his thoughts or his occupations.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+          Servant.  Get away, I say, wid dat nasty bell.
+
+          Punch.  Do you call this a bell?  (patting it.)  It is an
+          organ.
+
+          Servant.  I say it is a bell,--a nasty bell!
+
+          Punch.  I say it is an organ (striking him with it).  What do
+          you say it is now?
+
+          Servant.  An organ, Mr. Punch!
+
+                              The Tragical Comedy of Punch and Judy.
+
+The next morning, before Lucy and her father had left their apartments,
+Brandon, who was a remarkably early riser, had disturbed the luxurious
+Mauleverer in his first slumber. Although the courtier possessed a villa
+some miles from Bath, he preferred a lodging in the town, both as
+being warmer than a rarely inhabited country-house, and as being to an
+indolent man more immediately convenient for the gayeties and the
+waters of the medicinal city. As soon as the earl had rubbed his eyes,
+stretched himself, and prepared himself for the untimeous colloquy,
+Brandon poured forth his excuses for the hour he had chosen for a visit.
+"Mention it not, my dear Brandon," said the good-natured nobleman, with
+a sigh; "I am glad at any hour to see you, and I am very sure that what
+you have to communicate is always worth listening to."
+
+"It was only upon public business, though of rather a more important
+description than usual, that I ventured to disturb you," answered
+Brandon, seating himself on a chair by the bedside. "This morning, an
+hour ago, I received by private express a letter from London, stating
+that a new arrangement will positively be made in the Cabinet,--nay,
+naming the very promotions and changes. I confess that as my name
+occurred, as also your own, in these nominations, I was anxious to have
+the benefit of your necessarily accurate knowledge on the subject, as
+well as of your advice."
+
+"Really, Brandon," said Mauleverer, with a half-peevish smile, "any
+other hour in the day would have done for 'the business of the nation,'
+as the newspapers call that troublesome farce we go through; and I
+had imagined you would not have broken my nightly slumbers except for
+something of real importance,--the discovery of a new beauty or the
+invention of a new dish."
+
+"Neither the one nor the other could you have expected from me, my dear
+lord," rejoined Brandon. "You know the dry trifles in which a lawyer's
+life wastes itself away; and beauties and dishes have no attraction
+for us, except the former be damsels deserted, and the latter patents
+invaded. But my news, after all, is worth hearing, unless you have heard
+it before."
+
+"Not I! but I suppose I shall hear it in the course of the day. Pray
+Heaven I be not sent for to attend some plague of a council. Begin!"
+
+"In the first place Lord Duberly resolves to resign, unless this
+negotiation for peace be made a Cabinet question."
+
+"Pshaw! let him resign. I have opposed the peace so long that it is out
+of the question. Of course, Lord Wansted will not think of it, and he
+may count on my boroughs. A peace!--shameful, disgraceful, dastardly
+proposition!"
+
+"But, my dear lord, my letter says that this unexpected firmness on the
+part of Lord Daberly has produced so great a sensation that, seeing the
+impossibility of forming a durable Cabinet without him, the king has
+consented to the negotiation, and Duberly stays in!"
+
+"The devil!--what next?"
+
+"Raffden and Sternhold go out in favour of Baldwin and Charlton, and in
+the hope that you will lend your aid to--"
+
+"I!" said Lord Mauleverer, very angrily,--"I lend my aid to Baldwin, the
+Jacobin, and Charlton, the son of a brewer!"
+
+"Very true!" continued Brandon. "But in the hope that you might be
+persuaded to regard the new arrangements with an indulgent eye, you are
+talked of instead of the Duke of for the vacant garter and the office of
+chamberlain."
+
+"You don't mean it!" cried Mauleverer, starting from his bed.
+
+"A few other (but, I hear, chiefly legal) promotions are to be made.
+Among the rest, my learned brother, the democrat Sarsden, is to have a
+silk gown; Cromwell is to be attorney-general; and, between ourselves,
+they have offered me a judgeship."
+
+"But the garter!" said Mauleverer, scarcely hearing the rest of the
+lawyer's news,--"the whole object, aim, and ambition of my life. How
+truly kind in the king! After all," continued the earl, laughing, and
+throwing himself back, "opinions are variable, truth is not uniform. The
+times change, not we; and we must have peace instead of war!"
+
+"Your maxims are indisputable, and the conclusion you come to is
+excellent," said Brandon.
+
+"Why, you and I, my dear fellow," said the earl, "who know men, and who
+have lived all our lives in the world, must laugh behind the scenes at
+the cant we wrap in tinsel, and send out to stalk across the stage.
+We know that our Coriolanus of Tory integrity is a corporal kept by a
+prostitute, and the Brutus of Whig liberty is a lacquey turned out of
+place for stealing the spoons; but we must not tell this to the world.
+So, Brandon, you must write me a speech for the next session, and be
+sure it has plenty of general maxims, and concludes with 'my bleeding
+country!'"
+
+The lawyer smiled. "You consent then to the expulsion of Sternhold and
+Raffden? for, after all, that is the question. Our British vessel, as
+the d---d metaphor-mongers call the State, carries the public good safe
+in the hold like brandy; and it is only when fear, storm, or the devil
+makes the rogues quarrel among themselves and break up the casks, that
+one gets above a thimbleful at a time. We should go on fighting with the
+rest of the world forever, if the ministers had not taken to fight among
+themselves."
+
+"As for Sternhold," said the earl, "'t is a vulgar dog, and voted for
+economical reform. Besides, I don't know him; he may go to the devil,
+for aught I care; but Raffden must be dealt handsomely with, or, despite
+the garter, I will fall back among the Whigs, who, after all, give
+tolerable dinners."
+
+"But why, my lord, must Raffden be treated better than his brother
+recusant?"
+
+"Because he sent me, in the handsomest manner possible, a pipe of that
+wonderful Madeira, which you know I consider the chief grace of my
+cellars, and he gave up a canal navigation bill, which would have
+enriched his whole county, when he knew that it would injure my
+property. No, Brandon, curse public cant! we know what that is. But
+we are gentlemen, and our private friends must not be thrown
+overboard,--unless, at least, we do it in the civilest manner we can."
+
+"Fear not," said the lawyer; "you have only to say the word, and the
+Cabinet can cook up an embassy to Owhyhee, and send Raffden there with a
+stipend of five thousand a year."
+
+"Ah! that's well thought of; or we might give him a grant of a hundred
+thousand acres in one of the colonies, or let him buy crown land at a
+discount of eighty per cent. So that's settled."
+
+"And now, my dear friend," said Brandon, "I will tell you frankly why
+I come so early; I am required to give a hasty answer to the proposal I
+have received, namely, of the judgeship. Your opinion?"
+
+"A judgeship! you a judge? What! forsake your brilliant career for so
+petty a dignity? You jest!"
+
+"Not at all. Listen. You know how bitterly I have opposed this
+peace, and what hot enemies I have made among the new friends of the
+administration. On the one hand, these enemies insist on sacrificing
+me; and on the other, if I were to stay in the Lower House and speak
+for what I have before opposed, I should forfeit the support of a great
+portion of my own party. Hated by one body, and mistrusted by the other,
+a seat in the House of Commons ceases to be an object. It is proposed
+that I should retire on the dignity of a judge, with the positive and
+pledged though secret promise of the first vacancy among the chiefs.
+The place of chief-justice or chief-baron is indeed the only fair
+remuneration for my surrender of the gains of my profession, and the
+abandonment of my parliamentary and legal career; the title, which
+will of course be attached to it, might go (at least, by an exertion
+of interest) to the eldest son of my niece,--in case she married a
+commoner,--or," added he, after a pause, "her second son in case she
+married a peer."
+
+"Ha, true!" said Mauleverer, quickly, and as if struck by some sudden
+thought; "and your charming niece, Brandon, would be worthy of any
+honour, either to her children or herself. You do not know how struck I
+was with her. There is something so graceful in her simplicity; and
+in her manner of smoothing down the little rugosities of Warlock House
+there was so genuine and so easy a dignity that I declare I almost
+thought myself young again, and capable of the self-cheat of believing
+myself in love. But, oh! Brandon, imagine me at your brother's
+board,--me, for whom ortolans are too substantial, and who feel, when I
+tread, the slightest inequality in the carpets of Tournay,--imagine me,
+dear Brandon, in a black wainscot room, hung round with your ancestors
+in brown wigs with posies in their button-hole; an immense fire on one
+side, and a thorough draught on the other; a huge circle of beef before
+me, smoking like Vesuvius, and twice as large; a plateful (the plate was
+pewter,--is there not a metal so called?) of this mingled flame and
+lava sent under my very nostril, and upon pain of ill-breeding to be
+despatched down my proper mouth; an old gentleman in fustian breeches
+and worsted stockings, by way of a butler, filling me a can of ale, and
+your worthy brother asking me if I would not prefer port; a lean footman
+in livery,--such a livery, ye gods!--scarlet, blue, yellow, and green,
+a rainbow ill made!--on the opposite side of the table, looking at the
+'Lord' with eyes and mouth equally open, and large enough to swallow
+me; and your excellent brother himself at the head of the table glowing
+through the mists of the beef, like the rising sun in a signpost; and
+then, Brandon, turning from this image, behold beside me the fair,
+delicate, aristocratic, yet simple loveliness of your niece, and--But
+you look angry; I have offended you?"
+
+It was high time for Mauleverer to ask that question, for during the
+whole of the earl's recital the dark face of his companion had literally
+burned with rage; and here we may observe how generally selfishness,
+which makes the man of the world, prevents its possessor, by a sort of
+paradox, from being consummately so. For Mauleverer, occupied by the
+pleasure he felt at his own wit, and never having that magic sympathy
+with others which creates the incessantly keen observer, had not for a
+moment thought that he was offending to the quick the hidden pride of
+the lawyer. Nay, so little did he suspect Brandon's real weaknesses that
+he thought him a philosopher who would have laughed alike at principles
+and people, however near to him might be the latter, and however
+important the former. Mastering by a single effort, which restored his
+cheek to its usual steady hue, the outward signs of his displeasure,
+Brandon rejoined,--
+
+"Offend me! By no means, my dear lord. I do not wonder at your painful
+situation in an old country-gentleman's house, which has not for
+centuries offered scenes fit for the presence of so distinguished a
+guest,--never, I may say, since the time when Sir Charles de Brandon
+entertained Elizabeth at Warlock, and your ancestor (you know my old
+musty studies on those points of obscure antiquity), John Mauleverer,
+who was a noted goldsmith of London, supplied the plate for the
+occasion."
+
+"Fairly retorted," said Mauleverer, smiling; for though the earl had
+a great contempt for low birth set on high places in other men, he was
+utterly void of pride in his own family,--"fairly retorted! But I never
+meant anything else but a laugh at your brother's housekeeping,--a joke
+surely permitted to a man whose own fastidiousness on these matters
+is so standing a jest. But, by heavens, Brandon! to turn from these
+subjects, your niece is the prettiest girl I have seen for twenty years;
+and if she would forget my being the descendant of John Mauleverer, the
+noted goldsmith of London, she may be Lady Mauleverer as soon as she
+pleases."
+
+"Nay, now, let us be serious, and talk of the judgeship," said Brandon,
+affecting to treat the proposal as a joke.
+
+"By the soul of Sir Charles de Brandon, I am serious!" cried the earl;
+"and as a proof of it, I hope you will let me pay my respects to your
+niece to-day,--not with my offer in my hand yet, for it must be a love
+match on both sides." And the earl, glancing towards an opposite glass,
+which reflected his attenuated but comely features beneath his velvet
+nightcap trimmed with Mechlin, laughed half-triumphantly as he spoke.
+
+A sneer just passed the lips of Brandon, and as instantly vanished,
+while Mauleverer continued,--
+
+"And as for the judgeship, dear Brandon, I advise you to accept it,
+though you know best; and I do think no man will stand a fairer chance
+of the chief-justiceship,--or, though it be somewhat unusual for
+'common' lawyers, why not the woolsack itself? As you say, the second
+son of your niece might inherit the dignity of a peerage!"
+
+"Well, I will consider of it favourably," said Brandon; and soon
+afterwards he left the nobleman to renew his broken repose.
+
+"I can't laugh at that man," said Mauleverer to himself, as he turned
+round in his bed, "though he has much that I should laugh at in another;
+and, faith, there is one little matter I might well scorn him for, if I
+were not a philosopher. 'T is a pretty girl, his niece, and with proper
+instructions might do one credit; besides, she has L60,000 ready money;
+and, faith, I have not a shilling for my own pleasure, though I have--or
+alas! had--fifty thousand a year for that of my establishment! In all
+probability she will be the lawyer's heiress, and he must have made at
+least as much again as her portion; nor is he, poor devil, a very good
+life. Moreover, if he rise to the peerage? and the second son--Well!
+well! it will not be such a bad match for the goldsmith's descendant
+either!"
+
+With that thought, Lord Mauleverer fell asleep. He rose about noon,
+dressed himself with unusual pains, and was just going forth on a visit
+to Miss Brandon, when he suddenly remembered that her uncle had not
+mentioned her address or his own. He referred to the lawyer's note of
+the preceding evening; no direction was inscribed on it; and Mauleverer
+was forced, with much chagrin, to forego for that day the pleasure he
+had promised himself.
+
+In truth, the wary lawyer, who, as we have said, despised show and
+outward appearances as much as any man, was yet sensible of their effect
+even in the eyes of a lover; and moreover, Lord Mauleverer was one whose
+habits of life were calculated to arouse a certain degree of vigilance
+on points of household pomp even in the most unobservant. Brandon
+therefore resolved that Lucy should not be visited by her admirer till
+the removal to their new abode was effected; nor was it till the third
+day from that on which Mauleverer had held with Brandon the interview
+we have recorded, that the earl received a note from Brandon, seemingly
+turning only on political matters, but inscribed with the address and
+direction in full form.
+
+Mauleverer answered it in person. He found Lucy at home, and more
+beautiful than ever; and from that day his mind was made up, as the
+mammas say, and his visits became constant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+               There is a festival where knights and dames,
+               And aught that wealth or lofty lineage claims,
+               Appear.
+
+               'T is he,--how came he thence?
+               What doth he here?
+                                               Lara.
+
+There are two charming situations in life for a woman,--one, the first
+freshness of heiressship and beauty; the other, youthful widowhood, with
+a large jointure. It was at least Lucy's fortune to enjoy the first. No
+sooner was she fairly launched into the gay world than she became the
+object of universal idolatry. Crowds followed her wherever she moved
+nothing was talked of or dreamed of, toasted or betted on, but Lucy
+Brandon; even her simplicity, and utter ignorance of the arts of fine
+life, enhanced the eclat of her reputation. Somehow or other,
+young people of the gentler sex are rarely ill-bred, even in
+their eccentricities; and there is often a great deal of grace in
+inexperience. Her uncle, who accompanied her everywhere, himself no
+slight magnet of attraction, viewed her success with a complacent
+triumph which he suffered no one but her father or herself to detect.
+To the smooth coolness of his manner, nothing would have seemed more
+foreign than pride at the notice gained by a beauty, or exultation at
+any favour won from the caprices of fashion. As for the good old squire,
+one would have imagined him far more the invalid than his brother. He
+was scarcely ever seen; for though he went everywhere, he was one of
+those persons who sink into a corner the moment they enter a room.
+Whoever discovered him in his retreat, held out their hands, and
+exclaimed, "God bless me! you here! We have not seen you for this age!"
+Now and then, if in a very dark niche of the room a card-table had been
+placed, the worthy gentleman toiled through an obscure rubber; but more
+frequently he sat with his hands clasped and his mouth open, counting
+the number of candles in the room, or calculating "when that stupid
+music would be over."
+
+Lord Mauleverer, though a polished and courteous man, whose great object
+was necessarily to ingratiate himself with the father of his intended
+bride, had a horror of being bored, which surpassed all other feelings
+in his mind. He could not therefore persuade himself to submit to the
+melancholy duty of listening to the squire's "linked speeches long drawn
+out." He always glided by the honest man's station, seemingly in an
+exceeding hurry, with a "Ah, my dear sir, how do you do? How delighted I
+am to see you! And your incomparable daughter? Oh, there she is! Pardon
+me, dear sir,--you see my attraction."
+
+Lucy, indeed, who never forgot any one (except herself occasionally),
+sought her father's retreat as often as she was able; but her
+engagements were so incessant that she no sooner lost one partner than
+she was claimed and carried off by another. However, the squire bore his
+solitude with tolerable cheerfulness, and always declared that "he was
+very well amused; although balls and concerts were necessarily a little
+dull to one who came from a fine old place like Warlock Manor-house, and
+it was not the same thing that pleased young ladies (for, to them, that
+fiddling and giggling till two o'clock in the morning might be a very
+pretty way of killing time) and their papas!"
+
+What considerably added to Lucy's celebrity was the marked notice and
+admiration of a man so high in rank and ton as Lord Mauleverer. That
+personage, who still retained much of a youthful mind and temper, and
+who was in his nature more careless than haughty, preserved little or no
+state in his intercourse with the social revellers at Bath. He cared not
+whither he went, so that he was in the train of the young beauty; and
+the most fastidious nobleman of the English court was seen in every
+second and third rate set of a great watering-place,--the attendant, the
+flirt, and often the ridicule of the daughter of an obscure and almost
+insignificant country squire. Despite the honour of so distinguished a
+lover, and despite all the novelties of her situation, the pretty head
+of Lucy Brandon was as yet, however, perfectly unturned; and as for her
+heart, the only impression that it had ever received was made by that
+wandering guest of the village rector, whom she had never again seen,
+but who yet clung to her imagination, invested not only with all the
+graces which in right of a singularly handsome person he possessed, but
+with those to which he never could advance a claim,--more dangerous to
+her peace, for the very circumstance of their origin in her fancy, not
+his merits.
+
+They had now been some little time at Bath, and Brandon's brief respite
+was pretty nearly expired, when a public ball of uncommon and manifold
+attraction was announced. It was to be graced not only by the presence
+of all the surrounding families, but also by that of royalty itself; it
+being an acknowledged fact that people dance much better and eat much
+more supper when any relation to a king is present.
+
+"I must stay for this ball, Lucy," said Brandon, who, after spending
+the day with Lord Mauleverer, returned home in a mood more than usually
+cheerful,--"I must stay for this one ball, Lucy, and witness your
+complete triumph, even though it will be necessary to leave you the very
+next morning."
+
+"So soon!" cried Lucy.
+
+"So soon!" echoed the uncle, with a smile. "How good you are to speak
+thus to an old valetudinarian, whose company must have fatigued you to
+death! Nay, no pretty denials! But the great object of my visit to this
+place is accomplished: I have seen you, I have witnessed your debut in
+the great world, with, I may say, more than a father's exultation, and I
+go back to my dry pursuits with the satisfaction of thinking our old
+and withered genealogical tree has put forth one blossom worthy of its
+freshest day."
+
+"Uncle!" said Lucy, reprovingly, and holding up her taper finger with
+an arch smile, mingling with a blush, in which the woman's vanity spoke,
+unknown to herself.
+
+"And why that look, Lucy?" said Brandon.
+
+"Because--because--well, no matter! you have been bred to that trade in
+which, as you say yourself, men tell untruths for others till they lose
+all truth for themselves. But let us talk of you, not me; are you really
+well enough to leave us?"
+
+Simple and even cool as the words of Lucy's question, when written,
+appear, in her mouth they took so tender, so anxious a tone, that
+Brandon, who had no friend nor wife nor child, nor any one in his
+household in whom interest in his health or welfare was a thing of
+course, and who was consequently wholly unaccustomed to the accent of
+kindness, felt himself of a sudden touched and stricken.
+
+"Why, indeed, Lucy," said he, in a less artificial voice than that in
+which he usually spoke, "I should like still to profit by your cares,
+and forget my infirmities and pains in your society; but I cannot: the
+tide of events, like that of nature, waits not our pleasure!"
+
+"But we may take our own time for setting sail!" said Lucy.
+
+"Ay, this comes of talking in metaphor," rejoined Brandon, smiling;
+"they who begin it always get the worst of it. In plain words, dear
+Lucy, I can give no more time to my own ailments. A lawyer cannot play
+truant in term-time without--"
+
+"Losing a few guineas!" said Lucy, interrupting him.
+
+"Worse than that,--his practice and his name."
+
+"Better those than health and peace of mind."
+
+"Out on you, no!" said Brandon, quickly, and almost fiercely. "We
+waste all the greenness and pith of our life in striving to gain a
+distinguished slavery; and when it is gained, we must not think that
+an humble independence would have been better. If we ever admit that
+thought, what fools, what lavish fools, we have been! No!" continued
+Brandon, after a momentary pause, and in a tone milder and gayer, though
+not less characteristic of the man's stubbornness of will, "after losing
+all youth's enjoyments and manhood's leisure, in order that in age the
+mind, the all-conquering mind, should break its way at last into the
+applauding opinions of men, I should be an effeminate idler indeed, did
+I suffer, so long as its jarring parts hold together, or so long as I
+have the power to command its members, this weak body to frustrate the
+labour of its better and nobler portion, and command that which it is
+ordained to serve."
+
+Lucy knew not while she listened, half in fear, half in admiration,
+to her singular relation, that at the very moment he thus spoke, his
+disease was preying upon him in one of its most relentless moods,
+without the power of wringing from him a single outward token of his
+torture. But she wanted nothing to increase her pity and affection for a
+man who in consequence, perhaps, of his ordinary surface of worldly
+and cold properties of temperament never failed to leave an indelible
+impression on all who had ever seen that temperament broken through by
+deeper though often by more evil feelings.
+
+"Shall you go to Lady--------'s rout?" asked Brandon, easily sliding
+back into common topics. "Lord Mauleverer requested me to ask you."
+
+"That depends on you and my father."
+
+"If on me, I answer yes," said Brandon. "I like hearing Mauleverer,
+especially among persons who do not understand him. There is a refined
+and subtle sarcasm running through the commonplaces of his conversation,
+which cuts the good fools, like the invisible sword in the fable, that
+lopped off heads without occasioning the owners any other sensation than
+a pleasing and self-complacent titillation. How immeasurably superior he
+is in manner and address to all we meet here! Does it not strike you?"
+
+"Yes--no--I can't say that it does exactly," rejoined Lucy.
+
+"Is that confusion tender?" thought Brandon.
+
+"In a word," continued Lucy, "Lord Mauleverer is one whom I think
+pleasing without fascination, and amusing without brilliancy. He is
+evidently accomplished in mind and graceful in manner, and withal the
+most uninteresting person I ever met."
+
+"Women have not often thought so," said Brandon. "I cannot believe that
+they can think otherwise."
+
+A certain expression, partaking of scorn, played over Brandon's hard
+features. It was a noticeable trait in him, that while he was most
+anxious to impress Lucy with a favourable opinion of Lord Mauleverer, he
+was never quite able to mask a certain satisfaction at any jest at the
+earl's expense, or any opinion derogatory to his general character for
+pleasing the opposite sex; and this satisfaction was no sooner conceived
+than it was immediately combated by the vexation he felt that Lucy did
+not seem to share his own desire that she should become the wife of the
+courtier. There appeared as if in that respect there was a contest in
+his mind between interest on one hand and private dislike or contempt on
+the other.
+
+"You judge women wrongly!" said Brandon. "Ladies never know each
+other; of all persons, Mauleverer is best calculated to win them, and
+experience has proved my assertion. The proudest lot I know for a woman
+would be the thorough conquest of Lord Mauleverer; but it is impossible.
+He may be gallant, but he will never be subdued. He defies the whole
+female world, and with justice and impunity. Enough of him. Sing to me,
+dear Lucy."
+
+The time for the ball approached; and Lucy, who was a charming girl and
+had nothing of the angel about her, was sufficiently fond of gayety,
+dancing, music, and admiration to feel her heart beat high at the
+expectation of the event.
+
+At last the day itself came. Brandon dined alone with Mauleverer, having
+made the arrangement that he, with the earl, was to join his brother
+and niece at the ball. Mauleverer, who hated state, except on great
+occasions, when no man displayed it with a better grace, never suffered
+his servants to wait at dinner when he was alone or with one of his
+peculiar friends. The attendants remained without, and were summoned at
+will by a bell laid beside the host.
+
+The conversation was unrestrained.
+
+"I am perfectly certain, Brandon," said Mauleverer, "that if you were
+to live tolerably well, you would soon get the better of your nervous
+complaints. It is all poverty of blood, believe me. Some more of the
+fins, eh?--No! Oh, hang your abstemiousness; it is d----d unfriendly to
+eat so little! Talking of fins and friends, Heaven defend me from ever
+again forming an intimacy with a pedantic epicure, especially if he
+puns!"
+
+"Why, what has a pedant to do with fins?"
+
+"I will tell you,--ah, this madeira--I suggested to Lord Dareville, who
+affects the gourmand, what a capital thing a dish all fins (turbot's
+fins) might be made. 'Capital!' said he, in a rapture; 'dine on it with
+me to-morrow.' 'Volontiers!' said I. The next day, after indulging in
+a pleasing revery all the morning as to the manner in which Dareville's
+cook, who is not without genius, would accomplish the grand idea, I
+betook myself punctually to my engagement. Would you believe it? When
+the cover was removed, the sacrilegious dog of an Amphitryon had put
+into the dish Cicero's 'De Finibus.' 'There is a work all fins!' said
+he. "Atrocious jest!" exclaimed Brandon, solemnly.
+
+"Was it not? Whenever the gastronomists set up a religious inquisition,
+I trust they will roast every impious rascal who treats the divine
+mystery with levity. Pun upon cooking, indeed! A propos of Dareville, he
+is to come into the administration."
+
+"You astonish me!" said Brandon. "I never heard that; I don't know him.
+He has very little power; has he any talent?"
+
+"Yes, a very great one,--acquired, though."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"A pretty wife!"
+
+"My lord!" exclaimed Brandon, abruptly, and half rising from his seat.
+
+Mauleverer looked up hastily, and on seeing the expression of his
+companion's face coloured deeply; there was a silence for some moments.
+
+"Tell me," said Brandon, indifferently, helping himself to vegetables,
+for he seldom touched meat; and a more amusing contrast can scarcely be
+conceived than that between the earnest epicurism of Mauleverer and the
+careless contempt of the sublime art manifested by his guest,--"tell me,
+you who necessarily know everything, whether the government really
+is settled,--whether you are to have the garter, and I (mark the
+difference!) the judgeship."
+
+"Why so, I imagine, it will be arranged; namely, if you will consent to
+hang up the rogues instead of living by the fools!"
+
+"One may unite both!" returned Brandon. "But I believe, in general, it
+is vice versa; for we live by the rogues, and it is only the fools we
+are able to hang up. You ask me if I will take the judgeship. I would
+not--no, I would rather cut my hand off," and the lawyer spoke with
+great bitterness, "forsake my present career, despite all the obstacles
+that now encumber it, did I think that this miserable body would suffer
+me for two years longer to pursue it."
+
+"You shock me!" said Mauleverer, a little affected, but nevertheless
+applying the cayenne to his cucumber with his usual unerring nicety of
+tact,--"you shock me; but you are considerably better than you were."
+
+"It is not," continued Brandon, who was rather speaking to himself than
+to his friend,--"it is not that I am unable to conquer the pain and to
+master the recreant nerves; but I feel myself growing weaker and weaker
+beneath the continual exertion of my remaining powers, and I shall die
+before I have gained half my objects, if I do not leave the labours
+which are literally tearing me to pieces."
+
+"But," said Lord Mauleverer, who was the idlest of men, "the judgeship
+is not an easy sinecure."
+
+"No; but there is less demand on the mind in that station than in
+my present one;" and Brandon paused before he continued. "Candidly,
+Mauleverer, you do not think they will deceive me,--you do not think
+they mean to leave me to this political death without writing 'Resurgam'
+over the hatchment?"
+
+"They dare not!" said Mauleverer, quaffing his fourth glass of madeira.
+
+"Well, I have decided on my change of life," said the lawyer, with a
+slight sigh.
+
+"So have I on my change of opinion," chimed in the earl. "I will tell
+you what opinions seem to me like."
+
+"What?" said Brandon, abstractedly.
+
+"Trees!" answered Mauleverer, quaintly. "If they can be made serviceable
+by standing, don't part with a stick; but when they are of that growth
+that sells well, or whenever they shut out a fine prospect, cut them
+down, and pack them off by all manner of means!--And now for the second
+course."
+
+"I wonder," said the earl, when our political worthies were again alone,
+"whether there ever existed a minister who cared three straws for the
+people; many care for their party, but as for the country--"
+
+"It is all fiddlestick!" added the lawyer, with more significance than
+grace.
+
+"Right; it is all fiddlestick, as you tersely express it. King,
+Constitution, and Church, forever! which, being interpreted, means,
+first, King or Crown influence, judgeships, and garters; secondly,
+Constitution, or fees to the lawyer, places to the statesman, laws for
+the rich, and Game Laws for the poor; thirdly, Church, or livings for
+our younger sons, and starvings for their curates!"
+
+"Ha, ha!" said Brandon, laughing sardonically; "we know human nature!"
+
+"And how it may be gulled!" quoth the courtier. "Here's a health to
+your niece; and may it not be long before you hail her as your friend's
+bride!"
+
+"Bride, et cetera," said Brandon, with a sneer meant only for his own
+satisfaction. "But mark me, my dear lord, do not be too sure of her.
+She is a singular girl, and of more independence than the generality of
+women. She will not think of your rank and station in estimating you;
+she will think only of their owner; and pardon me if I suggest to you,
+who know the sex so well, one plan that it may not be unadvisable
+for you to pursue. Don't let her fancy you entirely hers; rouse her
+jealousy, pique her pride, let her think you unconquerable, and unless
+she is unlike all women, she will want to conquer you."
+
+The earl smiled. "I must take my chance!" said he, with a confident
+tone.
+
+"The hoary coxcomb!" muttered Brandon, between his teeth; "now will his
+folly spoil all."
+
+"And that reminds me," continued Mauleverer, "that time wanes, and
+dinner is not over; let us not hurry, but let us be silent, to enjoy the
+more. These truffles in champagne,--do taste them; they would raise the
+dead."
+
+The lawyer smiled, and accepted the kindness, though he left the
+delicacy untouched; and Mauleverer, whose soul was in his plate, saw not
+the heartless rejection.
+
+Meanwhile the youthful beauty had already entered the theatre of
+pleasure, and was now seated with the squire at the upper end of the
+half-filled ball-room.
+
+A gay lady of the fashion at that time, and of that half and half rank
+to which belonged the aristocracy of Bath,--one of those curious persons
+we meet with in the admirable novels of Miss Burney, as appertaining
+to the order of fine ladies,--made the trio with our heiress and her
+father, and pointed out to them by name the various characters that
+entered the apartments. She was still in the full tide of scandal, when
+an unusual sensation was visible in the environs of the door; three
+strangers of marked mien, gay dress, and an air which, though differing
+in each, was in all alike remarkable for a sort of "dashing" assurance,
+made their entree. One was of uncommon height, and possessed of
+an exceedingly fine head of hair; another was of a more quiet
+and unpretending aspect, but nevertheless he wore upon his face a
+supercilious yet not ill-humoured expression; the third was many years
+younger than his companions, strikingly handsome in face and figure,
+altogether of a better taste in dress, and possessing a manner that,
+though it had equal ease, was not equally noticeable for impudence and
+swagger.
+
+"Who can those be?" said Lucy's female friend, in a wondering tone. "I
+never saw them before,--they must be great people,--they have all the
+airs of persons of quality! Dear, how odd that I should not know them!"
+
+While the good lady, who, like all good ladies of that stamp, thought
+people of quality had airs, was thus lamenting her ignorance of
+the new-comers, a general whisper of a similar import was already
+circulating round the room, "Who are they?" and the universal answer
+was, "Can't tell,--never saw them before!"
+
+Our strangers seemed by no means displeased with the evident and
+immediate impression they had made. They stood in the most conspicuous
+part of the room, enjoying among themselves a low conversation,
+frequently broken by fits of laughter,--tokens, we need not add, of
+their supereminently good breeding. The handsome figure of the youngest
+stranger, and the simple and seemingly unconscious grace of his
+attitudes were not, however, unworthy of the admiration he excited; and
+even his laughter, rude as it really was, displayed so dazzling a set
+of teeth, and was accompanied by such brilliant eyes, that before he
+had been ten minutes in the room there was scarcely a young lady under
+thirty-nine not disposed to fall in love with him.
+
+Apparently heedless of the various remarks which reached their ears, our
+strangers, after they had from their station sufficiently surveyed the
+beauties of the ball, strolled arm-in-arm through the rooms. Having
+sauntered through the ball and card rooms, they passed the door that
+led to the entrance passage, and gazed, with other loiterers, upon the
+new-comers ascending the stairs. Here the two younger strangers renewed
+their whispered conversation, while the eldest, who was also the tallest
+one, carelessly leaning against the wall, employed himself for a few
+moments in thrusting his fingers through his hair. In finishing this
+occupation, the peculiar state of his rules forced itself upon the
+observation of our gentleman, who, after gazing for some moments on an
+envious rent in the right ruffle, muttered some indistinct words, like
+"the cock of that confounded pistol," and then tucked up the mutilated
+ornament with a peculiarly nimble motion of the fingers of his left
+hand; the next moment, diverted by a new care, the stranger applied his
+digital members to the arranging and caressing of a remarkably splendid
+brooch, set in the bosom of a shirt the rude texture of which formed
+a singular contrast with the magnificence of the embellishment and the
+fineness of the one ruffle suffered by our modern Hyperion to make
+its appearance beneath his cinnamon-coloured coatsleeve. These little
+personal arrangements completed, and a dazzling snuff-box released from
+the confinement of a side-pocket, tapped thrice, and lightened of two
+pinches of its titillating luxury, the stranger now, with the guardian
+eye of friendship, directed a searching glance to the dress of his
+friends. There all appeared meet for his strictest scrutiny, save,
+indeed, that the supercilious-looking stranger having just drawn forth
+his gloves, the lining of his coat-pocket which was rather soiled
+into the bargain--had not returned to its internal station; the tall
+stranger, seeing this little inelegance, kindly thrust three fingers
+with a sudden and light dive into his friend's pocket, and effectually
+repulsed the forwardness of the intrusive lining. The supercilious
+stranger no sooner felt the touch than he started back, and whispered to
+his officious companion,--
+
+"What! among friends, Ned! Fie now; curb the nature of thee for one
+night at least."
+
+Before he of the flowing locks had time to answer, the master of the
+ceremonies, who had for the last three minutes been eying the strangers
+through his glass, stepped forward with a sliding bow; and the handsome
+gentleman, taking upon himself the superiority and precedence over his
+comrades, was the first to return the courtesy. He did this with so good
+a grace and so pleasing an expression of countenance that the censor of
+bows was charmed at once, and with a second and more profound salutation
+announced himself and his office. "You would like to dance probably,
+gentlemen?" he asked, glancing at each, but directing his words to the
+one who had prepossessed him.
+
+"You are very good," said the comely stranger; "and, for my part, I
+shall be extremely indebted to you for the exercise of your powers in
+my behalf. Allow me to return with you to the ball-room, and I can there
+point out to you the objects of my especial admiration."
+
+The master of the ceremonies bowed as before, and he and his new
+acquaintance strolled into the ball-room, followed by the two comrades
+of the latter.
+
+"Have you been long in Bath, sir?" inquired the monarch of the rooms.
+
+"No, indeed! we only arrived this evening."
+
+"From London?"
+
+"No; we made a little tour across the country."
+
+"Ah! very pleasant, this fine weather."
+
+"Yes; especially in the evenings."
+
+"Oho! romantic!" thought the man of balls, as he rejoined aloud, "Why,
+the nights are agreeable, and the moon is particularly favourable to
+us."
+
+"Not always!" quoth the stranger.
+
+"True, true, the night before last was dark; but, in general, surely the
+moon has been very bright."
+
+The stranger was about to answer, but checked himself, and simply bowed
+his head as in assent.
+
+"I wonder who they are!" thought the master of the ceremonies. "Pray,
+sir," said he, in a low tone, "is that gentle man, that tall gentleman,
+any way related to Lord ----------? I cannot but think I see a family
+likeness."
+
+"Not in the least related to his lordship," answered the stranger; "but
+he is of a family that have made a noise in the world; though he, as
+well as my other friend, is merely a commoner!" laying a stress on the
+last word.
+
+"Nothing, sir, can be more respectable than a commoner of family,"
+returned the polite Mr. -------, with a bow.
+
+"I agree with you, sir," answered the stranger, with another. "But,
+heavens!"--and the stranger started; for at that moment his eye caught
+for the first time, at the far end of the room, the youthful and
+brilliant countenance of Lucy Brandon,--"do I see rightly, or is that
+Miss Brandon?"
+
+"It is indeed that lovely young lady," said Mr. -------. "I congratulate
+you on knowing one so admired. I suppose that you, being blessed with
+her acquaintance, do not need the formality of my introduction?"
+
+"Umph!" said the stranger, rather shortly and uncourteously. "No!
+Perhaps you had better present me!"
+
+"By what name shall I have that honour, sir?" discreetly inquired the
+nomenclator.
+
+"Clifford!" answered the stranger; "Captain Clifford!" Upon this the
+prim master of the ceremonies, threading his path through the now
+fast-filling room, approached towards Lucy to obey Mr. Clifford's
+request. Meanwhile that gentleman, before he followed the steps of the
+tutelary spirit of the place, paused and said to his friends, in a tone
+careless yet not without command, "Hark ye, gentlemen; oblige me by
+being as civil and silent as ye are able; and don't thrust yourselves
+upon me, as you are accustomed to do, whenever you see no opportunity
+of indulging me with that honour with the least show of propriety!" So
+saying, and waiting no reply, Mr. Clifford hastened after the master of
+the ceremonies.
+
+"Our friend grows mighty imperious!" said Long Ned, whom our readers
+have already recognized in the tall stranger.
+
+"'T is the way with your rising geniuses," answered the moralizing
+Augustus Tomlinson. "Suppose we go to the cardroom and get up a rubber!"
+
+"Well thought of," said Ned, yawning,--a thing he was very apt to do
+in society; "and I wish nothing worse to those who try our rubbers than
+that they may be well cleaned by them." Upon this witticism the Colossus
+of Roads, glancing towards the glass, strutted off, arm-in-arm with his
+companion, to the card-room.
+
+During this short conversation the re-introduction of Mr. Clifford (the
+stranger of the Rectory and deliverer of Dr. Slopperton) to Lucy Brandon
+had been effected, and the hand of the heiress was already engaged,
+according to the custom of that time, for the two ensuing dances.
+
+It was about twenty minutes after the above presentation had taken place
+that Lord Mauleverer and William Brandon entered the rooms; and the buzz
+created by the appearance of the noted peer and the distinguished lawyer
+had scarcely subsided, before the royal personage expected to grace the
+"festive scene" (as the newspapers say of a great room with plenty of
+miserable-looking people in it) arrived. The most attractive persons
+in Europe may be found among the royal family of England, and the great
+personage then at Bath, in consequence of certain political intrigues,
+wished, at that time especially, to make himself as popular as possible.
+Having gone the round of the old ladies, and assured them, as the "Court
+Journal" assures the old ladies at this day, that they were "morning
+stars" and "swan-like wonders," the prince espied Brandon, and
+immediately beckoned to him with a familiar gesture. The smooth but
+saturnine lawyer approached the royal presence with the manner that
+peculiarly distinguished him, and which blended in no ungraceful
+mixture a species of stiffness that passed with the crowd for native
+independence, with a supple insinuation that was usually deemed the
+token of latent benevolence of heart. There was something, indeed, in
+Brandon's address that always pleased the great; and they liked him
+the better because, though he stood on no idle political points, mere
+differences in the view taken of a hairbreadth,--such as a corn-law or a
+Catholic bill, alteration in the Church or a reform in parliament,--yet
+he invariably talked so like a man of honour (except when with
+Mauleverer) that his urbanity seemed attachment to individuals, and
+his concessions to power sacrifices of private opinion for the sake of
+obliging his friends.
+
+"I am very glad indeed," said the royal personage, "to see Mr. Brandon
+looking so much better. Never was the crown in greater want of his
+services; and if rumour speak true, they will soon be required in
+another department of his profession."
+
+Brandon bowed, and answered,--
+
+"So please your royal highness, they will always be at the command of
+a king from whore I have experienced such kindness, in any capacity for
+which his Majesty may deem them fitting."
+
+"It is true, then!" said his royal highness, significantly. "I
+congratulate you! The quiet dignity of the bench must seem to you a
+great change after a career so busy and restless."
+
+"I fear I shall feel it so at first, your royal highness," answered
+Brandon, "for I like even the toil of my profession; and at this moment,
+when I am in full practice, it more than ever--But" (checking himself at
+once) "his Majesty's wishes, and my satisfaction in complying with
+them, are more than sufficient to remove any momentary regret I might
+otherwise have felt in quitting those toils which have now become to me
+a second nature."
+
+"It is possible," rejoined the prince, "that his Majesty took into
+consideration the delicate state of health which, in common with the
+whole public, I grieve to see the papers have attributed to one of the
+most distinguished ornaments of the bar."
+
+"So please your royal highness," answered Brandon, coolly, and with a
+smile which the most piercing eye could not have believed the mask to
+the agony then gnawing at his nerves, "it is the interest of my rivals
+to exaggerate the little ailments of a weak constitution. I thank
+Providence that I am now entirely recovered; and at no time of my life
+have I been less unable to discharge--so far as my native and mental,
+incapacities will allow--the duties of any occupation, however arduous.
+Nay, as the brute grows accustomed to the mill, so have I grown wedded
+to business; and even the brief relaxation I have now allowed myself
+seems to me rather irksome than pleasurable."
+
+"I rejoice to hear you speak thus," answered his royal highness, warmly;
+"and I trust for many years, and," added he, in a lower tone, "in the
+highest chamber of the senate, that we may profit by your talents.
+The times are those in which many occasions occur that oblige all true
+friends of the Constitution to quit minor employment for that great
+constitutional one that concerns us all, the highest and the meanest;
+and" (the royal voice sank still lower) "I feel justified in assuring
+you that the office of chief-justice alone is not considered by his
+Majesty as a sufficient reward for your generous sacrifice of present
+ambition to the difficulties of government."
+
+Brandon's proud heart swelled, and that moment the veriest pains of hell
+would scarcely have been felt.
+
+While the aspiring schemer was thus agreeably engaged, Mauleverer,
+sliding through the crowd with that grace which charmed every one, old
+and young, and addressing to all he knew some lively or affectionate
+remark, made his way to the dancers, among whom he had just caught a
+glimpse of Lucy. "I wonder," he thought, "whom she is dancing with.
+I hope it is that ridiculous fellow, Mossop, who tells a good story
+against himself; or that handsome ass, Belmont, who looks at his own
+legs, instead of seeming to have eyes for no one but his partner. Ah! if
+Tarquin had but known women as well as I do, he would have had no reason
+to be rough with Lucretia. 'T is a thousand pities that experience
+comes, in women as in the world, just when it begins to be no longer of
+use to us!"
+
+As he made these moral reflections, Mauleverer gained the dancers, and
+beheld Lucy listening, with downcast eyes and cheeks that evidently
+blushed, to a young man whom Mauleverer acknowledged at once to be
+one of the best-looking fellows he had ever seen. The stranger's
+countenance, despite an extreme darkness of complexion, was, to be sure,
+from the great regularity of the features, rather effeminate; but, on
+the other hand, his figure, though slender and graceful, betrayed to
+an experienced eye an extraordinary proportion of sinew and muscle; and
+even the dash of effeminacy in the countenance was accompanied by so
+manly and frank an air, and was so perfectly free from all coxcombry or
+self-conceit, that it did not in the least decrease the prepossessing
+effect of his appearance. An angry and bitter pang shot across that
+portion of Mauleverer's frame which the earl thought fit, for want
+of another name, to call his heart. "How cursedly pleased she looks!"
+muttered he. "By Heaven! that stolen glance under the left eyelid,
+dropped as suddenly as it is raised; and he--ha! how firmly he holds
+that little hand! I think I see him paddle with it; and then the dog's
+earnest, intent look,--and she all blushes, though she dare not look
+up to meet his gaze, feeling it by intuition. Oh, the demure, modest,
+shamefaced hypocrite! How silent she is! She can prate enough to me! I
+would give my promised garter if she would but talk to him. Talk, talk,
+laugh, prattle, only simper, in God's name, and I shall be happy. But
+that bashful, blushing silence,--it is insupportable. Thank Heaven, the
+dance is over! Thank Heaven, again! I have not felt such pains since the
+last nightmare I had after dining with her father!"
+
+With a face all smiles, but with a mien in which more dignity than he
+ordinarily assumed was worn, Mauleverer now moved towards Lucy, who was
+leaning on her partner's arm. The earl, who had ample tact where his
+consummate selfishness did not warp it, knew well how to act the lover,
+without running ridiculously into the folly of seeming to play the hoary
+dangler. He sought rather to be lively than sentimental; and beneath the
+wit to conceal the suitor.
+
+Having paid, then, with a careless gallantry his first compliments, he
+entered into so animated a conversation, interspersed with so many naive
+yet palpably just observations on the characters present, that perhaps
+he had never appeared to more brilliant advantage. At length, as the
+music was about to recommence, Mauleverer, with a careless glance at
+Lucy's partner, said, "Will Miss Brandon now allow me the agreeable duty
+of conducting her to her father?"
+
+"I believe," answered Lucy, and her voice suddenly became timid, "that,
+according to the laws of the rooms, I am engaged to this gentleman for
+another dance."
+
+Clifford, in an assured and easy tone, replied in assent.
+
+As he spoke. Mauleverer honoured him with a more accurate survey than
+he had hitherto bestowed on him; and whether or not there was any
+expression of contempt or superciliousness in the survey, it was
+sufficient to call up the indignant blood to Clifford's cheek. Returning
+the look with interest, he said to Lucy, "I believe, Miss Brandon,
+that the dance is about to begin;" and Lucy, obeying the hint, left the
+aristocratic Mauleverer to his own meditations.
+
+At that moment the master of the ceremonies came bowing by, half afraid
+to address so great a person as Mauleverer, but willing to show his
+respect by the profoundness of his salutation.
+
+"Aha! my dear Mr. -------!" said the earl, holding out both his hands to
+the Lycurgus of the rooms; "how are you? Pray can you inform me who that
+young man is, now dancing with Miss Brandon?"
+
+"It is--let me see-oh! it is a Captain Clifford, my lord! a very fine
+young man, my lord! Has your lordship never met him?"
+
+"Never! Who is he? One under your more especial patronage?" said the
+earl, smiling.
+
+"Nay, indeed!" answered the master of the ceremonies, with a simper of
+gratification; "I scarcely know who he is yet; the captain only made
+his appearance here to-night for the first time. He came with two other
+gentlemen,--ah! there they are!" and he pointed the earl's scrutinizing
+attention to the elegant forms of Mr. Augustus Tomlinson and Mr. Ned
+Pepper, just emerging from the card-rooms. The swagger of the latter
+gentleman was so peculiarly important that Mauleverer, angry as he was,
+could scarcely help laughing. The master of the ceremonies noted the
+earl's countenance, and remarked that "that fine-looking man seemed
+disposed to give himself airs."
+
+"Judging from the gentleman's appearance," said the earl, dryly (Ned's
+face, to say truth, did betoken his affection for the bottle), "I
+should imagine that he was much more accustomed to give himself thorough
+draughts!"
+
+"Ah!" renewed the arbiter elegantiarum, who had not heard Mauleverer's
+observation, which was uttered in a very low voice,--"ah! they seem real
+dashers!"
+
+"Dashers!" repeated Mauleverer; "true, haberdashers!" Long Ned now,
+having in the way of his profession acquitted himself tolerably well
+at the card-table, thought he had purchased the right to parade himself
+through the rooms, and show the ladies what stuff a Pepper could be made
+of.
+
+Leaning with his left hand on Tomlinson's arm, and employing the right
+in fanning himself furiously with his huge chapeau bras, the lengthy
+adventurer stalked slowly along, now setting out one leg jauntily, now
+the other, and ogling "the ladies" with a kind of Irish look,--namely, a
+look between a wink and a stare.
+
+Released from the presence of Clifford, who kept a certain check on
+his companions, the apparition of Ned became glaringly conspicuous; and
+wherever he passed, a universal whisper succeeded.
+
+"Who can he be?" said the widow Matemore. "'T is a droll creature; but
+what a head of hair!"
+
+"For my part," answered the spinster Sneerall, "I think he is a
+linen-draper in disguise; for I heard him talk to his companion of
+'tape.'"
+
+"Well, well," thought Mauleverer, "it would be but kind to seek out
+Brandon, and hint to him in what company his niece seems to have
+fallen!" And so thinking, he glided to the corner where, with a
+gray-headed old politician, the astute lawyer was conning the affairs of
+Europe.
+
+In the interim the second dance had ended, and Clifford was conducting
+Lucy to her seat, each charmed with the other, when he found himself
+abruptly tapped on the back, and turning round in alarm,--for such taps
+were not unfamiliar to him,--he saw the cool countenance of Long Ned,
+with one finger sagaciously laid beside the nose.
+
+"How now?" said Clifford, between his ground teeth; "did I not tell thee
+to put that huge bulk of thine as far from me as possible?"
+
+"Humph!" granted Ned; "if these are my thanks, I may as well keep my
+kindness to myself; but know you, my kid, that Lawyer Brandon is here,
+peering through the crowd at this very moment, in order to catch a
+glimpse of that woman's face of thine."
+
+"Ha!" answered Clifford, in a very quick tone; "begone, then! I will
+meet you without the rooms immediately." Clifford now turned to his
+partner, and bowing very low, in reality to hide his face from those
+sharp eyes which had once seen it in the court of Justice Burnflat,
+said: "I trust, madam, I shall have the honour to meet you again. Is
+it, if I may be allowed to ask, with your celebrated uncle that you are
+staying, or--"
+
+"With my father," answered Lucy, concluding the sentence Clifford had
+left unfinished; "but my uncle has been with us, though I fear he leaves
+us to-morrow."
+
+Clifford's eyes sparkled; he made no answer, but bowing again, receded
+into the crowd and disappeared. Several times that night did the
+brightest eyes in Somersetshire rove anxiously round the rooms in search
+of our hero; but he was seen no more.
+
+It was on the stairs that Clifford encountered his comrades; taking an
+arm of each, he gained the door without any adventure worth noting, save
+that, being kept back by the crowd for a few moments, the moralizing
+Augustus Tomlinson, who honoured the moderate Whigs by enrolling himself
+among their number, took up, pour passer le temps, a tall gold-headed
+cane, and weighing it across his finger with a musing air, said,
+"Alas! among our supporters we often meet heads as heavy, but of what
+a different metal!" The crowd now permitting, Augustus was walking away
+with his companions, and, in that absence of mind characteristic of
+philosophers, unconsciously bearing with him the gold-headed object of
+his reflection, when a stately footman, stepping up to him, said, "Sir,
+my cane!"
+
+"Cane, fellow!" said Tomlinson. "Ah, I am so absent! Here is thy cane.
+Only think of my carrying off the man's cane, Ned! Ha, ha!"
+
+"Absent indeed!" grunted a knowing chairman, watching the receding
+figures of the three gentlemen; "body o' me! but it was the cane that
+was about to be absent!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+          Whackum.  My dear rogues, dear boys, Bluster and Dingboy! you
+          are the bravest fellows that ever scoured yet!--SUADWELL:
+          Scourers.
+
+          Cato, the Thessalian, was wont to say that some things may be
+          done unjustly, that many things may be done justly.--LORD BACON
+          (being a justification of every rascality).
+
+Although our three worthies had taken unto themselves a splendid lodging
+in Milsom Street, which, to please Ned, was over a hairdresser's shop,
+yet, instead of returning thither, or repairing to such taverns as might
+seem best befitting their fashion and garb, they struck at once from the
+gay parts of the town, and tarried not till they reached a mean-looking
+alehouse in a remote suburb.
+
+The door was opened to them by an elderly lady; and Clifford, stalking
+before his companions into an apartment at the back of the house, asked
+if the other gentlemen were come yet.
+
+"No," returned the dame. "Old Mr. Bags came in about ten minutes ago;
+but hearing more work might be done, he went out again."
+
+"Bring the lush and the pipes, old blone!" cried Ned, throwing himself
+on a bench; "we are never at a loss for company!"
+
+"You, indeed, never can be, who are always inseparably connected with
+the object of your admiration," said Tomlin, son, dryly, and taking up
+an old newspaper. Ned, who, though choleric, was a capital fellow, and
+could bear a joke on himself, smiled, and drawing forth a little pair of
+scissors, began trimming his nails.
+
+"Curse me," said he, after a momentary silence, "if this is not a
+devilish deal pleasanter than playing the fine gentleman in that great
+room, with a rose in one's button-hole! What say you, Master Lovett?"
+
+Clifford (as henceforth, despite his other aliases, we shall denominate
+our hero), who had thrown himself at full length on a bench at the far
+end of the room, and who seemed plunged into a sullen revery, now looked
+up for a moment, and then, turning round and presenting the dorsal part
+of his body to Long Ned, muttered, "Fish!"
+
+"Harkye, Master Lovett!" said Long Ned, colouring. "I don't know what
+has come over you of late; but I would have you to learn that gentlemen
+are entitled to courtesy and polite behaviour; and so, d' ye see, if
+you ride your high horse upon me, splice my extremities if I won't have
+satisfaction!"
+
+"Hist, man! be quiet," said Tomlinson, philosophically, snuffing the
+candles,--
+
+                  "'For companions to quarrel,
+                    Is extremely immoral.'
+
+"Don't you see that the captain is in a revery? What good man ever loves
+to be interrupted in his meditations? Even Alfred the Great could not
+bear it! Perhaps at this moment, with the true anxiety of a worthy
+chief, the captain is designing something for our welfare!"
+
+"Captain indeed!" muttered Long Ned, darting a wrathful look at
+Clifford, who had not deigned to pay any attention to Mr. Pepper's
+threat; "for my part I cannot conceive what was the matter with us when
+we chose this green slip of the gallows-tree for our captain of the
+district. To be sure, he did very well at first, and that robbery of the
+old lord was not ill-planned; but lately--"
+
+"Nay, nay," quoth Augustus, interrupting the gigantic grumbler; "the
+nature of man is prone to discontent. Allow that our present design
+of setting up the gay Lothario, and trying our chances at Bath for an
+heiress, is owing as much to Lovett's promptitude as to our invention."
+
+"And what good will come of it?" returned Ned, as he lighted his pipe;
+"answer me that. Was I not dressed as fine as a lord, and did not I walk
+three times up and down that great room without being a jot the better
+for it?"
+
+"Ah! but you know not how many secret conquests you may have made. You
+cannot win a prize by looking upon it."
+
+"Humph!" grunted Ned, applying himself discontentedly to the young
+existence of his pipe.
+
+"As for the captain's partner," renewed Tomlinson, who maliciously
+delighted in exciting the jealousy of the handsome "tax-collector,"--for
+that was the designation by which Augustus thought proper to style
+himself and companions,--"I will turn Tory if she be not already half
+in love with him; and did you hear the old gentleman who cut into our
+rubber say what a fine fortune she had? Faith, Ned, it is lucky for
+us two that we all agreed to go shares in our marriage speculations; I
+fancy the worthy captain will think it a bad bargain for himself."
+
+"I am not so sure of that, Mr. Tomlinson," said Long Ned, sourly eying
+his comrade. "Some women may be caught by a smooth skin and a showy
+manner; but real masculine beauty,--eyes, colour, and hair,--Mr.
+Tomlinson, must ultimately make its way; so hand me the brandy, and
+cease your jaw."
+
+"Well, well," said Tomlinson, "I'll give you a toast,--'The prettiest
+girl in England,' and that's Miss Brandon!"
+
+"You shall give no such toast, sir!" said Clifford, starting from the
+bench. "What the devil is Miss Brandon to you? And now, Ned," seeing
+that the tall hero looked on him with an unfavourable aspect, "here's my
+hand; forgive me if I was uncivil. Tomlinson will tell you, in a maxim,
+men are changeable. Here's to your health; and it shall not be my fault,
+gentlemen, if we have not a merry evening!"
+
+This speech, short as it was, met with great applause from the two
+friends; and Clifford, as president, stationed himself in a huge chair
+at the head of the table. Scarcely had he assumed this dignity, before
+the door opened, and half-a-dozen of the gentlemen confederates trooped
+somewhat noisily into the apartment.
+
+"Softly, softly, messieurs," said the president, recovering all
+his constitutional gayety, yet blending it with a certain negligent
+command,--"respect for the chair, if you please! 'T is the way with all
+assemblies where the public purse is a matter of deferential interest!"
+
+"Hear him!" cried Tomlinson.
+
+"What, my old friend Bags!" said the president; "you have not come
+empty-handed, I will swear; your honest face is like the table of
+contents to the good things in your pockets!"
+
+"Ah, Captain Clifford," said the veteran, groaning, and shaking his
+reverend head, "I have seen the day when there was not a lad in England
+forked so largely, so comprehensively-like, as I did. But, as King Lear
+says at Common Garden, 'I be's old now!'"
+
+"But your zeal is as youthful as ever, my fine fellow," said the
+captain, soothingly; "and if you do not clean out the public as
+thoroughly as heretofore, it is not the fault of your inclinations."
+
+"No, that it is not!" cried the "tax-collectors" unanimously.
+
+"And if ever a pocket is to be picked neatly, quietly, and effectually,"
+added the complimentary Clifford, "I do not know to this day, throughout
+the three kingdoms, a neater, quieter, and more effective set of fingers
+than Old Bags's!"
+
+The veteran bowed disclaimingly, and took his seat among the heartfelt
+good wishes of the whole assemblage.
+
+"And now, gentlemen," said Clifford, as soon as the revellers had
+provided themselves with their wonted luxuries, potatory and fumous,
+"let us hear your adventures, and rejoice our eyes with their produce.
+The gallant Attie shall begin; but first, a toast,--'May those who leap
+from a hedge never leap from a tree!'"
+
+This toast being drunk with enthusiastic applause, Fighting Attie began
+the recital of his little history.
+
+"You sees, Captain," said he, putting himself in a martial position,
+and looking Clifford full in the face, "that I'm not addicted to much
+blarney. Little cry and much wool is my motto. At ten o'clock A.M. saw
+the enemy--in the shape of a Doctor of Divinity. 'Blow me,' says I to
+Old Bags, 'but I 'll do his reverence!' 'Blow me,' says Old Bags, 'but
+you sha' n't,--you'll have us scragged if you touches the Church.'
+'My grandmother!' says I. Bags tells the pals,--all in a fuss about
+it,--what care I? I puts on a decent dress, and goes to the doctor as
+a decayed soldier wot supplies the shops in the turning line. His
+reverence--a fat jolly dog as ever you see--was at dinner over a fine
+roast pig; so I tells him I have some bargains at home for him. Splice
+me, if the doctor did not think he had got a prize; so he puts on his
+boots, and he comes with me to my house. But when I gets him into a
+lane, out come my pops. 'Give up, Doctor,' says I; 'others must share
+the goods of the Church now.' You has no idea what a row he made; but I
+did the thing, and there's an end on't."
+
+"Bravo, Attie!" cried Clifford; and the word echoed round the board.
+Attie put a purse on the table, and the next gentleman was called to
+confession.
+
+"It skills not, boots not," gentlest of readers, to record each of
+the narratives that now followed one another. Old Bags, in especial,
+preserved his well-earned reputation by emptying six pockets, which had
+been filled with every possible description of petty valuables. Peasant
+and prince appeared alike to have come under his hands; and perhaps the
+good old man had done in the town more towards effecting an equality
+of goods among different ranks than all the Reformers, from Cornwall to
+Carlisle. Yet so keen was his appetite for the sport that the veteran
+appropriator absolutely burst into tears at not having "forked more."
+
+"I love a warm-hearted enthusiasm," cried Clifford, handling the
+movables, while he gazed lovingly on the ancient purloiner. "May new
+cases never teach us to forget Old Bags!"
+
+As soon as this "sentiment" had been duly drunk, and Mr. Bagshot had
+dried his tears and applied himself to his favourite drink,--which,
+by the way, was "blue ruin,"--the work of division took place. The
+discretion and impartiality of the captain in this arduous part of his
+duty attracted universal admiration; and each gentleman having carefully
+pouched his share, the youthful president hemmed thrice, and the society
+became aware of a purposed speech.
+
+"Gentlemen!" began Clifford,--and his main supporter, the sapient
+Augustus, shouted out, "Hear!"--"gentlemen, you all know that when some
+months ago you were pleased, partly at the instigation of Gentleman
+George--God bless him!--partly from the exaggerated good opinion
+expressed of me by my friends, to elect me to the high honour of the
+command of this district, I myself was by no means ambitious to
+assume that rank, which I knew well was far beyond my merits, and that
+responsibility which I knew with equal certainty was too weighty for my
+powers. Your voices, however, overruled my own; and as Mr. Muddlepud,
+the great metaphysician, in that excellent paper, 'The Asinaeum,'
+was wont to observe, 'the susceptibilities, innate, extensible,
+incomprehensible, and eternal,' existing in my bosom, were infinitely
+more powerful than the shallow suggestions of reason,--that ridiculous
+thing which all wise men and judicious Asinaeans sedulously stifle."
+
+"Plague take the man! what is he talking about?" said Long Ned, who we
+have seen was of an envious temper, in a whisper to Old Bags. Old Bags
+shook his head.
+
+"In a word, gentlemen," renewed Clifford, "your kindness overpowered me;
+and despite my cooler inclinations, I accepted your flattering proposal.
+Since then I have endeavoured, so far as I have been able, to advance
+your interests; I have kept a vigilant eye upon all my neighbours; I
+have, from county to county, established numerous correspondents; and
+our exertions have been carried on with a promptitude that has ensured
+success.
+
+"Gentlemen, I do not wish to boast; but on these nights of periodical
+meetings, when every quarter brings us to go halves,--when we meet in
+private to discuss the affairs of the public, show our earnings as
+it were in privy council, and divide them amicably as it were in the
+Cabinet ['Hear! hear!' from Mr. Tomlinson],--it is customary for your
+captain for the time being to remind you of his services, engage
+your pardon for his deficiencies, and your good wishes for his future
+exertions. Gentlemen, has it ever been said of Paul Lovett that he heard
+of a prize and forgot to tell you of his news? ['Never! never!' loud
+cheering.] Has it ever been said of him that he sent others to seize the
+booty, and stayed at home to think how it should be spent? ['No! no!'
+repeated cheers.] Has it ever been said of him that he took less share
+than his due of your danger, and more of your guineas? [Cries in the
+negative, accompanied with vehement applause.] Gentlemen, I thank you
+for these flattering and audible testimonials in my favour; but the
+points on which I have dwelt, however necessary to my honour, would
+prove but little for my merits; they might be worthy notice in your
+comrade, you demand more subtle duties in your chief. Gentlemen, has
+it ever been said of Paul Lovett that he sent out brave men on forlorn
+hopes; that he hazarded your own heads by rash attempts in acquiring
+pictures of King George's; that zeal, in short, was greater in him than
+caution, or that his love of a quid (A guinea) ever made him neglectful
+of your just aversion to a quod? (A prison) [Unanimous cheering.]
+
+"Gentlemen, since I have had the honour to preside over your welfare,
+Fortune, which favours the bold, has not been unmerciful to you! But
+three of our companions have been missed from our peaceful festivities.
+One, gentlemen, I myself expelled from our corps for ungentlemanlike
+practices; he picked pockets of fogles, (handkerchiefs)--it was a vulgar
+employment. Some of you, gentlemen, have done the same for amusement;
+Jack Littlefork did it for occupation. I expostulated with him in public
+and in private; Mr. Pepper cut his society; Mr. Tomlinson read him an
+essay on Real Greatness of Soul: all was in vain. He was pumped by the
+mob for the theft of a bird's-eye wipe. The fault I had borne with,--the
+detection was unpardonable; I expelled him. Who's here so base as would
+be a fogle-hunter? If any, speak; for him have I offended! Who's here
+so rude as would not be a gentleman? If any, speak; for him have I
+offended! I pause for a reply! What, none! then none have I offended.
+[Loud cheers.] Gentlemen, I may truly add, that I have done no more to
+Jack Littlefork than you should do to Paul Lovett! The next vacancy in
+our ranks was occasioned by the loss of Patrick Blunderbull. You know,
+gentlemen, the vehement exertions that I made to save that misguided
+creature, whom I had made exertions no less earnest to instruct. But he
+chose to swindle under the name of the 'Honourable Captain Smico;' the
+Peerage gave him the lie at once; his case was one of aggravation, and
+he was so remarkably ugly that he 'created no interest.' He left us
+for a foreign exile; and if as a man I lament him, I confess to you,
+gentlemen, as a 'tax-collector' I am easily consoled.
+
+"Our third loss must be fresh in your memory. Peter Popwell, as bold a
+fellow as ever breathed, is no more! [A movement in the assembly.]
+Peace be with him! He died on the field of battle; shot dead by a Scotch
+Colonel, whom poor Popwell thought to rob of nothing with an empty
+pistol. His memory, gentlemen,--in solemn silence!
+
+"These make the catalogue of our losses," resumed the youthful chief,
+so soon as the "red cup had crowned the memory" of Peter Popwell; "I am
+proud, even in sorrow, to think that the blame of those losses rests
+not with me. And now, friends and followers! Gentlemen of the Road, the
+Street, the Theatre, and the Shop! Prigs, Tobymen, and Squires of the
+Cross! according to the laws of our Society, I resign into your hands
+that power which for two quarterly terms you have confided to mine,
+ready to sink into your ranks as a comrade, nor unwilling to renounce
+the painful honour I have borne,--borne with much infirmity, it is true,
+but at least with a sincere desire to serve that cause with which you
+have intrusted me."
+
+So saying, the captain descended from his chair amidst the most
+uproarious applause; and as soon as the first burst had partially
+subsided, Augustus Tomlinson rising, with one hand in his breeches'
+pocket and the other stretched out, said,--
+
+"Gentlemen, I move that Paul Lovett be again chosen as our captain for
+the ensuing term of three months. [Deafening cheers.] Much might I say
+about his surpassing merits; but why dwell upon that which is obvious?
+Life is short! Why should speeches be long? Our lives, perhaps, are
+shorter than the lives of other men; why should not our harangues be of
+a suitable brevity? Gentlemen, I shall say but one word in favour of my
+excellent friend,--of mine, say I? ay, of mine, of yours. He is a friend
+to all of us! A prime minister is not more useful to his followers and
+more burdensome to the public than I am proud to say is--Paul Lovett.
+[Loud plaudits.] What I shall urge in his favour is simply this: the man
+whom opposite parties unite in praising must have supereminent merit. Of
+all your companions, gentlemen, Paul Lovett is the only man who to that
+merit can advance a claim. [Applause.] You all know, gentlemen, that
+our body has long been divided into two factions,--each jealous of the
+other, each desirous of ascendancy, and each emulous which shall put the
+greatest number of fingers into the public pie. In the language of
+the vulgar, the one faction would be called 'swindlers,' and the other
+'highwaymen.' I, gentlemen, who am fond of finding new names for things
+and for persons, and am a bit of a politician, call the one Whigs, and
+the other Tories. [Clamorous cheering.] Of the former body I am esteemed
+no uninfluential member; of the latter faction Mr. Bags is justly
+considered the most shining ornament. Mr. Attie and Mr. Edward Pepper
+can scarcely be said to belong entirely to either; they unite the good
+qualities of both. 'British compounds' some term them; I term them
+Liberal Aristocrats! [Cheers.] I now call upon you all, Whig, or
+Swindler, Tory, or Highwayman, 'British Compounds,' or Liberal
+Aristocrats,--I call upon you all to name me one man whom you will all
+agree to elect."
+
+All,--"Lovett forever!"
+
+"Gentlemen," continued the sagacious Augustus, "that shout is
+sufficient; without another word, I propose, as your captain, Mr. Paul
+Lovett."
+
+"And I seconds the motion!" said old Mr. Bags.
+
+Our hero, being now by the unanimous applause of his confederates
+restored to the chair of office, returned thanks in a neat speech; and
+Scarlet Jem declared, with great solemnity, that it did equal honour to
+his head and heart.
+
+The thunders of eloquence being hushed, flashes of lightning, or, as
+the vulgar say, glasses of gin, gleamed about. Good old Mr. Bags stuck,
+however, to his blue ruin, and Attie to the bottle of bingo; some, among
+whom were Clifford and the wise Augustus, called for wine; and Clifford,
+who exerted himself to the utmost in supporting the gay duties of his
+station, took care that the song should vary the pleasures of the bowl.
+Of the songs we have only been enabled to preserve two. The first is
+by Long Ned; and though we confess we can see but little in it,
+yet (perhaps from some familiar allusion or other with which we are
+necessarily unacquainted) it produced a prodigious sensation. It ran
+thus:--
+
+                         THE ROGUE'S RECIPE.
+
+                    Your honest fool a rogue to make,
+                    As great as can be seen, sir,
+                    Two hackneyed rogues you first must take,
+                    Then place your fool between, sir.
+
+                    Virtue 's a dunghill cock, ashamed
+                    Of self when paired with game ones;
+                    And wildest elephants are tamed
+                    If stuck betwixt two tame ones.
+
+The other effusion with which we have the honour to favour our readers
+is a very amusing duet which took place between Fighting Attie and a
+tall thin robber, who was a dangerous fellow in a mob, and was therefore
+called Mobbing Francis; it was commenced by the latter:--
+
+                      MOBBING FRANCIS:
+
+          The best of all robbers as ever I knowed
+          Is the bold Fighting Attie, the pride of the road!--
+          Fighting Attie, my hero, I saw you to-day
+          A purse full of yellow boys seize;
+          And as, just at present, I'm low in the lay,
+          I'll borrow a quid, if you please.
+          Oh!  bold Fighting Attie, the knowing, the natty,
+          By us all it must sure be confest,
+          Though your shoppers and snobbers are pretty good robbers,
+          A soldier is always the best.
+
+                       FIGHTING ATTIE
+
+                    Stubble your whids, (Hold your tongue)
+                    You wants to trick I.
+                    Lend you my quids?
+                    Not one, by Dickey.
+
+                        MOBBING FRANCIS:
+
+               Oh, what a beast is a niggardly ruffler,
+               Nabbing, grabbing all for himself!
+               Hang it, old fellow, I'll hit you a muffler,
+               Since you won't give me a pinch of the pelf.
+               You has not a heart for the general distress,
+               You cares not a mag if our party should fall,
+               And if Scarlet Jem were not good at a press,
+               By Goles, it would soon be all up with us all!
+               Oh, Scarlet Jem, he is trusty and trim,
+               Like his wig to his poll, sticks his conscience to him;
+               But I vows I despises the fellow who prizes
+               More his own ends than the popular stock, sir;
+               And the soldier as bones for himself and his crones,
+               Should be boned like a traitor himself at the block, sir.
+
+The severe response of Mobbing Francis did not in the least ruffle the
+constitutional calmness of Fighting Attie; but the wary Clifford, seeing
+that Francis had lost his temper, and watchful over the least sign of
+disturbance among the company, instantly called for another song, and
+Mobbing Francis sullenly knocked down Old Bags.
+
+The night was far gone, and so were the wits of the honest
+tax-gatherers, when the president commanded silence, and the
+convivialists knew that their chief was about to issue forth the
+orders for the ensuing term. Nothing could be better timed than such
+directions,--during merriment and before oblivion.
+
+"Gentlemen," said the captain, "I will now, with your leave, impart to
+you all the plans I have formed for each. You, Attie, shall repair to
+London: be the Windsor road and the purlieus of Pimlico your especial
+care. Look you, my hero, to these letters; they will apprise you of much
+work. I need not caution you to silence. Like the oyster, you never open
+your mouth but for something. Honest Old Bags, a rich grazier will be
+in Smithfield on Thursday; his name is Hodges, and he will have somewhat
+like a thousand pounds in his pouch. He is green, fresh, and avaricious;
+offer to assist him in defrauding his neighbours in a bargain, and cease
+not till thou hast done that with him which he wished to do to others.
+Be, excellent old man, like the frog-fish, which fishes for other fishes
+with two horns that resemble baits; the prey dart at the horns, and are
+down the throat in an instant!--For thee, dearest Jem, these letters
+announce a prize: fat is Parson Pliant; full is his purse; and he rides
+from Henley to Oxford on Friday,--I need say no more! As for the rest
+of you, gentlemen, on this paper you will see your destinations fixed. I
+warrant you, ye will find enough work till we meet again this day three
+months. Myself, Augustus Tomlinson, and Ned Pepper remain in Bath; we
+have business in hand, gentlemen, of paramount importance; should you by
+accident meet us, never acknowledge us,--we are incog.; striking at
+high game, and putting on falcon's plumes to do it in character,--you
+understand; but this accident can scarcely occur, for none of you will
+remain at Bath; by to-morrow night, may the road receive you. And now,
+gentlemen, speed the glass, and I'll give you a sentiment by way of a
+spur to it,--
+
+                       "'Much sweeter than honey
+                         Is other men's money!"'
+
+Our hero's maxim was received with all the enthusiasm which agreeable
+truisms usually create. And old Mr. Bags rose to address the chair;
+unhappily for the edification of the audience, the veteran's foot
+slipped before he had proceeded further than "Mr. President;" he fell to
+the earth with a sort of reel,--
+
+               "Like shooting stars he fell to rise no more!"
+
+His body became a capital footstool for the luxurious Pepper. Now
+Augustus Tomlinson and Clifford, exchanging looks, took every possible
+pains to promote the hilarity of the evening; and before the third hour
+of morning had sounded, they had the satisfaction of witnessing the
+effects of their benevolent labours in the prostrate forms of all their
+companions. Long Ned, naturally more capacious than the rest, succumbed
+the last.
+
+"As leaves of trees," said the chairman, waving his hand,
+
+             "'As leaves of trees the race of man is found,
+               Now fresh with dew, now withering on the ground.'"
+
+"Well said, my Hector of Highways;" cried Tomlinson; and then helping
+himself to the wine, while he employed his legs in removing the supine
+forms of Scarlet Jem and Long Ned, he continued the Homeric quotation,
+with a pompous and self-gratulatory tone,--
+
+               "'So flourish these when those have passed away!'"
+
+"We managed to get rid of our friends," began Clifford--
+
+"Like Whigs in place," interrupted the politician.
+
+"Right, Tomlinson, thanks to the milder properties of our drink, and
+perchance to the stronger qualities of our heads; and now tell me,
+my friend, what think you of our chance of success? Shall we catch an
+heiress or not?"
+
+"Why, really," said Tomlinson, "women are like those calculations in
+arithmetic, which one can never bring to an exact account; for my part,
+I shall stuff my calves, and look out for a widow. You, my good fellow,
+seem to stand a fair chance with Miss ------"
+
+"Oh, name her not!" cried Clifford, colouring, even through the flush
+which wine had spread over his countenance. "Ours are not the lips by
+which her name should be breathed; and, faith, when I think of her, I do
+it anonymously."
+
+"What, have you ever thought of her before this evening?"
+
+"Yes, for months," answered Clifford. "You remember some time ago, when
+we formed the plan for robbing Lord Mauleverer, how, rather for
+frolic than profit, you robbed Dr. Slopperton, of Warlock, while
+I compassionately walked home with the old gentleman. Well, at the
+parson's house I met Miss Brandon--mind, if I speak of her by name, you
+must not; and, by Heaven!--But I won't swear. I accompanied her home.
+You know, before morning we robbed Lord Mauleverer; the affair made a
+noise, and I feared to endanger you all if I appeared in the vicinity
+of the robbery. Since then, business diverted my thoughts; we formed the
+plan of trying a matrimonial speculation at Bath. I came hither,--guess
+my surprise at seeing her--"
+
+"And your delight," added Tomlinson, "at hearing she is as rich as she
+is pretty."
+
+"No!" answered Clifford, quickly; "that thought gives me no pleasure.
+You stare. I will try and explain. You know, dear Tomlinson, I'm not
+much of a canter, and yet my heart shrinks when I look on that innocent
+face, and hear that soft happy voice, and think that my love to her can
+be only ruin and disgrace; nay, that my very address is contamination,
+and my very glance towards her an insult."
+
+"Heyday!" quoth Tomlinson; "have you been under my instructions, and
+learned the true value of words, and can you have any scruples left
+on so easy a point of conscience? True, you may call your representing
+yourself to her as an unprofessional gentleman, and so winning her
+affections, deceit; but why call it deceit when a genius for intrigue is
+so much neater a phrase? In like manner, by marrying the young lady, if
+you say you have ruined her, you justly deserve to be annihilated; but
+why not say you have saved yourself, and then, my dear fellow, you will
+have done the most justifiable thing in the world."
+
+"Pish, man!" said Clifford, peevishly; "none of thy sophisms and
+sneers!"
+
+"By the soul of Sir Edward Coke, I am serious! But look you, my friend!
+this is not a matter where it is convenient to have a tender-footed
+conscience. You see these fellows on the ground, all d---d clever, and
+so forth; but you and I are of a different order. I have had a classical
+education, seen the world, and mixed in decent society; you, too, had
+not been long a member of our club before you distinguished yourself
+above us all. Fortune smiled on your youthful audacity. You grew
+particular in horses and dress, frequented public haunts, and being a
+deuced good-looking fellow, with an inborn air of gentility and some
+sort of education, you became sufficiently well received to acquire in a
+short time the manner and tone of a--what shall I say?--a gentleman, and
+the taste to like suitable associates. This is my case too! Despite our
+labours for the public weal, the ungrateful dogs see that we are above
+them; a single envious breast is sufficient to give us to the hangman.
+We have agreed that we are in danger; we have agreed to make an
+honourable retreat; we cannot do so without money. You know the vulgar
+distich among our set. Nothing can be truer,--
+
+                       "'Hanging is 'nation
+                         More nice than starvation!'
+
+You will not carry off some of the common stock, though I think you
+justly might, considering how much you have put into it. What, then,
+shall we do? Work we cannot, beg we will not; and, between you and me,
+we are cursedly extravagant! What remains but marriage?"
+
+"It is true," said Clifford, with a half sigh.
+
+"You may well sigh, my good fellow. Marriage is a lackadaisical
+proceeding at best; but there is no resource. And now, when you have got
+a liking to a young lady who is as rich as a she-Craesus, and so gilded
+the pill as bright as a lord mayor's coach, what the devil have you to
+do with scruples?"
+
+Clifford made no answer, and there was a long pause; perhaps he would
+not have spoken so frankly as he had done, if the wine had not opened
+his heart.
+
+"How proud," renewed Tomlinson, "the good old matron at Thames Court
+would be if you married a lady! You have not seen her lately?"
+
+"Not for years," answered our hero. "Poor old soul! I believe that
+she is well in health, and I take care that she should not be poor in
+pocket."
+
+"But why not visit her? Perhaps, like all great men, especially of a
+liberal turn of mind, you are ashamed of old friends, eh?"
+
+"My good fellow, is that like me? Why, you know the beaux of our set
+look askant on me for not keeping up my dignity, robbing only in company
+with well-dressed gentlemen, and swindling under the name of a lord's
+nephew. No, my reasons are these: first, you must know, that the old
+dame had set her heart on my turning out an honest man."
+
+"And so you have," interrupted Augustus,--"honest to your party; what
+more would you have from either prig or politician?"
+
+"I believe," continued Clifford, not heeding the interruption, "that my
+poor mother, before she died, desired that I might be reared honestly;
+and strange as it may seem to you, Dame Lobkins is a conscientious woman
+in her own way,--it is not her fault if I have turned out as I have
+done. Now I know well that it would grieve her to the quick to see me
+what I am. Secondly, my friend, under my new names, various as they
+are,--Jackson and Howard, Russell and Pigwiggin, Villiers and Gotobed,
+Cavendish and Solomons,--you may well suppose that the good persons in
+the neighbourhood of Thames Court have no suspicion that the adventurous
+and accomplished ruffler, at present captain of this district, under the
+new appellation of Lovett, is in reality no other than the obscure and
+surnameless Paul of the Mug. Now you and I, Augustus, have read human
+nature, though in the black letter; and I know well that were I to make
+my appearance in Thames Court, and were the old lady (as she certainly
+would, not from unkindness, but insobriety,--not that she loves me less,
+but heavy wet more) to divulge the secret of that appearance--"
+
+"You know well," interrupted the vivacious Tomlinson, "that the identity
+of your former meanness with your present greatness would be easily
+traced; the envy and jealousy of your early friends aroused; a hint
+of your whereabout and your aliases given to the police, and yourself
+grabbed, with a slight possibility of a hempen consummation."
+
+"You conceive me exactly!" answered Clifford. "The fact is, that I have
+observed in nine cases out of ten our bravest fellows have been taken
+off by the treachery of some early sweetheart or the envy of some boyish
+friend. My destiny is not yet fixed. I am worthy of better things than
+a ride in the cart with a nosegay in my hand; and though I care not
+much about death in itself, I am resolved, if possible, not to die a
+highwayman. Hence my caution, and that prudential care for secrecy and
+safe asylums, which men less wise than you have so often thought an
+unnatural contrast to my conduct on the road."
+
+"Fools!" said the philosophical Tomlinson; "what has the bravery of a
+warrior to do with his insuring his house from fire?"
+
+"However," said Clifford, "I send my good nurse a fine gift every
+now and then to assure her of my safety; and thus, notwithstanding my
+absence, I show my affection by my presents,--excuse a pun."
+
+"And have you never been detected by any of your quondam associates?"
+
+"Never! Remember in what a much more elevated sphere of life I have been
+thrown; and who could recognize the scamp Paul with a fustian jacket
+in gentleman Paul with a laced waistcoat? Besides, I have diligently
+avoided every place where I was likely to encounter those who saw me
+in childhood. You know how little I frequent flash houses, and how
+scrupulous I am in admitting new confederates into our band; you and
+Pepper are the only two of my associates--save my _protege_, as you
+express it, who never deserts the cave--that possess a knowledge of my
+identity with the lost Paul; and as ye have both taken that dread oath
+to silence, which to disobey until indeed I be in the jail or on the
+gibbet, is almost to be assassinated, I consider my secret is little
+likely to be broken, save with my own consent."
+
+"True," said Augustus, nodding; "one more glass, and to bed, Mr.
+Chairman."
+
+"I pledge you, my friend; our last glass shall be philanthropically
+quaffed,--'All fools, and may their money soon be parted!'"
+
+"All fools!" cried Tomlinson, filling a bumper; "but I quarrel with the
+wisdom of your toast. May fools be rich, and rogues will never be poor!
+I would make a better livelihood off a rich fool than a landed estate."
+
+So saying, the contemplative and ever-sagacious Tomlinson tossed off
+his bumper; and the pair, having kindly rolled by pedal applications the
+body of Long Ned into a safe and quiet corner of the room, mounted the
+stairs, arm-in-arm, in search of somnambular accommodations.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+               That contrast of the hardened and mature,
+               The calm brow brooding o'er the project dark,
+               With the clear loving heart, and spirit pure
+               Of youth,--I love, yet, hating, love to mark!
+
+                                                  H. FLETCHER.
+
+On the forenoon of the day after the ball, the carriage of William
+Brandon, packed and prepared, was at the door of his abode at Bath;
+meanwhile the lawyer was closeted with his brother.
+
+"My dear Joseph," said the barrister, "I do not leave you without being
+fully sensible of your kindness evinced to me, both in coming hither,
+contrary to your habits, and accompanying me everywhere, despite of your
+tastes."
+
+"Mention it not, my dear William," said the kind-hearted squire, "for
+your delightful society is to me the most agreeable (and that's what I
+can say of very few people like you; for, for my own part, I generally
+find the cleverest men the most unpleasant) in the world! And I think
+lawyers in particular (very different, indeed, from your tribe you are!)
+perfectly intolerable!"
+
+"I have now," said Brandon, who with his usual nervous quickness of
+action was walking with rapid strides to and fro the apartment, and
+scarcely noted his brother's compliment,--"I have now another favour
+to request of you. Consider this house and these servants yours for the
+next month or two at least. Don't interrupt me,--it is no compliment,--I
+speak for our family benefit." And then seating himself next to his
+brother's armchair, for a fit of the gout made the squire a close
+prisoner, Brandon unfolded to his brother his cherished scheme of
+marrying Lucy to Lord Mauleverer. Notwithstanding the constancy of the
+earl's attentions to the heiress, the honest squire had never dreamed
+of their palpable object; and he was overpowered with surprise when he
+heard the lawyer's expectations.
+
+"But, my dear brother," he began, "so great a match for my Lucy, the
+Lord-Lieutenant of the Coun--"
+
+"And what of that?" cried Brandon, proudly, and interrupting his
+brother. "Is not the race of Brandon, which has matched its scions with
+royalty, far nobler than that of the upstart stock of Mauleverer? What
+is there presumptuous in the hope that the descendant of the Earls of
+Suffolk should regild a faded name with some of the precious dust of the
+quondam silversmiths of London? Besides," he continued, after a pause,
+"Lucy will be rich, very rich, and before two years my rank may possibly
+be of the same order as Mauleverer's!"
+
+The squire stared; and Brandon, not giving him time to answer, resumed.
+It is needless to detail the conversation; suffice it to say that
+the artful barrister did not leave his brother till he had gained his
+point,--till Joseph Brandon had promised to remain at Bath in possession
+of the house and establishment of his brother; to throw no impediment on
+the suit of Mauleverer; to cultivate society, as before; and above
+all, not to alarm Lucy, who evidently did not yet favour Mauleverer
+exclusively, by hinting to her the hopes and expectations of her uncle
+and father. Brandon, now taking leave of his brother, mounted to the
+drawing-room in search of Lucy. He found her leaning over the gilt cage
+of one of her feathered favourites, and speaking to the little inmate
+in that pretty and playful language in which all thoughts, innocent yet
+fond, should be clothed. So beautiful did Lucy seem, as she was thus
+engaged in her girlish and caressing employment, and so utterly unlike
+one meet to be the instrument of ambitious designs, and the sacrifice of
+worldly calculations, that Brandon paused, suddenly smitten at heart,
+as he beheld her. He was not, however, slow in recovering himself; he
+approached. "Happy he," said the man of the world, "for whom caresses
+and words like these are reserved!"
+
+Lucy turned. "It is ill!" she said, pointing to the bird, which sat with
+its feathers stiff and erect, mute and heedless even of that voice which
+was as musical as its own.
+
+"Poor prisoner!" said Brandon; "even gilt cages and sweet tones cannot
+compensate to thee for the loss of the air and the wild woods!"
+
+"But," said Lucy, anxiously, "it is not confinement which makes it ill!
+If you think so, I will release it instantly."
+
+"How long have you had it?" asked Brandon.
+
+"For three years!" said Lucy. "And is it your chief favourite?"
+
+"Yes; it does not sing so prettily as the other, but it is far more
+sensible, and so affectionate!"
+
+"Can you release it then?" asked Brandon, smiling. "Would it not be
+better to see it die in your custody than to let it live and to see it
+no more?"
+
+"Oh, no, no!" said Lucy, eagerly; "when I love any one, anything, I wish
+that to be happy, not me!"
+
+As she said this, she took the bird from the cage; and bearing it to
+the open window, kissed it, and held it on her hand in the air. The poor
+bird turned a languid and sickly eye around it, as if the sight of the
+crowded houses and busy streets presented nothing familiar or inviting;
+and it was not till Lucy with a tender courage shook it gently from her,
+that it availed itself of the proffered liberty. It flew first to
+an opposite balcony; and then recovering from a short and as it were
+surprised pause, took a brief circuit above the houses; and after
+disappearing for a few minutes, flew back, circled the window, and
+re-entering, settled once more on the fair form of its mistress and
+nestled into her bosom.
+
+Lucy covered it with kisses. "You see it will not leave me!" said she.
+
+"Who can?" said the uncle, warmly, charmed for the moment from every
+thought but that of kindness for the young and soft creature before
+him,--"who can," he repeated with a sigh, "but an old and withered
+ascetic like myself? I must leave you indeed; see, my carriage is at
+the door! Will my beautiful niece, among the gayeties that surround her,
+condescend now and then to remember the crabbed lawyer, and assure him
+by a line of her happiness and health? Though I rarely write any notes
+but those upon cases, you, at least, may be sure of an answer. And tell
+me, Lucy, if there be in all this city one so foolish as to think that
+these idle gems, useful only as a vent for my pride in you, can add a
+single charm to a beauty above all ornament?"
+
+So saying, Brandon produced a leathern case; and touching a spring, the
+imperial flash of diamonds, which would have made glad many a patrician
+heart, broke dazzlingly on Lucy's eyes.
+
+"No thanks, Lucy," said Brandon, in answer to his niece's disclaiming
+and shrinking gratitude; "I do honour to myself, not you; and now bless
+you, my dear girl. Farewell! Should any occasion present itself in which
+you require an immediate adviser, at once kind and wise, I beseech you,
+my dearest Lucy, as a parting request, to have no scruples in consulting
+Lord Mauleverer. Besides his friendship for me, he is much interested
+in you, and you may consult him with the more safety and assurance;
+because" (and the lawyer smiled) "he is perhaps the only man in the
+world whom my Lucy could not make in love with her. His gallantry may
+appear adulation, but it is never akin to love. Promise me that you will
+not hesitate in this."
+
+Lucy gave the promise readily; and Brandon continued in a careless tone:
+"I hear that you danced last night with a young gentleman whom no one
+knew, and whose companions bore a very strange appearance. In a place
+like Bath, society is too mixed not to render the greatest caution
+in forming acquaintances absolutely necessary. You must pardon me, my
+dearest niece, if I remark that a young lady owes it not only to
+herself but to her relations to observe the most rigid circumspection of
+conduct. This is a wicked world, and the peach-like bloom of character
+is easily rubbed away. In these points Mauleverer can be of great use to
+you. His knowledge of character, his penetration into men, and his tact
+in manners are unerring. Pray, be guided by him; whomsoever he warns
+you against, you may be sure is unworthy of your acquaintance. God bless
+you! You will write to me often and frankly, dear Lucy; tell me all that
+happens to you,--all that interests, nay, all that displeases."
+
+Brandon then, who had seemingly disregarded the blushes with which
+during his speech Lucy's cheeks had been spread, folded his niece in his
+arms, and hurried, as if to hide his feelings, into his carriage. When
+the horses had turned the street, he directed the postilions to stop at
+Lord Mauleverer's. "Now," said he to himself, "if I can get this clever
+coxcomb to second my schemes, and play according to my game and not
+according to his own vanity, I shall have a knight of the garter for my
+nephew-in-law!"
+
+Meanwhile Lucy, all in tears, for she loved her uncle greatly, ran down
+to the squire to show him Brandon's magnificent present.
+
+"Ah," said the squire, with a sigh, "few men were born with more good,
+generous, and great qualities (pity only that his chief desire was to
+get on in the world; for my part, I think no motive makes greater and
+more cold-hearted rogues) than my brother William!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+               Why did she love him?  Curious fool, be still!
+               Is human love the growth of human will?
+               To her he might be gentleness!
+
+                                                  LORD BYRON.
+
+In three weeks from the time of his arrival, Captain Clifford was the
+most admired man in Bath. It is true the gentlemen, who have a quicker
+tact as to the respectability of their own sex than women, might have
+looked a little shy upon him, had he not himself especially shunned
+appearing intrusive, and indeed rather avoided the society of men than
+courted it; so that after he had fought a duel with a baronet (the
+son of a shoemaker), who called him one Clifford, and had exhibited a
+flea-bitten horse, allowed to be the finest in Bath, he rose insensibly
+into a certain degree of respect with the one sex as well as popularity
+with the other. But what always attracted and kept alive suspicion,
+was his intimacy with so peculiar and dashing a gentleman as Mr. Edward
+Pepper. People could get over a certain frankness in Clifford's
+address, but the most lenient were astounded by the swagger of Long
+Ned. Clifford, however, not insensible to the ridicule attached to his
+acquaintances, soon managed to pursue his occupations alone; nay, he
+took a lodging to himself, and left Long Ned and Augustus Tomlinson (the
+latter to operate as a check on the former) to the quiet enjoyment of
+the hairdresser's apartments. He himself attended all public gayeties;
+and his mien, and the appearance of wealth which he maintained,
+procured him access into several private circles which pretended to be
+exclusive,--as if people who had daughters ever could be exclusive! Many
+were the kind looks, nor few the inviting letters, which he received;
+and if his sole object had been to marry an heiress, he would have found
+no difficulty in attaining it. But he devoted himself entirely to Lucy
+Brandon; and to win one glance from her, he would have renounced all the
+heiresses in the kingdom. Most fortunately for him, Mauleverer, whose
+health was easily deranged, had fallen ill the very day William Brandon
+left Bath; and his lordship was thus rendered unable to watch the
+movements of Lucy, and undermine or totally prevent the success of her
+lover. Miss Brandon, indeed, had at first, melted by the kindness of
+her uncle, and struck with the sense of his admonition (for she was
+no self-willed young lady, who was determined to be in love), received
+Captain Clifford's advances with a coldness which, from her manner the
+first evening they had met at Bath, occasioned him no less surprise than
+mortification. He retreated, and recoiled on the squire, who, patient
+and bold, as usual, was sequestered in his favourite corner. By
+accident, Clifford trod on the squire's gouty digital; and in
+apologizing for the offence, was so struck by the old gentleman's
+good-nature and peculiarity of expressing himself, that without knowing
+who he was, he entered into conversation with him. There was an off-hand
+sort of liveliness and candour, not to say wit, about Clifford, which
+always had a charm for the elderly, who generally like frankness above
+all the cardinal virtues; the squire was exceedingly pleased with him.
+The acquaintance, once begun, was naturally continued without difficulty
+when Clifford ascertained who was his new friend; and next morning,
+meeting in the pump-room, the squire asked Clifford to dinner. The
+entree to the house thus gained, the rest was easy. Long before
+Mauleverer recovered his health, the mischief effected by his rival
+was almost beyond redress; and the heart of the pure, the simple, the
+affectionate Lucy Brandon was more than half lost to the lawless and
+vagrant cavalier who officiates as the hero of this tale.
+
+One morning, Clifford and Augustus strolled out together. "Let us," said
+the latter, who was in a melancholy mood, "leave the busy streets, and
+indulge in a philosophical conversation on the nature of man, while we
+are enjoying a little fresh air in the country." Clifford assented to
+the proposal, and the pair slowly sauntered up one of the hills that
+surround the city of Bladud.
+
+"There are certain moments," said Tomlinson, looking pensively down at
+his kerseymere gaiters, "when we are like the fox in the nursery rhyme,
+'The fox had a wound, he could not tell where,'--we feel extremely
+unhappy, and we cannot tell why. A dark and sad melancholy grows over
+us; we shun the face of man; we wrap ourselves in our thoughts like
+silkworms; we mutter fag-ends of dismal songs; tears come into our eyes;
+we recall all the misfortunes that have ever happened to us; we stoop in
+our gait, and bury our hands in our breeches-pockets; we say, 'What is
+life?--a stone to be shied into a horsepond!' We pine for some congenial
+heart, and have an itching desire to talk prodigiously about ourselves;
+all other subjects seem weary, stale, and unprofitable. We feel as if a
+fly could knock us down, and are in a humour to fall in love, and make a
+very sad piece of business of it. Yet with all this weakness we have at
+these moments a finer opinion of ourselves than we ever had before. We
+call our megrims the melancholy of a sublime soul, the yearnings of an
+indigestion we denominate yearnings after immortality, nay, sometimes
+'a proof of the nature of the soul!' May I find some biographer who
+understands such sensations well, and may he style those melting
+emotions the offspring of the poetical character,' which, in reality,
+are the offspring of--a mutton-chop!"
+
+     [Vide Moore's "Life of Byron," in which it is satisfactorily shown
+     that if a man fast forty-eight hours, then eat three lobsters, and
+     drink Heaven knows how many bottles of claret; if, when he wake the
+     next morning, he sees himself abused as a demon by half the
+     periodicals of the country,--if, in a word, he be broken in his
+     health, irregular in his habits, unfortunate in his affairs, unhappy
+     in his home, and if then he should be so extremely eccentric as to
+     be low-spirited and misanthropical, the low spirits and the
+     misanthropy are by no means to be attributed to the above agreeable
+     circumstances, but, God wot, to the "poetical character"!]
+
+"You jest pleasantly enough on your low spirits," said Clifford; "but I
+have a cause for mine."
+
+"What then?" cried Tomlinson. "So much the easier is it to cure them.
+The mind can cure the evils that spring from the mind. It is only a fool
+and a quack and a driveller when it professes to heal the evils that
+spring from the body. My blue devils spring from the body; consequently
+my mind, which, as you know, is a particularly wise mind, wrestles riot
+against them. Tell me frankly," renewed Augustus, after a pause, "do you
+ever repent? Do you ever think, if you had been a shop-boy with a white
+apron about your middle, that you would have been a happier and a better
+member of society than you now are?"
+
+"Repent!" said Clifford, fiercely; and his answer opened more of his
+secret heart, its motives, its reasonings, and its peculiarities
+than were often discernible,--"repent! that is the idlest word in our
+language. No; the moment I repent, that moment I reform! Never can it
+seem to me an atonement for crime merely to regret it. My mind would
+lead me, not to regret, but to repair! Repent! no, not yet. The older I
+grow, the more I see of men and of the callings of social life, the more
+I, an open knave, sicken at the glossed and covert dishonesties around.
+I acknowledge no allegiance to society. From my birth to this hour, I
+have received no single favour from its customs or its laws; openly
+I war against it, and patiently will I meet its revenge. This may be
+crime; but it looks light in my eyes when I gaze around, and survey on
+all sides the masked traitors who acknowledge large debts to society,
+who profess to obey its laws, adore its institutions, and, above
+all--oh, how righteously!--attack all those who attack it, and who
+yet lie and cheat and defraud and peculate,--publicly reaping all the
+comforts, privately filching all the profits. Repent!--of what? I come
+into the world friendless and poor; I find a body of laws hostile to
+the friendless and the poor! To those laws hostile to me, then, I
+acknowledge hostility in my turn. Between us are the conditions of
+war. Let them expose a weakness,--I insist on my right to seize
+the advantage; let them defeat me, and I allow their right to
+destroy."--[The author need not, he hopes, observe that these sentiments
+are Mr. Paul Clifford's, not his.]
+
+"Passion," said Augustus, coolly, "is the usual enemy of reason; in your
+case it is the friend."
+
+The pair had now gained the summit of a hill which commanded a view of
+the city below. Here Augustus, who was a little short-winded, paused
+to recover breath. As soon as he had done so, he pointed with his
+forefinger to the scene beneath, and said enthusiastically, "What a
+subject for contemplation!"
+
+Clifford was about to reply, when suddenly the sound of laughter and
+voices was heard behind. "Let us fly!" cried Augustus; "on this day of
+spleen man delights me not--or woman either."
+
+"Stay!" said Clifford, in a trembling accent; for among those voices he
+recognized one which had already acquired over him an irresistible and
+bewitching power. Augustus sighed, and reluctantly remained motionless.
+Presently a winding in the road brought into view a party of pleasure,
+some on foot, some on horseback, others in the little vehicles which
+even at that day haunted watering-places, and called themselves "Flies"
+or "Swallows."
+
+But among the gay procession Clifford had only eyes for one! Walking
+with that elastic step which so rarely survives the first epoch of
+youth, by the side of the heavy chair in which her father was drawn, the
+fair beauty of Lucy Brandon threw--at least in the eyes of her lover--a
+magic and a lustre over the whole group. He stood for a moment, stilling
+the heart that leaped at her bright looks and the gladness of her
+innocent laugh; and then recovering himself, he walked slowly, and with
+a certain consciousness of the effect of his own singularly handsome
+person, towards the party. The good squire received him with his usual
+kindness, and informed him, according to that lucidus ordo which he so
+especially favoured, of the whole particulars of their excursion. There
+was something worthy of an artist's sketch in the scene at that moment:
+the old squire in his chair, with his benevolent face turned towards
+Clifford, and his hands resting on his cane, Clifford himself bowing
+down his stately head to hear the details of the father; the beautiful
+daughter on the other side of the chair, her laugh suddenly stilled, her
+gait insensibly more composed, and blush chasing blush over the smooth
+and peach-like loveliness of her cheek; the party, of all sizes, ages,
+and attire, affording ample scope for the caricaturist; and the pensive
+figure of Augustus Tomlinson (who, by the by, was exceedingly like
+Liston) standing apart from the rest, on the brow of the hill where
+Clifford had left him, and moralizing on the motley procession, with
+one hand hid in his waistcoat, and the other caressing his chin, which
+slowly and pendulously with the rest of his head moved up and down.
+
+As the party approached the brow of the hill, the view of the city
+below was so striking that there was a general pause for the purpose of
+survey. One young lady in particular drew forth her pencil, and began
+sketching, while her mamma looked complacently on, and abstractedly
+devoured a sandwich. It was at this time, in the general pause, that
+Clifford and Lucy found themselves--Heaven knows how!--next to each
+other, and at a sufficient distance from the squire and the rest of the
+party to feel in some measure alone. There was a silence in both which
+neither dared to break; when Lucy, after looking at and toying with a
+flower that she had brought from the place which the party had been to
+see, accidentally dropped it; and Clifford and herself stooping at the
+same moment to recover it, their hands met. Involuntarily, Clifford
+detained the soft fingers in his own; his eyes, that encountered hers,
+so spell-bound and arrested them that for once they did not sink beneath
+his gaze; his lips moved, but many and vehement emotions so suffocated
+his voice that no sound escaped them. But all the heart was in the eyes
+of each; that moment fixed their destinies. Henceforth there was an
+era from which they dated a new existence; a nucleus around which their
+thoughts, their remembrances, and their passions clung. The great gulf
+was passed; they stood on the same shore, and felt that though
+still apart and disunited, on that shore was no living creature but
+themselves! Meanwhile Augustus Tomlinson, on finding himself surrounded
+by persons eager to gaze and to listen, broke from his moodiness and
+reserve. Looking full at his next neighbour, and flourishing his right
+hand in the air, till he suffered it to rest in the direction of the
+houses and chimneys below, he repeated that moral exclamation which
+had been wasted on Clifford, with a more solemn and a less passionate
+gravity than before,--"What a subject, ma'am, for contemplation!"
+
+"Very sensibly said, indeed, sir," said the lady addressed, who was
+rather of a serious turn.
+
+"I never," resumed Augustus in a louder key, and looking round for
+auditors,--"I never see a great town from the top of a hill without
+thinking of an apothecary's shop!"
+
+"Lord, sir!" said the lady. Tomlinson's end was gained. Struck with the
+quaintness of the notion, a little crowd gathered instantly around him,
+to hear it further developed.
+
+"Of an apothecary's shop, ma'am!" repeated Tomlinson. "There lie your
+simples and your purges and your cordials and your poisons,--all things
+to heal and to strengthen and to destroy. There are drugs enough in that
+collection to save you, to cure you all; but none of you know how to use
+them, nor what medicines to ask for, nor what portions to take; so that
+the greater part of you swallow a wrong dose, and die of the remedy!"
+
+"But if the town be the apothecary's shop, what, in the plan of your
+idea, stands for the apothecary?" asked an old gentleman, who perceived
+at what Tomlinson was driving.
+
+"The apothecary, sir," answered Augustus, stealing his notion from
+Clifford, and sinking his voice lest the true proprietor should overhear
+him (Clifford was otherwise employed),--"the apothecary, sir, is the
+LAW! It is the law that stands behind the counter, and dispenses to
+each man the dose he should take. To the poor it gives bad drugs
+gratuitously; to the rich, pills to stimulate the appetite; to the
+latter, premiums for luxury; to the former, only speedy refuges from
+life! Alas! either your apothecary is but an ignorant quack, or his
+science itself is but in its cradle. He blunders as much as you would
+do if left to your own selection. Those who have recourse to him seldom
+speak gratefully of his skill. He relieves you, it is true,--but of your
+money, not your malady; and the only branch of his profession in which
+he is an adept is that which enables him to bleed you! O mankind!"
+continued Augustus, "what noble creatures you ought to be! You have keys
+to all sciences, all arts, all mysteries, but one! You have not a notion
+how you ought to be governed; you cannot frame a tolerable law, for the
+life and soul of you! You make yourselves as uncomfortable as you can by
+all sorts of galling and vexatious institutions, and you throw the blame
+upon 'Fate.' You lay down rules it is impossible to comprehend, much
+less to obey; and you call each other monsters, because you cannot
+conquer the impossibility! You invent all sorts of vices, under pretence
+of making laws for preserving virtue; and the anomalous artificialities
+of conduct yourselves produce, you say you are born with; you make a
+machine by the perversest art you can think of, and you call it, with
+a sigh, 'Human Nature.' With a host of good dispositions struggling at
+your breasts, you insist upon libelling the Almighty, and declaring that
+he meant you to be wicked. Nay, you even call the man mischievous and
+seditious who begs and implores you to be one jot better than you are. O
+mankind! you are like a nosegay bought at Covent Garden. The flowers are
+lovely, the scent delicious. Mark that glorious hue; contemplate that
+bursting petal! How beautiful, how redolent of health, of nature, of the
+dew and breath and blessing of Heaven, are you all! But as for the dirty
+piece of string that ties you together, one would think you had picked
+it out of the kennel."
+
+So saying, Tomlinson turned on his heel, broke away from the crowd, and
+solemnly descended the hill. The party of pleasure slowly followed;
+and Clifford, receiving an invitation from the squire to partake of his
+family dinner, walked by the side of Lucy, and felt as if his spirit
+were drunk with the airs of Eden.
+
+A brother squire, who among the gayeties of Bath was almost as forlorn
+as Joseph Brandon himself, partook of the Lord of Warlock's hospitality.
+When the three gentlemen adjourned to the drawing-room, the two
+elder sat down to a game at backgammon, and Clifford was left to the
+undisturbed enjoyment of Lucy's conversation. She was sitting by the
+window when Clifford joined her. On the table by her side were scattered
+books, the charm of which (they were chiefly poetry) she had only
+of late learned to discover; there also were strewn various little
+masterpieces of female ingenuity, in which the fairy fingers of Lucy
+Brandon were especially formed to excel. The shades of evening were
+rapidly darkening over the empty streets; and in the sky, which was
+cloudless and transparently clear, the stars came gradually out one by
+one, until,--
+
+              "As water does a sponge, so their soft light
+               Filled the void, hollow, universal air."
+
+Beautiful evening! (if we, as well as Augustus Tomlinson, may indulge in
+an apostrophe)--beautiful evening! For thee all poets have had a song,
+and surrounded thee with rills and waterfalls and dews and flowers and
+sheep and bats and melancholy and owls; yet we must confess that to us,
+who in this very sentimental age are a bustling, worldly, hard-minded
+person, jostling our neighbours, and thinking of the main chance,--to us
+thou art never so charming as when we meet thee walking in thy gray hood
+through the emptying streets and among the dying sounds of a city. We
+love to feel the stillness where all, two hours back, was clamour.
+We love to see the dingy abodes of Trade and Luxury--those restless
+patients of earth's constant fever--contrasted and canopied by a heaven
+full of purity and quietness and peace. We love to fill our thought with
+speculations on man, even though the man be the muffin-man, rather than
+with inanimate objects,--hills and streams,--things to dream about, not
+to meditate on. Man is the subject of far nobler contemplation, of far
+more glowing hope, of a far purer and loftier vein of sentiment, than
+all the "floods and fells" in the universe; and that, sweet evening!
+is one reason why we like that the earnest and tender thoughts thou
+excitest within us should be rather surrounded by the labours and tokens
+of our species than by sheep and bats and melancholy and owls. But
+whether, most blessed evening! thou delightest us in the country or in
+the town, thou equally disposest us to make and to feel love! Thou art
+the cause of more marriages and more divorces than any other time in the
+twenty-four hours! Eyes that were common eyes to us before, touched by
+thy enchanting and magic shadows, become inspired, and preach to us of
+heaven. A softness settles on features that were harsh to us while the
+sun shone; a mellow "light of love" reposes on the complexion which by
+day we would have steeped "full fathom five" in a sea of Mrs. Gowland's
+lotion. What, then, thou modest hypocrite! to those who already and
+deeply love,--what, then, of danger and of paradise dost thou bring?
+
+Silent, and stilling the breath which heaved in both quick and fitfully,
+Lucy and Clifford sat together. The streets were utterly deserted; and
+the loneliness, as they looked below, made them feel the more intensely
+not only the emotions which swelled within them, but the undefined and
+electric sympathy which, in uniting them, divided them from the world.
+The quiet around was broken by a distant strain of rude music; and as it
+came nearer, two forms of no poetical order grew visible. The one was
+a poor blind man, who was drawing from his flute tones in which the
+melancholy beauty of the air compensated for any deficiency (the
+deficiency was but slight) in the execution. A woman much younger
+than the musician, and with something of beauty in her countenance,
+accompanied him, holding a tattered hat, and looking wistfully up at the
+windows of the silent street. We said two forms; we did the injustice of
+forgetfulness to another,--a rugged and simple friend, it is true, but
+one that both minstrel and wife had many and moving reasons to love.
+This was a little wiry terrier, with dark piercing eyes, that glanced
+quickly and sagaciously in all quarters from beneath the shaggy covert
+that surrounded them. Slowly the animal moved onward, pulling gently
+against the string by which he was held, and by which he guided his
+master. Once his fidelity was tempted: another dog invited him to
+play; the poor terrier looked anxiously and doubtingly round, and then,
+uttering a low growl of denial, pursued--
+
+                    "The noiseless tenour of his way."
+
+The little procession stopped beneath the window where Lucy and Clifford
+sat; for the quick eye of the woman had perceived them, and she laid her
+hand on the blind man's arm, and whispered him. He took the hint, and
+changed his air into one of love. Clifford glanced at Lucy; her cheek
+was dyed in blushes. The air was over; another succeeded,--it was of the
+same kind; a third,--the burden was still unaltered; and then Clifford
+threw into the street a piece of money, and the dog wagged his abridged
+and dwarfed tail, and darting forward, picked it up in his mouth; and
+the woman (she had a kind face!) patted the officious friend, even
+before she thanked the donor, and then she dropped the money with
+a cheering word or two into the blind man's pocket, and the three
+wanderers moved slowly on. Presently they came to a place where the
+street had been mended, and the stones lay scattered about. Here the
+woman no longer trusted to the dog's guidance, but anxiously hastened
+to the musician, and led him with evident tenderness and minute
+watchfulness over the rugged way. When they had passed the danger, the
+man stopped; and before he released the hand which had guided him, he
+pressed it gratefully, and then both the husband and the wife stooped
+down and caressed the dog. This little scene--one of those rough copies
+of the loveliness of human affections, of which so many are scattered
+about the highways of the world--both the lovers had involuntarily
+watched; and now as they withdrew their eyes,--those eyes settled on
+each other,--Lucy's swam in tears.
+
+"To be loved and tended by the one I love," said Clifford, in a low
+voice, "I would walk blind and barefoot over the whole earth!"
+
+Lucy sighed very gently; and placing her pretty hands (the one clasped
+over the other) upon her knee, looked down wistfully on them, but made
+no answer. Clifford drew his chair nearer, and gazed on her, as she
+sat; the long dark eyelashes drooping over her eyes, and contrasting the
+ivory lids; her delicate profile half turned from him, and borrowing
+a more touching beauty from the soft light that dwelt upon it; and her
+full yet still scarcely developed bosom heaving at thoughts which she
+did not analyze, but was content to feel at once vague and delicious. He
+gazed, and his lips trembled; he longed to speak; he longed to say but
+those words which convey what volumes have endeavoured to express and
+have only weakened by detail,--"I love." How he resisted the yearnings
+of his heart, we know not,--but he did resist; and Lucy, after a
+confused and embarrassed pause, took up one of the poems on the table,
+and asked him some questions about a particular passage in an old ballad
+which he had once pointed to her notice. The passage related to a border
+chief, one of the Armstrongs of old, who, having been seized by the
+English and condemned to death, vented his last feelings in a passionate
+address to his own home--his rude tower--and his newly wedded bride. "Do
+you believe," said Lucy, as their conversation began to flow, "that
+one so lawless and eager for bloodshed and strife as this robber is
+described to be, could be so capable of soft affections?"
+
+"I do," said Clifford, "because he was not sensible that he was as
+criminal as you esteem him. If a man cherish the idea that his actions
+are not evil, he will retain at his heart all its better and gentler
+sensations as much as if he had never sinned. The savage murders his
+enemy, and when he returns home is not the less devoted to his friend
+or the less anxious for his children. To harden and embrute the kindly
+dispositions, we must not only indulge in guilt but feel that we are
+guilty. Oh! many that the world load with their opprobrium are capable
+of acts--nay, have committed acts--which in others the world would
+reverence and adore. Would you know whether a man's heart be shut to
+the power of love,--ask what he is, not to his foes, but to his friends!
+Crime, too," continued Clifford, speaking fast and vehemently, while his
+eyes flashed and the dark blood rushed to his cheek,--"crime,--what is
+crime? Men embody their worst prejudices, their most evil passions, in a
+heterogeneous and contradictory code; and whatever breaks this code they
+term a crime. When they make no distinction in the penalty--that is
+to say, in the estimation--awarded both to murder and to a petty theft
+imposed on the weak will by famine, we ask nothing else to convince us
+that they are ignorant of the very nature of guilt, and that they make
+up in ferocity for the want of wisdom."
+
+Lucy looked in alarm at the animated and fiery countenance of the
+speaker. Clifford recovered himself after a moment's pause, and rose
+from his seat, with the gay and frank laugh which made one of his
+peculiar characteristics. "There is a singularity in politics, Miss
+Brandon," said he, "which I dare say you have often observed,--namely,
+that those who are least important are always most noisy, and that the
+chief people who lose their temper are those who have nothing to gain in
+return."
+
+As Clifford spoke, the doors were thrown open, and some visitors to
+Miss Brandon were announced. The good squire was still immersed in
+the vicissitudes of his game; and the sole task of receiving and
+entertaining "the company," as the chambermaids have it, fell, as usual,
+upon Lucy. Fortunately for her, Clifford was one of those rare persons
+who possess eminently the talents of society. There was much in his
+gay and gallant temperament, accompanied as it was with sentiment and
+ardour, that resembled our beau-ideal of those chevaliers, ordinarily
+peculiar to the Continent,--heroes equally in the drawing-room and
+the field. Observant, courteous, witty, and versed in the various
+accomplishments that combine (that most unfrequent of all unions!)
+vivacity with grace, he was especially formed for that brilliant world
+from which his circumstances tended to exclude him. Under different
+auspices, he might have been--Pooh! we are running into a most pointless
+commonplace; what might any man be under auspices different from those
+by which his life has been guided? Music soon succeeded to conversation,
+and Clifford's voice was of necessity put into requisition. Miss Brandon
+had just risen from the harpsichord, as he sat down to perform his part;
+and she stood by him with the rest of the group while he sang. Only
+twice his eye stole to that spot which her breath and form made sacred
+to him; once when he began, and once when he concluded his song. Perhaps
+the recollection of their conversation inspired him; certainly it dwelt
+upon his mind at the moment,--threw a richer flush over his brow, and
+infused a more meaning and heartfelt softness into his tone.
+
+                               STANZAS.
+
+               When I leave thee, oh! ask not the world what that heart
+               Which adores thee to others may be!
+               I know that I sin when from thee I depart,
+               But my guilt shall not light upon thee!
+
+               My life is a river which glasses a ray
+               That hath deigned to descend from above;
+               Whatever the banks that o'ershadow its way,
+               It mirrors the light of thy love.
+
+               Though the waves may run high when the night wind awakes,
+               And hurries the stream to its fall;
+               Though broken and wild be the billows it makes,
+               Thine image still trembles on all!"
+
+While this ominous love between Clifford and Lucy was thus finding
+fresh food in every interview and every opportunity, the unfortunate
+Mauleverer, firmly persuaded that his complaint was a relapse of what he
+termed the "Warlock dyspepsia," was waging dire war with the remains of
+the beef and pudding, which he tearfully assured his physicians "were
+lurking in his constitution." As Mauleverer, though complaisant, like
+most men of unmistakable rank, to all his acquaintances, whatever might
+be their grade, possessed but very few friends intimate enough to enter
+his sick-chamber, and none of that few were at Bath, it will readily be
+perceived that he was in blissful ignorance of the growing fortunes
+of his rival; and to say the exact truth, illness, which makes a man's
+thoughts turn very much upon himself, banished many of the most tender
+ideas usually floating in his mind around the image of Lucy Brandon. His
+pill superseded his passion; and he felt that there are draughts in
+the world more powerful in their effects than those in the phials of
+Alcidonis.--[See Marmontel's pretty tale of "Les Quatres Flacons."]--He
+very often thought, it is true, how pleasant it would be for Lucy to
+smooth his pillow, and Lucy to prepare that mixture; but then Mauleverer
+had an excellent valet, who hoped to play the part enacted by Gil
+Blas towards the honest Licentiate, and to nurse a legacy while he was
+nursing his master. And the earl, who was tolerably good-tempered, was
+forced to confess that it would be scarcely possible for any one "to
+know his ways better than Smoothson." Thus, during his illness, the
+fair form of his intended bride little troubled the peace of the noble
+adorer. And it was not till he found himself able to eat three good
+dinners consecutively, with a tolerable appetite, that Mauleverer
+recollected that he was violently in love. As soon as this idea was
+fully reinstated in his memory, and he had been permitted by his doctor
+to allow himself "a little cheerful society," Mauleverer resolved to go
+to the rooms for an hour or two.
+
+It may be observed that most great personages have some favourite place,
+some cherished Baiae, at which they love to throw off their state, and
+to play the amiable instead of the splendid; and Bath at that time,
+from its gayety, its ease, the variety of character to be found in
+its haunts, and the obliging manner in which such characters exposed
+themselves to ridicule, was exactly the place calculated to please a man
+like Mauleverer, who loved at once to be admired and to satirize. He was
+therefore an idolized person at the city of Bladud; and as he entered
+the rooms he was surrounded by a whole band of imitators and sycophants,
+delighted to find his lordship looking so much better and declaring
+himself so convalescent. As soon as the earl had bowed and smiled,
+and shaken hands sufficiently to sustain his reputation, he sauntered
+towards the dancers in search of Lucy. He found her not only exactly in
+the same spot in which he had last beheld her, but dancing with exactly
+the same partner who had before provoked all the gallant nobleman's
+jealousy and wrath. Mauleverer, though not by any means addicted to
+preparing his compliments beforehand, had just been conning a delicate
+speech for Lucy; but no sooner did the person of her partner flash on
+him than the whole flattery vanished at once from his recollection.
+He felt himself grow pale; and when Lucy turned, and seeing him near,
+addressed him in the anxious and soft tone which she thought due to her
+uncle's friend on his recovery, Mauleverer bowed, confused and silent;
+and that green-eyed passion, which would have convulsed the mind of
+a true lover, altering a little the course of its fury, effectually
+disturbed the manner of the courtier.
+
+Retreating to an obscure part of the room, where he could see all
+without being conspicuous, Mauleverer now employed himself in watching
+the motions and looks of the young pair. He was naturally a penetrating
+and quick observer, and in this instance jealousy sharpened his
+talents; he saw enough to convince him that Lucy was already attached to
+Clifford; and being, by that conviction, fully persuaded that Lucy was
+necessary to his own happiness, he resolved to lose not a moment in
+banishing Captain Clifford from her presence, or at least in instituting
+such inquiries into that gentleman's relatives, rank, and respectability
+as would, he hoped, render such banishment a necessary consequence of
+the research.
+
+Fraught with this determination, Mauleverer repaired at once to the
+retreat of the squire, and engaging him in conversation, bluntly asked
+him who the deuce Miss Brandon was dancing with.
+
+The squire, a little piqued at this brusquerie, replied by a long
+eulogium on Paul; and Mauleverer, after hearing it throughout with the
+blandest smile imaginable, told the squire, very politely, that he was
+sure Mr. Brandon's good-nature had misled him. "Clifford!" said he,
+repeating the name,--"Clifford! It is one of those names which are
+particularly selected by persons nobody knows,--first, because the name
+is good, and secondly, because it is common. My long and dear friendship
+with your brother makes me feel peculiarly anxious on any point relative
+to his niece; and, indeed, my dear William, overrating, perhaps, my
+knowledge of the world and my influence in society, but not my affection
+for him, besought me to assume the liberty of esteeming myself a friend,
+nay, even a relation of yours and Miss Brandon's; so that I trust you do
+not consider my caution impertinent."
+
+The flattered squire assured him that he was particularly honoured, so
+far from deeming his lordship (which never could be the case with people
+so distinguished as his lordship was, especially!) impertinent.
+
+Lord Mauleverer, encouraged by this speech, artfully renewed, and
+succeeded, if not in convincing the squire that the handsome captain was
+a suspicious character, at least in persuading him that common prudence
+required that he should find out exactly who the handsome captain was,
+especially as he was in the habit of dining with the squire thrice a
+week, and dancing with Lucy every night.
+
+"See," said Mauleverer, "he approaches you now; I will retreat to the
+chair by the fireplace, and you shall cross-examine him,--I have no
+doubt you will do it with the utmost delicacy."
+
+So saying, Mauleverer took possession of a seat where he was not
+absolutely beyond hearing (slightly deaf as he was) of the ensuing
+colloquy, though the position of his seat screened him from sight.
+Mauleverer was esteemed a man of the most punctilious honour in private
+life, and he would not have been seen in the act of listening to other
+people's conversation for the world.
+
+Hemming with an air and resettling himself as Clifford approached, the
+squire thus skilfully commenced the attack "Ah, ha! my good Captain
+Clifford, and how do you do? I saw you (and I am very glad, my friend,
+as every one else is, to see you) at a distance. And where have you left
+my daughter?"
+
+"Miss Brandon is dancing with Mr. Muskwell, sir," answered Clifford.
+
+"Oh! she is! Mr. Muskwell,--humph! Good family the Muskwells,--came from
+Primrose Hall. Pray, Captain, not that I want to know for my own sake,
+for I am a strange, odd person, I believe, and I am thoroughly convinced
+(some people are censorious, and others, thank God, are not!) of your
+respectability,--what family do you come from? You won't think my--my
+caution impertinent?" added the shrewd old gentleman, borrowing that
+phrase which he thought so friendly in the mouth of Lord Mauleverer.
+
+Clifford coloured for a moment, but replied with a quiet archness of
+look, "Family! oh, my dear sir, I come from an old family,--a very old
+family indeed."
+
+"So I always thought; and in what part of the world?"
+
+"Scotland, sir,--all our family come from Scotland; namely, all who live
+long do,--the rest die young."
+
+"Ay, particular air does agree with particular constitutions. I, for
+instance, could not live in all countries; not--you take me--in the
+North!"
+
+"Few honest men can live there," said Clifford, dryly. "And," resumed
+the squire, a little embarrassed by the nature of his task, and the
+cool assurance of his young friend,--"and pray, Captain Clifford, what
+regiment do you belong to?"
+
+"Regiment?--oh, the Rifles!" answered Clifford. ("Deuce is in me,"
+muttered he, "if I can resist a jest, though I break my neck over it.")
+
+"A very gallant body of men," said the squire.
+
+"No doubt of that, sir!" rejoined Clifford.
+
+"And do you think, Captain Clifford," renewed the squire, "that it is a
+good corps for getting on?"
+
+"It is rather a bad one for getting off," muttered the Captain; and then
+aloud, "Why, we have not much interest at court, sir."
+
+"Oh! but then there is a wider scope, as my brother the lawyer says--and
+no man knows better--for merit. I dare say you have seen many a man
+elevated from the ranks?"
+
+"Nothing more common, sir, than such elevation; and so great is the
+virtue of our corps, that I have also known not a few willing to
+transfer the honour to their comrades."
+
+"You don't say so!" exclaimed the squire, opening his eyes at such
+disinterested magnanimity.
+
+"But," said Clifford, who began to believe he might carry the equivoke
+too far, and who thought, despite of his jesting, that it was possible
+to strike out a more agreeable vein of conversation--"but, sir, if you
+remember, you have not yet finished that youthful hunting adventure of
+yours, when the hounds were lost at Burnham Copse."
+
+"Oh, very true," cried the squire, quite forgetting his late suspicions;
+and forthwith he began a story that promised to be as long as the
+chase it recorded. So charmed was he, when he had finished it, with the
+character of the gentleman who had listened to it so delightedly, that
+on rejoining Mauleverer, he told the earl, with an important air,
+that he had strictly examined the young captain, and that he had fully
+convinced himself of the excellence of his family, as well as the
+rectitude of his morals. Mauleverer listened with a countenance of
+polite incredulity; he had heard but little of the conversation that had
+taken place between the pair; but on questioning the squire upon sundry
+particulars of Clifford's birth, parentage, and property, he found him
+exactly as ignorant as before. The courtier, however, seeing further
+expostulation was in vain, contented himself with patting the squire's
+shoulder, and saying, with a mysterious urbanity, "Ah, sir, you are too
+good!"
+
+With these words he turned on his heel, and, not yet despairing, sought
+the daughter. He found Miss Brandon just released from dancing, and
+with a kind of paternal gallantry, he offered his arm to parade the
+apartments. After some preliminary flourish, and reference for the
+thousandth time to his friendship for William Brandon, the earl spoke
+to her about that "fine-looking young man who called himself Captain
+Clifford."
+
+Unfortunately for Mauleverer, he grew a little too unguarded, as
+his resentment against the interference of Clifford warmed with his
+language, and he dropped in his anger one or two words of caution, which
+especially offended the delicacy of Miss Brandon.
+
+"Take care how I encourage, my lord!" said Lucy, with glowing cheeks,
+repeating the words which had so affronted her, "I really must beg
+you--"
+
+"You mean, dear Miss Brandon," interrupted Mauleverer, squeezing her
+hand with respectful tenderness, "that you must beg me to apologize
+for my inadvertent expression. I do most sincerely. If I had felt less
+interest in your happiness, believe me, I should have been more guarded
+in my language."
+
+Miss Brandon bowed stiffly, and the courtier saw, with secret rage, that
+the country beauty was not easily appeased, even by an apology from Lord
+Mauleverer. "I have seen the time," thought he, "when young unmarried
+ladies would have deemed an affront from me an honour! They would have
+gone into hysterics at an apology!" Before he had time to make his
+peace, the squire joined them; and Lucy, taking her father's arm,
+expressed her wish to return home. The squire was delighted at the
+proposition. It would have been but civil in Mauleverer to offer his
+assistance in those little attentions preparatory to female departure
+from balls. He hesitated for a moment. "It keeps one so long in those
+cursed thorough draughts," thought he, shivering. "Besides, it is just
+possible that I may not marry her, and it is no good risking a cold
+(above all, at the beginning of winter) for nothing!" Fraught with this
+prudential policy, Mauleverer then resigned Lucy to her father, and
+murmuring in her ear that "her displeasure made him the most wretched of
+men," concluded his adieu by a bow penitentially graceful.
+
+About five minutes afterwards, he himself withdrew. As he was wrapping
+his corporeal treasure in his roquelaire of sables, previous to
+immersing himself in his chair, he had the mortification of seeing Lucy,
+who with her father, from some cause or other, had been delayed in the
+hall, handed to the carriage by Captain Clifford. Had the earl watched
+more narrowly than in the anxious cares due to himself he was enabled
+to do, he would, to his consolation, have noted that Lucy gave her hand
+with an averted and cool air, and that Clifford's expressive features
+bore rather the aspect of mortification than triumph.
+
+He did not, however, see more than the action; and as he was borne
+homeward with his flambeaux and footmen preceding him, and the
+watchful Smoothson by the side of the little vehicle, he muttered his
+determination of writing by the very next post to Brandon all his anger
+for Lucy and all his jealousy of her evident lover.
+
+While this doughty resolve was animating the great soul of Mauleverer,
+Lucy reached her own room, bolted the door, and throwing herself on her
+bed, burst into a long and bitter paroxysm of tears. So unusual were
+such visitors to her happy and buoyant temper, that there was something
+almost alarming in the earnestness and obstinacy with which she now
+wept.
+
+"What!" said she, bitterly, "have I placed my affections upon a man of
+uncertain character, and is my infatuation so clear that an acquaintance
+dare hint at its imprudence? And yet his manner--his tone! No, no, there
+can be no reason for shame in loving him!" And as she said this, her
+heart smote her for the coldness of her manner towards Clifford on his
+taking leave of her for the evening. "Am I," she thought, weeping yet
+more vehemently than before,--"am I so worldly, so base, as to feel
+altered towards him the moment I hear a syllable breathed against his
+name? Should I not, on the contrary, have clung to his image with a
+greater love, if he were attacked by others? But my father, my dear
+father, and my kind, prudent uncle,--something is due to them; and they
+would break their hearts if I loved one whom they deemed unworthy. Why
+should I not summon courage, and tell him of the suspicions respecting
+him? One candid word would dispel them. Surely it would be but kind in
+me towards him, to give him an opportunity of disproving all false and
+dishonouring conjectures. And why this reserve, when so often, by look
+and hint, if not by open avowal, he has declared that he loves me, and
+knows--he must know--that he is not indifferent to me? Why does he never
+speak of his parents, his relations, his home?"
+
+And Lucy, as she asked this question, drew from a bosom whose hue and
+shape might have rivalled hers who won Cymon to be wise,--[See Dryden's
+poem of "Cymon and Iphigenia."]--a drawing which she herself had
+secretly made of her lover, and which, though inartificially and even
+rudely done, yet had caught the inspiration of memory, and breathed
+the very features and air that were stamped already ineffaceably upon a
+heart too holy for so sullied an idol. She gazed upon the portrait as
+if it could answer her question of the original; and as she looked and
+looked, her tears slowly ceased, and her innocent countenance relapsed
+gradually into its usual and eloquent serenity. Never, perhaps, could
+Lucy's own portrait have been taken at a more favourable moment, The
+unconscious grace of her attitude; her dress loosened; the modest and
+youthful voluptuousness of her beauty; the tender cheek to which the
+virgin bloom, vanished for a while, was now all glowingly returning;
+the little white soft hand on which that cheek leaned, while the other
+contained the picture upon which her eyes fed; the half smile just
+conjured to her full, red, dewy lips, and gone the moment after, yet
+again restored,--all made a picture of such enchanting loveliness that
+we question whether Shakspeare himself could have fancied an earthly
+shape more meet to embody the vision of a Miranda or a Viola. The quiet
+and maiden neatness of the apartment gave effect to the charm; and there
+was a poetry even in the snowy furniture of the bed, the shutters partly
+unclosed and admitting a glimpse of the silver moon, and the solitary
+lamp just contending with the purer ray of the skies, and so throwing a
+mixed and softened light around the chamber.
+
+She was yet gazing on the drawing, when a faint stream of music stole
+through the air beneath her window, and it gradually rose till the sound
+of a guitar became distinct and clear, suiting with, not disturbing, the
+moonlit stillness of the night. The gallantry and romance of a
+former day, though at the time of our story subsiding, were not quite
+dispelled; and nightly serenades under the casements of a distinguished
+beauty were by no means of unfrequent occurrence. But Lucy, as the music
+floated upon her ear, blushed deeper and deeper, as if it had a dearer
+source to her heart than ordinary gallantry; and raising herself on one
+arm from her incumbent position, she leaned forward to catch the sound
+with a greater and more unerring certainty.
+
+After a prelude of some moments a clear and sweet voice accompanied the
+instrument, and the words of the song were as follows:--
+
+                      CLIFFORD'S SERENADE.
+
+               There is a world where every night
+               My spirit meets and walks with thine;
+               And hopes I dare not tell thee light,
+               Like stars of Love, that world of mine!
+
+               Sleep!--to the waking world my heart
+               Hath now, methinks, a stranger grown;
+               Ah, sleep! that I may feel thou art
+               Within one world that is my own.
+
+As the music died away, Lucy sank back once more, and the drawing which
+she held was pressed (with cheeks glowing, though unseen, at the act)
+to her lips. And though the character of her lover was uncleared, though
+she herself had come to no distinct resolution even to inform him of the
+rumours against his name, yet so easily restored was her trust in him,
+and so soothing the very thought of his vigilance and his love, that
+before an hour had passed, her eyes were closed in sleep. The drawing
+was laid, as a spell against grief, under her pillow; and in her dreams
+she murmured his name, and unconscious of reality and the future, smiled
+tenderly as she did so!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+               Come, the plot thickens! and another fold
+               Of the warm cloak of mystery wraps us around.
+             ..................
+               And for their loves?
+                      Behold the seal is on them!
+
+                                             Tanner of Tyburn.
+
+We must not suppose that Clifford's manner and tone were towards Lucy
+Brandon such as they seemed to others. Love refines every roughness; and
+that truth which nurtures tenderness is never barren of grace. Whatever
+the habits and comrades of Clifford's life, he had at heart many
+good and generous qualities. They were not often perceptible, it is
+true,--first, because he was of a gay and reckless turn; secondly,
+because he was not easily affected by any external circumstances; and
+thirdly, because he had the policy to affect among his comrades only
+such qualities as were likely to give him influence with them. Still,
+however, his better genius broke out whenever an opportunity presented
+itself. Though no "Corsair," romantic and unreal, an Ossianic shadow
+becoming more vast in proportion as it recedes from substance; though
+no grandly-imagined lie to the fair proportions of human nature, but an
+erring man in a very prosaic and homely world,--Clifford still mingled
+a certain generosity and chivalric spirit of enterprise even with the
+practices of his profession. Although the name of Lovett, by which he
+was chiefly known, was one peculiarly distinguished in the annals of
+the adventurous, it had never been coupled with rumours of cruelty
+or outrage; and it was often associated with anecdotes of courage,
+courtesy, good humour, or forbearance. He was one whom a real love
+was peculiarly calculated to soften and to redeem. The boldness, the
+candour, the unselfishness of his temper, were components of nature
+upon which affection invariably takes a strong and deep hold. Besides,
+Clifford was of an eager and aspiring turn; and the same temper and
+abilities which had in a very few years raised him in influence and
+popularity far above all the chivalric band with whom he was connected,
+when once inflamed and elevated by a higher passion, were likely to
+arouse his ambition from the level of his present pursuits, and reform
+him, ere too late, into a useful, nay, even an honourable member of
+society. We trust that the reader has already perceived that, despite
+his early circumstances, his manner and address were not such as to
+unfit him for a lady's love. The comparative refinement of his exterior
+is easy of explanation, for he possessed a natural and inborn gentility,
+a quick turn for observation, a ready sense both of the ridiculous and
+the graceful; and these are materials which are soon and lightly wrought
+from coarseness into polish. He had been thrown, too, among the leaders
+and heroes of his band; many not absolutely low in birth, nor debased in
+habit. He had associated with the Barringtons of the day,--gentlemen who
+were admired at Ranelagh, and made speeches worthy of Cicero, when they
+were summoned to trial. He had played his part in public places; and
+as Tomlinson was wont to say after his classic fashion, "the triumphs
+accomplished in the field had been planned in the ball-room." In short,
+he was one of those accomplished and elegant highwaymen of whom we yet
+read wonders, and by whom it would have been delightful to have been
+robbed: and the aptness of intellect which grew into wit with his
+friends, softened into sentiment with his mistress. There is something,
+too, in beauty (and Clifford's person, as we have before said, was
+possessed of even uncommon attractions) which lifts a beggar into
+nobility; and there was a distinction in his gait and look which
+supplied the air of rank and the tone of courts. Men, indeed, skilled
+like Mauleverer in the subtleties of manner, might perhaps have easily
+detected in him the want of that indescribable essence possessed only
+by persons reared in good society; but that want being shared by so
+many persons of indisputable birth and fortune, conveyed no particular
+reproach. To Lucy, indeed, brought up in seclusion, and seeing at
+Warlock none calculated to refine her taste in the fashion of an air
+or phrase to a very fastidious standard of perfection, this want
+was perfectly imperceptible; she remarked in her lover only a figure
+everywhere unequalled, an eye always eloquent with admiration, a step
+from which grace could never be divorced, a voice that spoke in a silver
+key, and uttered flatteries delicate in thought and poetical in word;
+even a certain originality of mind, remark, and character, occasionally
+approaching to the bizarre, yet sometimes also to the elevated,
+possessed a charm for the imagination of a young and not unenthusiastic
+female, and contrasted favourably, rather than the reverse, with the
+dull insipidity of those she ordinarily saw. Nor are we sure that the
+mystery thrown about him, irksome as it was to her, and discreditable as
+it appeared to others, was altogether ineffectual in increasing her
+love for the adventurer; and thus Fate, which transmutes in her magic
+crucible all opposing metals into that one which she is desirous to
+produce, swelled the wealth of an ill-placed and ominous passion by the
+very circumstances which should have counteracted and destroyed it.
+
+We are willing, by what we have said, not to defend Clifford, but to
+redeem Lucy in the opinion of our readers for loving so unwisely; and
+when they remember her youth, her education, her privation of a mother,
+of all female friendship, even of the vigilant and unrelaxing care of
+some protector of the opposite sex, we do not think that what was so
+natural will be considered by any inexcusable.
+
+Mauleverer woke the morning after the ball in better health than usual,
+and consequently more in love than ever. According to his resolution the
+night before, he sat down to write a long letter to William Brandon: it
+was amusing and witty as usual; but the wily nobleman succeeded, under
+the cover of wit, in conveying to Brandon's mind a serious apprehension
+lest his cherished matrimonial project should altogether fail. The
+account of Lucy and of Captain Clifford contained in the epistle
+instilled, indeed, a double portion of sourness into the professionally
+acrid mind of the lawyer; and as it so happened that he read the letter
+just before attending the court upon a case in which he was counsel to
+the crown, the witnesses on the opposite side of the question felt the
+full effects of the barrister's ill humour. The case was one in which
+the defendant had been engaged in swindling transactions to a very large
+amount; and among his agents and assistants was a person of the very
+lowest orders, but who, seemingly enjoying large connections, and
+possessing natural acuteness and address, appeared to have been of
+great use in receiving and disposing of such goods as were fraudulently
+obtained. As a witness against the latter person appeared a pawnbroker,
+who produced certain articles that had been pledged to him at different
+times by this humble agent. Now, Brandon, in examining the guilty
+go-between, became the more terribly severe in proportion as the man
+evinced that semblance of unconscious stolidity which the lower orders
+can so ingeniously assume, and which is so peculiarly adapted to enrage
+and to baffle the gentlemen of the bar. At length, Brandon entirely
+subduing and quelling the stubborn hypocrisy of the culprit, the man
+turned towards him a look between wrath and beseechingness, muttering,--
+
+"Aha! if so be, Counsellor Prandon, you knew vat I knows. You vould not
+go for to bully I so!"
+
+"And pray, my good fellow, what is it that you know that should make me
+treat you as if I thought you an honest man?"
+
+The witness had now relapsed into sullenness, and only answered by
+a sort of grunt. Brandon, who knew well how to sting a witness
+into communicativeness, continued his questioning till the witness,
+re-aroused into anger, and it may be into indiscretion, said in a low
+voice,--
+
+"Hax Mr. Swoppem the pawnbroker what I sold 'im on the 15th hof
+February, exactly twenty-three yearn ago." Brandon started back, his
+lips grew white, he clenched his hands with a convulsive spasm; and
+while all his features seemed distorted with an earnest yet fearful
+intensity of expectation, he poured forth a volley of questions, so
+incoherent and so irrelevant that he was immediately called to order
+by his learned brother on the opposite side. Nothing further could be
+extracted from the witness. The pawnbroker was resummoned: he appeared
+somewhat disconcerted by an appeal to his memory so far back as
+twenty-three years; but after taking some time to consider, during which
+the agitation of the usually cold and possessed Brandon was remarkable
+to all the court, he declared that he recollected no transaction
+whatsoever with the witness at that time. In vain were all Brandon's
+efforts to procure a more elucidatory answer. The pawnbroker was
+impenetrable, and the lawyer was compelled reluctantly to dismiss
+him. The moment the witness left the box, Brandon sank into a gloomy
+abstraction,--he seemed quite to forget the business and the duties of
+the court; and so negligently did he continue to conclude the case, so
+purposeless was the rest of his examination and cross-examination, that
+the cause was entirely marred, and a verdict "Not guilty" returned by
+the jury.
+
+The moment he left the court, Brandon repaired to the pawnbroker's; and
+after a conversation with Mr. Swoppem, in which he satisfied that honest
+tradesman that his object was rather to reward than intimidate, Swoppem
+confessed that twenty-three years ago the witness had met him at a
+public-house in Devereux Court, in company with two other men, and sold
+him several articles in plate, ornaments, etc. The great bulk of these
+articles had, of course, long left the pawnbroker's abode; but he still
+thought a stray trinket or two, not of sufficient worth to be reset or
+remodelled, nor of sufficient fashion to find a ready sale, lingered in
+his drawers. Eagerly, and with trembling hands, did Brandon toss over
+the motley contents of the mahogany reservoirs which the pawnbroker now
+submitted to his scrutiny. Nothing on earth is so melancholy a
+prospect as a pawnbroker's drawer! Those little, quaint, valueless
+ornaments,--those true-lovers' knots, those oval lockets, those battered
+rings, girdled by initials, or some brief inscription of regard or of
+grief,--what tales of past affections, hopes, and sorrows do they not
+tell! But no sentiment of so general a sort ever saddened the hard mind
+of William Brandon, and now less than at any time could such reflections
+have occurred to him. Impatiently he threw on the table, one after
+another, the baubles once hoarded perchance with the tenderest respect,
+till at length his eyes sparkled, and with a nervous gripe he seized
+upon an old ring which was inscribed with letters, and circled a heart
+containing hair. The inscription was simply, "W. B. to Julia." Strange
+and dark was the expression that settled on Brandon's face as he
+regarded this seemingly worthless trinket. After a moment's gaze, he
+uttered an inarticulate exclamation, and thrusting it into his pocket,
+renewed his search. He found one or two other trifles of a similar
+nature; one was an ill-done miniature set in silver, and bearing at
+the back sundry half-effaced letters, which Brandon construed at once
+(though no other eye could) into "Sir John Brandon, 1635, AEtat. 28;"
+the other was a seal stamped with the noble crest of the house of
+Brandon, 'A bull's head, ducally crowned and armed, Or.' As soon as
+Brandon had possessed himself of these treasures, and arrived at the
+conviction that the place held no more, he assured the conscientious
+Swoppem of his regard for that person's safety, rewarded him
+munificently, and went his way to Bow Street for a warrant against the
+witness who had commended him to the pawnbroker. On his road thither,
+a new resolution occurred to him. "Why make all public," he muttered
+to himself, "if it can be avoided? and it may be avoided!" He paused a
+moment, then retraced his way to the pawnbroker's, and, after a brief
+mandate to Mr. Swoppem, returned home. In the course of the same
+evening the witness we refer to was brought to the lawyer's house by Mr.
+Swoppem, and there held a long and private conversation with Brandon;
+the result of this seemed a compact to their mutual satisfaction, for
+the man went away safe, with a heavy purse and a light heart, although
+sundry shades and misgivings did certainly ever and anon cross the
+latter; while Brandon flung himself back in his seat with the triumphant
+air of one who has accomplished some great measure, and his dark face
+betrayed in every feature a joyousness and hope which were unfrequent
+guests, it must be owned, either to his countenance or his heart.
+
+So good a man of business, however, was William Brandon that he allowed
+not the event of that day to defer beyond the night his attention to his
+designs for the aggrandizement of his niece and house. By daybreak the
+next morning he had written to Lord Mauleverer, to his brother, and to
+Lucy. To the last his letter, couched in all the anxiety of fondness and
+the caution of affectionate experience, was well calculated to occasion
+that mingled shame and soreness which the wary lawyer rightly judged
+would be the most effectual enemy to an incipient passion. "I have
+accidentally heard," he wrote, "from a friend of mine, just arrived from
+Bath, of the glaring attentions paid to you by a Captain Clifford; I
+will not, my dearest niece, wound you by repeating what also I heard of
+your manner in receiving them. I know the ill-nature and the envy of the
+world; and I do not for a moment imagine that my Lucy, of whom I am so
+justly proud, would countenance, from a petty coquetry, the advances
+of one whom she could never marry, or evince to any suitor partiality
+unknown to her relations, and certainly placed in a quarter which could
+never receive their approbation. I do not credit the reports of the
+idle, my dear niece; but if I discredit, you must not slight them. I
+call upon your prudence, your delicacy, your discretion, your sense of
+right, at once and effectually to put a stop to all impertinent rumours:
+dance with this young man no more; do not let him be of your party in
+any place of amusement, public or private; avoid even seeing him if you
+are able, and throw in your manner towards him that decided coldness
+which the world cannot mistake." Much more did the skilful uncle write,
+but all to the same purpose, and for the furtherance of the same design.
+His letter to his brother was not less artful. He told him at once
+that Lucy's preference of the suit of a handsome fortune-hunter was
+the public talk, and besought him to lose not a moment in quelling the
+rumour. "You may do so easily," he wrote, "by avoiding the young man;
+and should he be very importunate, return at once to Warlock. Your
+daughter's welfare must be dearer to you than anything."
+
+To Mauleverer, Brandon replied by a letter which turned first on
+public matters, and then slid carelessly into the subject of the earl's
+information.
+
+Among the admonitions which he ventured to give Mauleverer, he dwelt,
+not without reason, on the want of tact displayed by the earl in not
+manifesting that pomp and show which his station in life enabled him
+to do. "Remember," he urged, "you are not among your equals, by whom
+unnecessary parade begins to be considered an ostentatious vulgarity.
+The surest method of dazzling our inferiors is by splendour, not taste.
+All young persons--all women in particular--are caught by show, and
+enamoured of magnificence. Assume a greater state, and you will be more
+talked of; and notoriety wins a woman's heart more than beauty or youth.
+You have, forgive me, played the boy too long; a certain dignity becomes
+your manhood; women will not respect you if you suffer yourself to
+become 'stale and cheap to vulgar company.' You are like a man who has
+fifty advantages, and uses only one of them to gain his point, when you
+rely on your conversation and your manner, and throw away the resources
+of your wealth and your station. Any private gentleman may be amiable
+and witty; but any private gentleman cannot call to his aid the
+Aladdin's lamp possessed in England by a wealthy peer. Look to this,
+my dear lord! Lucy at heart is vain, or she is not a woman. Dazzle her,
+then,--dazzle! Love may be blind, but it must be made so by excess of
+light. You have a country-house within a few miles of Bath. Why not take
+up your abode there instead of in a paltry lodging in the town? Give
+sumptuous entertainments,--make it necessary for all the world to attend
+them,--exclude, of course, this Captain Clifford; you will then meet
+Lucy without a rival. At present, excepting only your title, you fight
+on a level ground with this adventurer, instead of an eminence from
+which you could in an instant sweep him away. Nay, he is stronger than
+you; he has the opportunities afforded by a partnership in balls where
+you cannot appear to advantage; he is, you say, in the first bloom
+of youth, he is handsome. Reflect!--your destiny, so far as Lucy is
+concerned, is in your hands. I turn to other subjects," etc. As Brandon
+re-read, ere he signed, this last letter, a bitter smile sat on his
+harsh yet handsome features. "If," said he, mentally, "I can effect this
+object,--if Mauleverer does marry this girl,--why so much the better
+that she has another, a fairer, and a more welcome lover. By the great
+principle of scorn within me, which has enabled me to sneer at what
+weaker minds adore, and make a footstool of that worldly honour which
+fools set up as a throne, it would be to me more sweet than fame--ay,
+or even than power--to see this fine-spun lord a gibe in the mouths
+of men,--a cuckold, a cuckold!" and as he said the last word Brandon
+laughed outright. "And he thinks, too," added he, "that he is sure of my
+fortune; otherwise, perhaps, he, the goldsmith's descendant, would not
+dignify our house with his proposals; but he may err there,--he may err
+there," and, finishing his soliloquy, Brandon finished also his letter
+by--"Adieu, my dear lord, your most affectionate friend"!
+
+It is not difficult to conjecture the effect produced upon Lucy by
+Brandon's letter. It made her wretched; she refused for days to go out;
+she shut herself up in her apartment, and consumed the time in tears
+and struggles with her own heart. Sometimes what she conceived to be her
+duty conquered, and she resolved to forswear her lover; but the night
+undid the labour of the day,--for at night, every night, the sound of
+her lover's voice, accompanied by music, melted away her resolution, and
+made her once more all tenderness and trust. The words, too, sung
+under her window were especially suited to affect her; they breathed
+a melancholy which touched her the more from its harmony with her own
+thoughts. One while they complained of absence, at another they hinted
+at neglect; but there was always in them a tone of humiliation, not
+reproach; they bespoke a sense of unworthiness in the lover, and
+confessed that even the love was a crime: and in proportion as they
+owned the want of desert did Lucy more firmly cling to the belief that
+her lover was deserving.
+
+The old squire was greatly disconcerted by his brother's letter. Though
+impressed with the idea of self-consequence, and the love of tolerably
+pure blood, common to most country squires, he was by no means ambitious
+for his daughter. On the contrary, the same feeling which at Warlock had
+made him choose his companions among the inferior gentry made him
+averse to the thought of a son-in-law from the peerage. In spite of
+Mauleverer's good-nature, the very ease of the earl annoyed him, and he
+never felt at home in his society. To Clifford he had a great liking;
+and having convinced himself that there was nothing to suspect in the
+young gentleman, he saw no earthly reason why so agreeable a companion
+should not be an agreeable son-in-law. "If he be poor," thought the
+squire, "though he does not seem so, Lucy is rich!" And this truism
+appeared to him to answer every objection. Nevertheless, William Brandon
+possessed a remarkable influence over the weaker mind of his brother;
+and the squire, though with great reluctance, resolved to adopt his
+advice. He shut his doors against Clifford, and when he met him in the
+streets, instead of greeting him with his wonted cordiality, he passed
+him with a hasty "Good day, Captain!" which, after the first day or two,
+merged into a distant bow. Whenever very good-hearted people are rude,
+and unjustly so, the rudeness is in the extreme. The squire felt it so
+irksome to be less familiar than heretofore with Clifford, that his
+only remaining desire was now to drop him altogether; and to this
+consummation of acquaintance the gradually cooling salute appeared
+rapidly approaching. Meanwhile Clifford, unable to see Lucy, shunned by
+her father, and obtaining in answer to all inquiry rude looks from the
+footman, whom nothing but the most resolute command over his muscles
+prevented him from knocking down, began to feel perhaps, for the first
+time in his life, that an equivocal character is at least no equivocal
+misfortune. To add to his distress, "the earnings of his previous
+industry"--we use the expression cherished by the wise Tomlinson--waxed
+gradually less and less beneath the expenses of Bath; and the murmuring
+voices of his two comrades began already to reproach their chief for his
+inglorious idleness, and to hint at the necessity of a speedy exertion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+     Whackum.  Look you there, now!  Well, all Europe cannot show a knot
+     of finer wits and braver gentlemen.
+
+     Dingboy.  Faith, they are pretty smart men.
+
+                                        SHADWELL: Scourers.
+
+The world of Bath was of a sudden delighted by the intelligence that
+Lord Mauleverer had gone to Beauvale (the beautiful seat possessed by
+that nobleman in the neighbourhood of Bath), with the intention of there
+holding a series of sumptuous entertainments.
+
+The first persons to whom the gay earl announced his "hospitable
+purpose" were Mr. and Miss Brandon; he called at their house, and
+declared his resolution of not leaving it till Lucy (who was in her own
+room) consented to gratify him with an interview, and a promise to
+be the queen of his purposed festival. Lucy, teased by her father,
+descended to the drawing-room, spiritless and pale; and the earl,
+struck by the alteration of her appearance, took her hand, and made his
+inquiries with so interesting and feeling a semblance of kindness as
+prepossessed the father for the first time in his favour, and touched
+even the daughter. So earnest, too, was his request that she would
+honour his festivities with her presence, and with so skilful a flattery
+was it conveyed, that the squire undertook to promise the favour in
+her name; and when the earl, declaring he was not contented with that
+promise from another, appealed to Lucy herself, her denial was soon
+melted into a positive though a reluctant assent.
+
+Delighted with his success, and more struck with Lucy's loveliness,
+refined as it was by her paleness, than he had ever been before,
+Mauleverer left the house, and calculated, with greater accuracy than
+he had hitherto done, the probable fortune Lucy would derive from her
+uncle.
+
+No sooner were the cards issued for Lord Mauleverer's fete than nothing
+else was talked of among the circles which at Bath people were pleased
+to term "the World."
+
+But in the interim caps are making, and talk flowing, at Bath; and when
+it was found that Lord Mauleverer--the good-natured Lord Mauleverer, the
+obliging Lord Mauleverer--was really going to be exclusive, and out of
+a thousand acquaintances to select only eight hundred, it is amazing
+how his popularity deepened into respect. Now, then, came anxiety and
+triumph; she who was asked turned her back upon her who was not,--old
+friendships dissolved,--Independence wrote letters for a ticket,--and,
+as England is the freest country in the world, all the Mistresses
+Hodges and Snodges begged to take the liberty of bringing their youngest
+daughters.
+
+Leaving the enviable Mauleverer,--the god-like occasion of so much
+happiness and woe, triumph and dejection,--ascend with us, O reader,
+into those elegant apartments over the hairdresser's shop, tenanted
+by Mr. Edward Pepper and Mr. Augustus Tomlinson. The time was that of
+evening; Captain Clifford had been dining with his two friends; the
+cloth was removed, and conversation was flowing over a table graced
+by two bottles of port, a bowl of punch for Mr. Pepper's especial
+discussion, two dishes of filberts, another of devilled biscuits, and a
+fourth of three Pomarian crudities, which nobody touched.
+
+The hearth was swept clean, the fire burned high and clear, the curtains
+were let down, and the light excluded. Our three adventurers and
+their rooms seemed the picture of comfort. So thought Mr. Pepper; for,
+glancing round the chamber and putting his feet upon the fender, he
+said,--
+
+"Were my portrait to be taken, gentlemen, it is just as I am now that I
+would be drawn!"
+
+"And," said Tomlinson, cracking his filberts,--Tomlinson was fond of
+filberts,--"were I to choose a home, it is in such a home as this that I
+would be always quartered."
+
+"Ah, gentlemen," said Clifford, who had been for some time silent, "it
+is more than probable that both your wishes may be heard, and that ye
+may be drawn, quartered, and something else, too, in the very place of
+your desert!"
+
+"Well," said Tomlinson, smiling gently, "I am happy to hear you jest
+again, Captain, though it be at our expense."
+
+"Expense!" echoed Ned; "ay, there's the rub! Who the deuce is to pay the
+expense of our dinner?"
+
+"And our dinners for the last week?" added Tomlinson. "This empty nut
+looks ominous; it certainly has one grand feature strikingly resembling
+my pockets."
+
+"Heigho!" sighed Long Ned, turning his waistcoat commodities inside-out
+with a significant gesture, while the accomplished Tomlinson, who
+was fond of plaintive poetry, pointed to the disconsolate vacua, and
+exclaimed,
+
+              "E'en while Fashion's brightest arts decoy,
+               The heart desponding asks if this be joy!"
+
+"In truth, gentlemen," added he, solemnly depositing his nut-crackers
+on the table, and laying, as was his wont when about to be luminous, his
+right finger on his sinister palm,--"in truth, gentlemen, affairs are
+growing serious with us, and it becomes necessary forthwith to devise
+some safe means of procuring a decent competence."
+
+"I am dunned confoundedly," cried Ned.
+
+"And," continued Tomlinson, "no person of delicacy likes to be subjected
+to the importunity of vulgar creditors; we must therefore raise money
+for the liquidation of our debts. Captain Lovett, or Clifford, whichever
+you be styled, we call upon you to assist us in so praiseworthy a
+purpose."
+
+Clifford turned his eyes first on one and then on the other; but made no
+answer.
+
+"Imprimis," said Tomlinson, "let us each produce our stock in hand; for
+my part, I am free to confess--for what shame is there in that poverty
+which our exertions are about to relieve?--that I have only two guineas
+four shillings and threepence halfpenny!"
+
+"And I," said Long Ned, taking a China ornament from the chimney-piece,
+and emptying its contents in his hand, "am in a still more pitiful
+condition. See, I have only three shillings and a bad guinea. I gave
+the guinea to the waiter at the White Hart yesterday; the dog brought
+it back to me to-day, and I was forced to change it with my last shiner.
+Plague take the thing! I bought it of a Jew for four shillings, and have
+lost one pound five by the bargain."
+
+"Fortune frustrates our wisest schemes," rejoined the moralizing
+Augustus. "Captain, will you produce the scanty wrecks of your wealth?"
+
+Clifford, still silent, threw a purse on the table. Augustus carefully
+emptied it, and counted out five guineas; an expression of grave
+surprise settled on Tomlinson's contemplative brow, and extending the
+coins towards Clifford, he said in a melancholy tone,--
+
+                    "All your pretty ones?
+                           Did you say all?"
+
+A look from Clifford answered the interesting interrogatory.
+"These, then," said Tomlinson, collecting in his hand the common
+wealth,--"these, then, are all our remaining treasures!" As he spoke,
+he jingled the coins mournfully in his palm, and gazing upon them with a
+parental air, exclaimed,--
+
+     "Alas! regardless of their doom, the little victims play!"
+
+"Oh, d---it!" said Ned, "no sentiment! Let us come to business at once.
+To tell you the truth, I, for one, am tired of this heiress-hunting, and
+a man may spend a fortune in the chase before he can win one."
+
+"You despair then, positively, of the widow you have courted so long?"
+asked Tomlinson.
+
+"Utterly," rejoined Ned, whose addresses had been limited solely to the
+dames of the middling class, and who had imagined himself at one
+time, as he punningly expressed it, sure of a dear rib from
+Cheapside,--"utterly; she was very civil to me at first, but when I
+proposed, asked me, with a blush, for my 'references.' 'References?'
+said I; 'why, I want the place of your husband, my charmer, not your
+footman!' The dame was inexorable, said she could not take me without
+a character, but hinted that I might be the lover instead of the
+bridegroom; and when I scorned the suggestion, and pressed for the
+parson, she told me point-blank, with her unlucky city pronunciation,
+'that she would never accompany me to the halter!'"
+
+"Ha, ha, ha!" cried Tomlinson, laughing. "One can scarcely blame the
+good lady for that. Love rarely brooks such permanent ties. But have you
+no other lady in your eye?"
+
+"Not for matrimony,--all roads but those to the church!" While this
+dissolute pair were thus conversing, Clifford, leaning against
+the wainscot, listened to them with a sick and bitter feeling of
+degradation, which till of late days had been a stranger to his breast.
+He was at length aroused from his silence by Ned, who, bending forward
+and placing his hand upon Clifford's knee, said abruptly,--
+
+"In short, Captain, you must lead us once more to glory. We have still
+our horses, and I keep my mask in my pocketbook, together with my comb.
+Let us take the road to-morrow night, dash across the country towards
+Salisbury, and after a short visit in that neighbourhood to a band of
+old friends of mine,--bold fellows, who would have stopped the devil
+himself when he was at work upon Stonehenge,--make a tour by Reading and
+Henley and end by a plunge into London."
+
+"You have spoken well, Ned!" said Tomlinson, approvingly. "Now, noble
+captain, your opinion?"
+
+"Messieurs," answered Clifford, "I highly approve of your intended
+excursion, and I only regret that I cannot be your companion."
+
+"Not! and why?" cried Mr. Pepper, amazed.
+
+"Because I have business here that renders it impossible; perhaps,
+before long, I may join you in London."
+
+"Nay," said Tomlinson, "there is no necessity for our going to London,
+if you wish to remain here; nor need we at present recur to so desperate
+an expedient as the road,--a little quiet business at Bath will answer
+our purpose; and for my part, as you well know, I love exerting my
+wits in some scheme more worthy of them than the highway,--a profession
+meeter for a bully than a man of genius. Let us then, Captain, plan a
+project of enrichment on the property of some credulous tradesman! Why
+have recourse to rough measures so long as we can find easy fools?"
+
+Clifford shook his head. "I will own to you fairly," said he, "that I
+cannot at present take a share in your exploits; nay, as your chief I
+must lay my positive commands on you to refrain from all exercise of
+your talents at Bath. Rob, if you please: the world is before you; but
+this city is sacred."
+
+"Body o' me!" cried Ned, colouring, "but this is too good. I will not be
+dictated to in this manner."
+
+"But, sir," answered Clifford, who had learned in his oligarchical
+profession the way to command,--"but, sir, you shall, or if you mutiny
+you leave our body, and then will the hangman have no petty chance of
+your own. Come, come! ingrate as you are, what would you be without me?
+How many times have I already saved that long carcass of thine from the
+rope, and now would you have the baseness to rebel? Out on you!"
+
+Though Mr. Pepper was still wroth, he bit his lip in moody silence, and
+suffered not his passion to have its way; while Clifford, rising, after
+a short pause continued: "Look you, Mr. Pepper, you know my commands;
+consider them peremptory. I wish you success and plenty! Farewell,
+gentlemen!"
+
+"Do you leave us already?" cried Tomlinson. "You are offended."
+
+"Surely not!" answered Clifford, retreating to the door. "But an
+engagement elsewhere, you know!"
+
+"Ay, I take you," said Tomlinson, following Clifford out of the room,
+and shutting the door after him. "Ay, I take you!" added he, in a
+whisper, as he arrested Clifford at the head of the stairs. "But tell
+me, how do you get on with the heiress?"
+
+Smothering that sensation at his heart which made Clifford, reckless as
+he was, enraged and ashamed, whenever through the lips of his comrades
+there issued any allusion to Lucy Brandon, the chief replied: "I fear,
+Tomlinson, that I am already suspected by the old squire! All of a
+sudden he avoids me, shuts his door against me; Miss Brandon goes
+nowhere, and even if she did, what could I expect from her after this
+sudden change in the father?"
+
+Tomlinson looked blank and disconcerted. "But," said he, after a
+moment's silence, "why not put a good face on the matter, walk up to the
+squire, and ask him the reason of his unkindness?"
+
+"Why, look you, my friend; I am bold enough with all others, but this
+girl has made me as bashful as a maid in all that relates to herself.
+Nay, there are moments when I think I can conquer all selfish feeling
+and rejoice for her sake that she has escaped me. Could I but see her
+once more, I could--yes! I feel--I feel I could--resign her forever!"
+
+"Humph!" said Tomlinson; "and what is to become of us? Really, my
+captain, your sense of duty should lead you to exert yourself; your
+friends starve before your eyes, while you are shilly-shallying about
+your mistress. Have you no bowels for friendship?"
+
+"A truce with this nonsense!" said Clifford, angrily.
+
+"It is sense,--sober sense,--and sadness too," rejoined Tomlinson.
+"Ned is discontented, our debts are imperious. Suppose, now,--just
+suppose,--that we take a moonlight flitting from Bath, will that tell
+well for you whom we leave behind? Yet this we must do, if you do not
+devise some method of refilling our purses. Either, then, consent to
+join us in a scheme meet for our wants, or pay our debts in this city,
+or fly with us to London, and dismiss all thoughts of that love which is
+so seldom friendly to the projects of ambition."
+
+Notwithstanding the manner in which Tomlinson made this threefold
+proposition, Clifford could not but acknowledge the sense and justice
+contained in it; and a glance at the matter sufficed to show how ruinous
+to his character, and therefore to his hopes, would be the flight of his
+comrades and the clamour of their creditors.
+
+"You speak well, Tomlinson," said he, hesitating; "and yet for the life
+of me I cannot aid you in any scheme which may disgrace us by detection.
+Nothing can reconcile me to the apprehension of Miss Brandon's
+discovering who and what was her suitor."
+
+"I feel for you," said Tomlinson, "but give me and Pepper at least
+permission to shift for ourselves; trust to my known prudence for
+finding some method to raise the wind without creating a dust; in other
+words (this cursed Pepper makes one so vulgar!), of preying on the
+public without being discovered."
+
+"I see no alternative," answered Clifford, reluctantly; "but if
+possible, be quiet for the present. Bear with me for a few days longer,
+give me only sufficient time once more to see Miss Brandon, and I will
+engage to extricate you from your difficulties!"
+
+"Spoken like yourself, frankly and nobly," replied Tomlinson; "no one
+has a greater confidence in your genius, once exerted, than I have!"
+
+So saying, the pair shook hands and parted. Tomlinson rejoined Mr.
+Pepper.
+
+"Well, have you settled anything?" quoth the latter.
+
+"Not exactly; and though Lovett has promised to exert himself in a few
+days, yet, as the poor man is in love, and his genius under a cloud, I
+have little faith in his promises."
+
+"And I have none!" said Pepper; "besides, time presses! A few days!--a
+few devils! We are certainly scented here, and I walk about like a
+barrel of beer at Christmas, under hourly apprehension of being tapped!"
+
+"It is very strange," said the philosophic Augustus; "but I think there
+is an instinct in tradesmen by which they can tell a rogue at first
+sight; and I can get (dress I ever so well) no more credit with my
+laundress than my friends the Whigs can with the people."
+
+"In short, then," said Ned, "we must recur at once to the road; and on
+the day after to-morrow there will be an excellent opportunity. The
+old earl with the hard name gives a breakfast, or feast, or some such
+mummery. I understand people will stay till after nightfall; let us
+watch our opportunity, we are famously mounted, and some carriage later
+than the general string may furnish us with all our hearts can desire!"
+
+"Bravo!" cried Tomlinson, shaking Mr. Pepper heartily by the hand; "I
+give you joy of your ingenuity, and you may trust to me to make our
+peace afterwards with Lovett. Any enterprise that seems to him gallant
+he is always willing enough to forgive; and as he never practises
+any other branch of the profession than that of the road (for which I
+confess that I think him foolish), he will be more ready to look
+over our exploits in that line than in any other more subtle but less
+heroic."
+
+"Well, I leave it to you to propitiate the cove or not, as you please;
+and now that we have settled the main point, let us finish the lush!"
+
+"And," added Augustus, taking a pack of cards from the chimney-piece,
+"we can in the mean while have a quiet game at cribbage for shillings."
+
+"Done!" cried Ned, clearing away the dessert.
+
+If the redoubted hearts of Mr. Edward Pepper, and that Ulysses of
+robbers, Augustus Tomlinson, beat high as the hours brought on Lord
+Mauleverer's fete, their leader was not without anxiety and expectation
+for the same event. He was uninvited, it is true, to the gay scene;
+but he had heard in public that Miss Brandon, recovered from her late
+illness, was certainly to be there; and Clifford, torn with suspense,
+and eager once more, even if for the last time, to see the only person
+who had ever pierced his soul with a keen sense of his errors or crimes,
+resolved to risk all obstacles and meet her at Mauleverer's.
+
+"My life," said he, as he sat alone in his apartment, eying the
+falling embers of his still and lethargic fire, "may soon approach its
+termination; it is, indeed, out of the chances of things that I can
+long escape the doom of my condition; and when, as a last hope to raise
+myself from my desperate state into respectability and reform, I came
+hither, and meditated purchasing independence by marriage, I was
+blind to the cursed rascality of the action! Happy, after all, that my
+intentions were directed against one whom I so soon and so adoringly
+learned to love! Had I wooed one whom I loved less, I might not have
+scrupled to deceive her into marriage. As it is,--well, it is idle in
+me to think thus of my resolution, when I have not even the option to
+choose; when her father, perhaps, has already lifted the veil from my
+assumed dignities, and the daughter already shrinks in horror from my
+name. Yet I will see her! I will look once more upon that angel face, I
+will hear from her own lips the confession of her scorn, I will see that
+bright eye flash hatred upon me, and I can then turn once more to my
+fatal career, and forget that I have ever repented that it was begun.
+Yet, what else could have been my alternative? Friendless, homeless,
+nameless,--an orphan, worse than an orphan,--the son of a harlot, my
+father even unknown; yet cursed with early aspirings and restlessness,
+and a half glimmering of knowledge, and an entire lust of whatever
+seemed enterprise,--what wonder that I chose anything rather than daily
+labour and perpetual contumely? After all, the fault is in fortune and
+the world, not me! Oh, Lucy! had I but been born in your sphere, had
+I but possessed the claim to merit you, what would I not have done and
+dared and conquered for your sake!"
+
+Such, or similar to these, were the thoughts of Clifford during the
+interval between his resolution of seeing Lucy and the time of effecting
+it. The thoughts were of no pleasing though of an exciting nature;
+nor were they greatly soothed by the ingenious occupation of cheating
+himself into the belief that if he was a highwayman, it was altogether
+the fault of the highways.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+          Dream.  Let me but see her, dear Leontins.
+                                   Humorous Lieutenant.
+
+          Hempskirke.  It was the fellow, sure.
+          Wolfort.  What are you, sirrah?
+                                   Beggar's Bush.
+
+O thou divine spirit that burnest in every breast, inciting each with
+the sublime desire to be fine; that stirrest up the great to become
+little in order to seem greater, and that makest a duchess woo insult
+for a voucher,--thou that delightest in so many shapes, multifarious yet
+the same; spirit that makest the high despicable, and the lord meaner
+than his valet; equally great whether thou cheatest a friend or cuttest
+a father; lacquering all thou touchest with a bright vulgarity that thy
+votaries imagine to be gold,--thou that sendest the few to fashionable
+balls and the many to fashionable novels; that smitest even Genius as
+well as Folly, making the favourites of the gods boast an acquaintance
+they have not with the graces of a mushroom peerage rather than the
+knowledge they have of the Muses of an eternal Helicon,--thou that
+leavest in the great ocean of our manners no dry spot for the foot of
+independence; that pallest on the jaded eye with a moving and girdling
+panorama of daubed vilenesses, and fritterest away the souls of
+free-born Britons into a powder smaller than the angels which dance
+in myriads on a pin's point,--whether, O spirit! thou callest thyself
+Fashion or Ton, or Ambition or Vanity or Cringing or Cant or any title
+equally lofty and sublime,--would that from thy wings we could gain
+but a single plume! Fain would we, in fitting strain, describe the
+festivities of that memorable day when the benevolent Lord Mauleverer
+received and blessed the admiring universe of Bath.
+
+But to be less poetical, as certain writers say, when they have been
+writing nonsense,--but to be less poetical and more exact, the morning,
+though in the depth of winter, was bright and clear, and Lord Mauleverer
+found himself in particularly good health. Nothing could be better
+planned than the whole of his arrangements. Unlike those which are
+ordinarily chosen for the express reason of being as foreign as possible
+to the nature of our climate, all at Lord Mauleverer's were made
+suitable to a Greenland atmosphere. The temples and summer-houses,
+interspersed through the grounds, were fitted up, some as Esquimaux
+huts, others as Russian pavilions; fires were carefully kept up; the
+musicians Mauleverer took care should have as much wine as they pleased;
+they were set skilfully in places where they were unseen, but where they
+could be heard. One or two temporary buildings were erected for those
+who loved dancing; and as Mauleverer, miscalculating on the principles
+of human nature, thought gentlemen might be averse from ostentatious
+exhibition, he had hired persons to skate minuets and figures of eight
+upon his lakes, for the amusement of those who were fond of skating. All
+people who would be kind enough to dress in strange costumes and make
+odd noises, which they called singing, the earl had carefully engaged,
+and planted in the best places for making them look still stranger than
+they were.
+
+There was also plenty to eat, and more than plenty to drink. Mauleverer
+knew well that our countrymen and countrywomen, whatever be their rank,
+like to have their spirits exalted. In short, the whole dejeuner was so
+admirably contrived that it was probable the guests would not look much
+more melancholy during the amusements than they would have done had they
+been otherwise engaged at a funeral.
+
+Lucy and the squire were among the first arrivals. Mauleverer,
+approaching the father and daughter with his most courtly manner,
+insisted on taking the latter under his own escort, and being her
+cicerone through the round of preparations.
+
+As the crowd thickened, and it was observed how gallant were the
+attentions testified towards Lucy by the host, many and envious were
+the whispers of the guests! Those good people, naturally angry at the
+thought that two individuals should be married, divided themselves into
+two parties: one abused Lucy, and the other Lord Mauleverer; the former
+vituperated her art, the latter his folly. "I thought she would play
+her cards well, deceitful creature!" said the one. "January and May,"
+muttered the other; "the man's sixty!" It was noticeable that the party
+against Lucy was chiefly composed of ladies, that against Mauleverer
+of men; that conduct must indeed be heinous which draws down the
+indignation of one's own sex!
+
+Unconscious of her crimes, Lucy moved along, leaning on the arm of the
+gallant earl, and languidly smiling, with her heart far away, at his
+endeavours to amuse her. There was something interesting in the mere
+contrast of the pair; so touching seemed the beauty of the young
+girl, with her delicate cheek, maiden form, drooping eyelid, and
+quiet simplicity of air, in comparison to the worldly countenance and
+artificial grace of her companion.
+
+After some time, when they were in a sequestered part of the grounds,
+Mauleverer, observing that none were near, entered a rude hut; and so
+fascinated was he at that moment by the beauty of his guest, and so meet
+to him seemed the opportunity of his confession, that he with difficulty
+suppressed the avowal rising to his lips, and took the more prudent plan
+of first sounding and preparing as it were the way.
+
+"I cannot tell you, my dear Miss Brandon," said he, slightly pressing
+the beautiful hand leaning on his arm, "how happy I am to see you the
+guest--the queen, rather--of my house! Ah! could the bloom of youth
+return with its feelings! Time is never so cruel as when, while stealing
+from us the power to please, he leaves us in full vigour the unhappy
+privilege to be charmed!"
+
+Mauleverer expected at least a blushing contradiction to the
+implied application of a sentiment so affectingly expressed: he was
+disappointed. Lucy, less alive than usual to the sentimental, or its
+reverse, scarcely perceived his meaning, and answered simply that it was
+very true. "This comes of being, like my friend Burke, too refined
+for one's audience," thought Mauleverer, wincing a little from the
+unexpected reply. "And yet!" he resumed, "I would not forego my power to
+admire, futile, nay, painful as it is. Even now, while I gaze on you, my
+heart tells me that the pleasure I enjoy, it is at your command at once
+and forever to blight into misery; but while it tells me, I gaze on!"
+
+Lucy raised her eyes, and something of her natural archness played in
+their expression.
+
+"I believe, my lord," said she, moving from the hut, "that it would be
+better to join your guests: walls have ears; and what would be the
+gay Lord Mauleverer's self-reproach if he heard again of his fine
+compliments to--"
+
+"The most charming person in Europe!" cried Mauleverer, vehemently; and
+the hand which he before touched he now clasped. At that instant Lucy
+saw opposite to her, half hid by a copse of evergreens, the figure of
+Clifford. His face, which seemed pale and wan, was not directed towards
+the place where she stood, and he evidently did not perceive Mauleverer
+or herself; yet so great was the effect that this glimpse of him
+produced on Lucy, that she trembled violently, and, unconsciously
+uttering a faint cry, snatched her hand from Mauleverer.
+
+The earl started, and catching the expression of her eyes, turned
+instantly towards the spot to which her gaze seemed riveted. He had
+not heard the rustling of the boughs, but he saw, with his habitual
+quickness of remark, that they still trembled, as if lately displaced;
+and he caught through their interstices the glimpse of a receding
+figure. He sprang forward with an agility very uncommon to his usual
+movements; but before he gained the copse, every vestige of the intruder
+had vanished.
+
+What slaves we are to the moment! As Mauleverer turned back to rejoin
+Lucy, who, agitated almost to fainting, leaned against the rude wall
+of the but, he would as soon have thought of flying as of making that
+generous offer of self, etc., which the instant before he had been
+burning to render Lucy. The vain are always sensitively jealous; and
+Mauleverer, remembering Clifford, and Lucy's blushes in dancing with
+him, instantly accounted for her agitation and its cause. With a very
+grave air he approached the object of his late adoration, and requested
+to know if it were not some abrupt intruder that had occasioned her
+alarm. Lucy, scarcely knowing what she said, answered in a low voice
+that it was, indeed, and begged instantly to rejoin her father.
+Mauleverer offered his arm with great dignity; and the pair passed
+into the frequented part of the grounds, where Mauleverer once more
+brightened into smiles and courtesy to all around him.
+
+"He is certainly accepted!" said Mr. Shrewd to Lady Simper.
+
+"What an immense match for the girl!" was Lady Simper's reply.
+
+Amidst the music, the dancing, the throng, the noise, Lucy found it easy
+to recover herself; and disengaging her arm from Lord Mauleverer, as she
+perceived her father, she rejoined the squire, and remained a patient
+listener to his remarks till late in the noon it became an understood
+matter that people were expected to go into a long room in order to eat
+and drink. Mauleverer, now alive to the duties of his situation,
+and feeling exceedingly angry with Lucy, was more reconciled than he
+otherwise might have been to the etiquette which obliged him to select
+for the object of his hospitable cares an old dowager duchess instead of
+the beauty of the fete; but he took care to point out to the squire the
+places appointed for himself and daughter, which were, though at some
+distance from the earl, under the providence of his vigilant survey.
+
+While Mauleverer was deifying the dowager duchess, and refreshing
+his spirits with a chicken and a medicinal glass of madeira, the
+conversation near Lucy turned, to her infinite dismay, upon Clifford.
+Some one had seen him in the grounds, booted and in a riding undress
+(in that day people seldom rode and danced in the same conformation of
+coat); and as Mauleverer was a precise person about those little matters
+of etiquette, this negligence of Clifford's made quite a subject of
+discussion. By degrees the conversation changed into the old inquiry as
+to who this Captain Clifford was; and just as it had reached that point,
+it reached also the gently deafened ears of Lord Mauleverer.
+
+"Pray, my lord," said the old duchess, "since he is one of your guests,
+you, who know who and what every one is, can possibly inform us of the
+real family of this beautiful Mr. Clifford?"
+
+"One of my guests, did you say?" answered Mauleverer, irritated greatly
+beyond his usual quietness of manner. "Really, your grace does me wrong.
+He may be a guest of my valet, but he assuredly is not mine; and should
+I encounter him, I shall leave it to my valet to give him his conge as
+well as his invitation!"
+
+Mauleverer, heightening his voice as he observed athwart the table
+an alternate paleness and flush upon Lucy's face, which stung all the
+angrier passions, generally torpid in him, into venom, looked round, on
+concluding, with a haughty and sarcastic air. So loud had been his tone,
+so pointed the insult, and so dead the silence at the table while
+he spoke, that every one felt the affront must be carried at once to
+Clifford's hearing, should he be in the room. And after Mauleverer had
+ceased, there was a universal nervous and indistinct expectation of
+an answer and a scene; all was still, and it soon became certain that
+Clifford was not in the apartment. When Mr. Shrewd had fully convinced
+himself of this fact,--for there was a daring spirit about Clifford
+which few wished to draw upon themselves,--that personage broke the
+pause by observing that no man who pretended to be a gentleman
+would intrude himself, unasked and unwelcome, into any society; and
+Mauleverer, catching up the observation, said (drinking wine at the same
+time with Mr. Shrewd) that undoubtedly such conduct fully justified the
+rumours respecting Mr. Clifford, and utterly excluded him from that rank
+to which it was before more than suspected he had no claim.
+
+So luminous and satisfactory an opinion from such an authority, once
+broached, was immediately and universally echoed; and long before the
+repast was over, it seemed to be tacitly agreed that Captain Clifford
+should be sent to Coventry, and if he murmured at the exile, he would
+have no right to insist upon being sent thence to the devil.
+
+The good old squire, mindful of his former friendship for Clifford, and
+not apt to veer, was about to begin a speech on the occasion, when Lucy,
+touching his arm, implored him to be silent; and so ghastly was the
+paleness of her cheek while she spoke, that the squire's eyes, obtuse
+as he generally was, opened at once to the real secret of her heart. As
+soon as the truth flashed upon him, he wondered, recalling Clifford's
+great personal beauty and marked attentions, that it had not flashed
+upon him sooner; and leaning back on his chair, he sank into one of the
+most unpleasant reveries he had ever conceived.
+
+At a given signal the music for the dancers recommenced, and at a hint
+to that effect from the host, persons rose without ceremony to repair to
+other amusements, and suffer such guests as had hitherto been excluded
+from eating to occupy the place of the relinquishers. Lucy, glad to
+escape, was one of the first to resign her situation, and with the
+squire she returned to the grounds. During the banquet, evening had
+closed in, and the scene now really became fairy-like and picturesque;
+lamps hung from many a tree, reflecting the light through the richest
+and softest hues; the music itself sounded more musically than during
+the day; gipsy-tents were pitched at wild corners and copses, and the
+bright wood-fires burning in them blazed merrily upon the cold yet
+cheerful air of the increasing night. The view was really novel and
+inviting; and as it had been an understood matter that ladies were to
+bring furs, cloaks, and boots, all those who thought they looked well
+in such array made little groups, and scattered themselves about the
+grounds and in the tents. They, on the contrary, in whom "the purple
+light of love" was apt by the frost to be propelled from the cheeks to
+the central ornament of the face, or who thought a fire in a room quite
+as agreeable as a fire in a tent, remained within, and contemplated the
+scene through the open windows.
+
+Lucy longed to return home, nor was the squire reluctant; but,
+unhappily, it wanted an hour to the time at which the carriage had been
+ordered, and she mechanically joined a group of guests who had persuaded
+the good-natured squire to forget his gout and venture forth to look at
+the illuminations. Her party was soon joined by others, and the group
+gradually thickened into a crowd; the throng was stationary for a few
+minutes before a little temple in which fireworks had just commenced an
+additional attraction to the scene. Opposite to this temple, as well as
+in its rear, the walks and trees had been purposely left in comparative
+darkness, in order to heighten the effect of the fireworks.
+
+"I declare," said Lady Simper, glancing down one of the alleys which
+seemed to stretch away into blackness,--"I declare it seems quite a
+lovers' walk. How kind in Lord Mauleverer!--such a delicate attention--"
+
+"To your ladyship!" added Mr. Shrewd, with a bow. While, one of this
+crowd, Lucy was vacantly eying the long trains of light which ever and
+anon shot against the sky, she felt her hand suddenly seized, and at the
+same time a voice whispered, "For God's sake, read this now and grant my
+request!"
+
+The voice, which seemed to rise from the very heart of the speaker, Lucy
+knew at once; she trembled violently, and remained for some minutes with
+eyes which did not dare to look from the ground. A note she felt had
+been left in her hand; and the agonized and earnest tone of that
+voice, which was dearer to her than the fulness of all music, made her
+impatient yet afraid to read it. As she recovered courage, she
+looked around, and seeing that the attention of all was bent upon the
+fireworks, and that her father in particular, leaning on his cane,
+seemed to enjoy the spectacle with a child's engrossed delight, she
+glided softly away, and entering unperceived one of the alleys, she
+read, by a solitary lamp that burned at its entrance, the following
+lines, written in pencil and in a hurried hand, apparently upon a leaf
+torn from a pocket-book:--
+
+     I implore, I entreat you, Miss Brandon, to see me, if but for a
+     moment.  I purpose to tear myself away from the place in which you
+     reside, to go abroad, to leave even the spot hallowed by your
+     footstep.  After this night my presence, my presumption, will
+     degrade you no more.  But this night, for mercy's sake, see me, or I
+     shall go mad!  I will but speak to you one instant: this is all I
+     ask.  If you grant me this prayer, the walk to the left where you
+     stand, at the entrance to which there is one purple lamp, will
+     afford an opportunity to your mercy.  A few yards down that walk I
+     will meet you,--none can see or hear us.  Will you grant this?  I
+     know not, I dare not think; but under any case, your name shall be
+     the last upon my lips.
+                                                  P.  C.
+
+As Lucy read this hurried scrawl, she glanced towards the lamp above
+her, and saw that she had accidentally entered the very walk indicated
+in the note. She paused, she hesitated; the impropriety, the singularity
+of the request, darted upon her at once; on the other hand, the anxious
+voice still ringing in her ear, the incoherent vehemence of the note,
+the risk, the opprobrium Clifford had incurred solely--her heart
+whispered--to see her, all aided her simple temper, her kind feelings,
+and her love for the petitioner, in inducing her to consent. She cast
+one glance behind,--all seemed occupied with far other thoughts than
+that of notice towards her; she looked anxiously before,--all looked
+gloomy and indistinct; but suddenly, at some little distance, she
+descried a dark figure in motion. She felt her knees shake under her,
+her heart beat violently; she moved onward a few paces, again paused,
+and looked back. The figure before her moved as in approach; she resumed
+courage, and advanced,--the figure was by her side.
+
+"How generous, how condescending, is this goodness in Miss Brandon!"
+said the voice, which so struggled with secret and strong emotion that
+Lucy scarcely recognized it as Clifford's. "I did not dare to expect it;
+and now--now that I meet you--" Clifford paused, as if seeking words;
+and Lucy, even through the dark, perceived that her strange companion
+was powerfully excited; she waited for him to continue, but observing
+that he walked on in silence, she said, though with a trembling voice,
+"Indeed, Mr. Clifford, I fear that it is very, very improper in me
+to meet you thus; nothing but the strong expressions in your
+letter--and--and--in short, my fear that you meditated some desperate
+design, at which I could not guess, caused me to yield to your wish for
+an interview." She paused, and Clifford still preserving silence, she
+added, with some little coldness in her tone: "If you have really aught
+to say to me, you must allow me to request that you speak it quickly.
+This interview, you must be sensible, ought to end almost as soon as it
+begins."
+
+"Hear me, then!" said Clifford, mastering his embarrassment and
+speaking in a firm and clear voice; "is that true which I have but just
+heard,--is it true that I have been spoken of in your presence in terms
+of insult and affront?"
+
+It was now for Lucy to feel embarrassed; fearful to give pain, and yet
+anxious that Clifford should know, in order that he might disprove,
+the slight and the suspicion which the mystery around him drew upon his
+name, she faltered between the two feelings, and without satisfying the
+latter, succeeded in realizing the fear of the former.
+
+"Enough!" said Clifford, in a tone of deep mortification, as his quick
+ear caught and interpreted, yet more humiliatingly than the truth, the
+meaning of her stammered and confused reply,--"enough! I see that it is
+true, and that the only human being in the world to whose good opinion
+I am not indifferent has been a witness of the insulting manner in which
+others have dared to speak of me!"
+
+"But," said Lucy, eagerly, "why give the envious or the idle any excuse?
+Why not suffer your parentage and family to be publicly known? Why are
+you here"--and her voice sank into a lower key--"this very day,
+unasked, and therefore subject to the cavils of all who think the
+poor distinction of an invitation an honour? Forgive me, Mr. Clifford;
+perhaps I offend. I hurt you by speaking thus frankly; but your good
+name rests with yourself, and your friends cannot but feel angry that
+you should trifle with it."
+
+"Madam," said Clifford; and Lucy's eyes, now growing accustomed to the
+darkness, perceived a bitter smile upon his lips, "my name, good or ill,
+is an object of little care to me. I have read of philosophers who pride
+themselves in placing no value in the opinions of the world. Rank me
+among that sect. But I am--I own I am--anxious that you alone, of all
+the world, should not despise me; and now that I feel you do, that you
+must, everything worth living or hoping for is past!"
+
+"Despise you!" said Lucy, and her eyes filled with tears; "indeed you
+wrong me and yourself. But listen to me, Mr. Clifford. I have seen, it
+is true, but little of the world, yet I have seen enough to make me
+wish I could have lived in retirement forever. The rarest quality among
+either sex, though it is the simplest, seems to me good-nature; and the
+only occupation of what are termed 'fashionable people' appears to be
+speaking ill of one another. Nothing gives such a scope to scandal as
+mystery; nothing disarms it like openness. I know, your friends know,
+Mr. Clifford, that your character can bear inspection; and I believe,
+for my own part, the same of your family. Why not, then, declare who and
+what you are?"
+
+"That candour would indeed be my best defender," said Clifford, in a
+tone which ran displeasingly through Lucy's ear; "but in truth, madam, I
+repeat, I care not one drop of this worthless blood what men say of me:
+that time has passed, and forever; perhaps it never keenly existed for
+me,--no matter. I came hither, Miss Brandon, not wasting a thought on
+these sickening fooleries, or on the hoary idler by whom they are given.
+I came hither only once more to see you, to hear you speak, to watch
+you move, to tell you"--and the speaker's voice trembled, so as to be
+scarcely audible--"to tell you, if any reason for the disclosure offered
+itself, that I have had the boldness, the crime, to love--to love--O
+God! to adore you; and then to leave you forever!"
+
+Pale, trembling, scarcely preserved from falling by the tree against
+which she leaned, Lucy listened to this abrupt avowal. "Dare I touch
+this hand?" continued Clifford, as he knelt and took it timidly and
+reverently. "You know not, you cannot dream, how unworthy is he who thus
+presumes; yet not all unworthy, while he is sensible of so deep, so
+holy a feeling as that which he bears to you. God bless you, Miss
+Brandon!--Lucy, God bless you! And if hereafter you hear me subjected
+to still blacker suspicion or severer scrutiny than that which I now
+sustain; if even your charity and goodness can find no defence for
+me; if the suspicion become certainty, and the scrutiny end in
+condemnation,--believe at least that circumstances have carried me
+beyond my nature, and that under fairer auspices I might have been other
+than I am!"
+
+Lucy's tear dropped upon Clifford's hand as he spoke; and while his
+heart melted within him as he felt it and knew his own desperate and
+unredeemed condition, he added,--
+
+"Every one courts you,--the proud, the rich, the young, the
+high-born,--all are at your feet! You will select one of that number for
+your husband; may he watch over you as I would have done!--love you as
+I do he cannot! Yes, I repeat it," continued Clifford, vehemently,--"he
+cannot! None amidst the gay, happy, silken crowd of your equals and
+followers can feel for you that single and overruling passion which
+makes you to me what all combined--country, power, wealth, reputation,
+an honest name, peace, common safety, the quiet of the common air, alike
+the least blessing and the greatest-are to all others! Once more, may
+God in heaven watch over you and preserve you! I tear myself, on leaving
+you, from all that cheers or blesses or raises or might have saved me!
+Farewell!"
+
+The hand which Lucy had relinquished to her strange suitor was pressed
+ardently to his lips, dropped in the same instant, and she knew that she
+was once more alone.
+
+But Clifford, hurrying rapidly through the trees, made his way towards
+the nearest gate which led from Lord Mauleverer's domain; when he
+reached it, a crowd of the more elderly guests occupied the entrance,
+and one of these was a lady of such distinction that Mauleverer, in
+spite of his aversion to any superfluous exposure to the night air, had
+obliged himself to conduct her to her carriage. He was in a very ill
+humour with this constrained politeness, especially as the carriage was
+very slow in relieving him of his charge, when he saw, by the lamplight,
+Clifford passing near him, and winning his way to the gate. Quite
+forgetting his worldly prudence, which should have made him averse to
+scenes with any one, especially with a flying enemy, and a man with
+whom, if he believed aright, little glory was to be gained in conquest,
+much less in contest; and only remembering Clifford's rivalship, and
+his own hatred towards him for the presumption, Mauleverer, uttering a
+hurried apology to the lady on his arm, stepped forward, and opposing
+Clifford's progress, said, with a bow of tranquil insult, "Pardon me,
+sir, but is it at my invitation or that of one of my servants that you
+have honoured me with your company this day?"
+
+Clifford's thoughts at the time of this interruption were of that nature
+before which all petty misfortunes shrink into nothing; if, therefore,
+he started for a moment at the earl's address, he betrayed no
+embarrassment in reply, but bowing with an air of respect, and taking no
+notice of the affront implied in Mauleverer's speech, he answered,--
+
+"Your lordship has only to deign a glance at my dress to see that I have
+not intruded myself on your grounds with the intention of claiming your
+hospitality. The fact is, and I trust to your lordship's courtesy to
+admit the excuse, that I leave this neighbourhood to-morrow, and for
+some length of time. A person whom I was very anxious to see before I
+left was one of your lordship's guests; I heard this, and knew that
+I should have no other opportunity of meeting the person in question
+before my departure; and I must now throw myself on the well-known
+politeness of Lord Mauleverer to pardon a freedom originating in a
+business very much approaching to a necessity."
+
+Lord Mauleverer's address to Clifford had congregated an immediate crowd
+of eager and expectant listeners; but so quietly respectful and really
+gentlemanlike were Clifford's air and tone in excusing himself, that the
+whole throng were smitten with a sudden disappointment.
+
+Lord Mauleverer himself, surprised by the temper and deportment of the
+unbidden guest, was at a loss for one moment; and Clifford was about to
+take advantage of that moment and glide away, when Mauleverer, with a
+second bow, more civil than the former one, said,--
+
+"I cannot but be happy, sir, that my poor place has afforded you any
+convenience; but if I am not very impertinent, will you allow me to
+inquire the name of my guest with whom you required a meeting?"
+
+"My lord," said Clifford, drawing himself up and speaking gravely and
+sternly, though still with a certain deference, "I need not surely
+point out to your lordship's good sense and good feeling that your very
+question implies a doubt, and consequently an affront, and that the tone
+of it is not such as to justify that concession on my part which the
+further explanation you require would imply!"
+
+Few spoken sarcasms could be so bitter as that silent one which
+Mauleverer could command by a smile, and with this complimentary
+expression on his thin lips and raised brow, the earl answered: "Sir,
+I honour the skill testified by your reply; it must be the result of
+a profound experience in these affairs. I wish you, sir, a very good
+night; and the next time you favour me with a visit, I am quite sure
+that your motives for so indulging me will be no less creditable to you
+than at present."
+
+With these words Mauleverer turned to rejoin his fair charge. But
+Clifford was a man who had seen in a short time a great deal of the
+world, and knew tolerably well the theories of society, if not the
+practice of its minutiae; moreover, he was of an acute and resolute
+temper, and these properties of mind, natural and acquired, told him
+that he was now in a situation in which it had become more necessary
+to defy than to conciliate. Instead therefore of retiring he walked
+deliberately up to Mauleverer, and said,--
+
+"My lord, I shall leave it to the judgment of your guests to decide
+whether you have acted the part of a nobleman and a gentleman in thus,
+in your domains, insulting one who has given you such explanation of
+his trespass as would fully excuse him in the eyes of all considerate or
+courteous persons. I shall also leave it to them to decide whether the
+tone of your inquiry allowed me to give you any further apology. But
+I shall take it upon myself, my lord, to demand from you an immediate
+explanation of your last speech."
+
+"Insolent!" cried Mauleverer, colouring with indignation, and almost for
+the first time in his life losing absolute command over his temper; "do
+you bandy words with me? Begone, or I shall order my servants to thrust
+you forth!"
+
+"Begone, sir! begone!" cried several voices in echo to Mauleverer,
+from those persons who deemed it now high time to take part with the
+powerful.
+
+Clifford stood his ground, gazing around with a look of angry and
+defying contempt, which, joined to his athletic frame, his dark and
+fierce eye, and a heavy riding-whip, which, as if mechanically, he half
+raised, effectually kept the murmurers from proceeding to violence.
+
+"Poor pretender to breeding and to sense!" said he, disdainfully turning
+to Mauleverer; "with one touch of this whip I could shame you forever,
+or compel you to descend from the level of your rank to that of mine,
+and the action would be but a mild return to your language. But I love
+rather to teach you than to correct. According to my creed, my lord, he
+conquers most in good breeding who forbears the most,--scorn enables me
+to forbear! Adieu!"
+
+With this, Clifford turned on his heel and strode away. A murmur,
+approaching to a groan, from the younger or sillier part of the
+parasites (the mature and the sensible have no extra emotion to throw
+away), followed him as he disappeared.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+     Outlaw.  Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you!
+
+     Val.  Ruffians, forego that rude, uncivil touch!
+
+                                   The Two Gentlemen of Verona.
+
+On leaving the scene in which he had been so unwelcome a guest, Clifford
+hastened to the little inn where he had left his horse. He mounted
+and returned to Bath. His thoughts were absent, and he unconsciously
+suffered the horse to direct its course whither it pleased. This was
+naturally towards the nearest halting-place which the animal remembered;
+and this halting-place was at that illustrious tavern, in the suburbs of
+the town, in which we have before commemorated Clifford's re-election to
+the dignity of chief. It was a house of long-established reputation; and
+here news of any of the absent confederates was always to be obtained.
+This circumstance, added to the excellence of its drink, its ease, and
+the electric chain of early habits, rendered it a favourite haunt,
+even despite their present gay and modish pursuits, with Tomlinson and
+Pepper; and here, when Clifford sought the pair at unseasonable hours,
+was he for the most part sure to find them. As his meditations were
+interrupted by the sudden stopping of his horse beneath the well-known
+sign, Clifford, muttering an angry malediction on the animal, spurred it
+onward in the direction of his own home. He had already reached the end
+of the street, when his resolution seemed to change, and muttering
+to himself, "Ay, I might as well arrange this very night for our
+departure!" he turned his horse's head backward, and was once more at
+the tavern door. He threw the bridle over an iron railing, and knocking
+with a peculiar sound at the door, was soon admitted.
+
+"Are ------ and ------- here?" asked he of the old woman, as he entered,
+mentioning the cant words by which, among friends, Tomlinson and Pepper
+were usually known.
+
+"They are both gone on the sharps to-night," replied the old lady,
+lifting her unsnuffed candle to the face of the speaker with an
+intelligent look; "Oliver (the moon) is sleepy, and the lads will take
+advantage of his nap."
+
+"Do you mean," answered Clifford, replying in the same key, which
+we take the liberty to paraphrase, "that they are out on any actual
+expedition?"
+
+"To be sure," rejoined the dame. "They who lag late on the road may want
+money for supper!"
+
+"Ha! which road?"
+
+"You are a pretty fellow for captain!" rejoined the dame, with a
+good-natured sarcasm in her tone. "Why, Captain Gloak, poor fellow! knew
+every turn of his men to a hair, and never needed to ask what they were
+about. Ah, he was a fellow! none of your girl-faced mudgers, who make
+love to ladies, forsooth,--a pretty woman need not look far for a kiss
+when he was in the room, I warrant, however coarse her duds might be;
+and lauk! but the captain was a sensible man, and liked a cow as well as
+a calf."
+
+"So, so! on the road, are they?" cried Clifford, musingly, and without
+heeding the insinuated attack on his decorum. "But answer me, what is
+the plan? Be quick!"
+
+"Why," replied the dame, "there's some swell cove of a lord gives a
+blow-out to-day; and the lads, dear souls! think to play the queer on
+some straggler."
+
+Without uttering a word, Clifford darted from the house, and was
+remounted before the old lady had time to recover her surprise.
+
+"If you want to see them," cried she, as he put spurs to his horse,
+"they ordered me to have supper ready at------" The horse's hoofs
+drowned the last words of the dame; and carefully rebolting the door,
+and muttering an invidious comparison between Captain Clifford and
+Captain Gloak, the good landlady returned to those culinary operations
+destined to rejoice the hearts of Tomlinson and Pepper.
+
+Return we ourselves to Lucy. It so happened that the squire's carriage
+was the last to arrive; for the coachman, long uninitiated among the
+shades of Warlock into the dissipation of fashionable life, entered on
+his debut at Bath, with all the vigorous heat of matured passions for
+the first time released, into the festivities of the ale-house,
+and having a milder master than most of his comrades, the fear of
+displeasure was less strong in his aurigal bosom than the love of
+companionship; so that during the time this gentleman was amusing
+himself, Lucy had ample leisure for enjoying all the thousand-and-one
+reports of the scene between Mauleverer and Clifford which regaled
+her ears. Nevertheless, whatever might have been her feelings at these
+pleasing recitals, a certain vague joy predominated over all. A man
+feels but slight comparative happiness in being loved, if he know that
+it is in vain; but to a woman that simple knowledge is sufficient to
+destroy the memory of a thousand distresses, and it is not till she has
+told her heart again and again that she is loved, that she will even
+begin to ask if it be in vain.
+
+It was a partially starlight yet a dim and obscure night, for the moon
+had for the last hour or two been surrounded by mist and cloud, when at
+length the carriage arrived; and Mauleverer, for the second time that
+evening playing the escort, conducted Lucy to the vehicle. Anxious to
+learn if she had seen or been addressed by Clifford, the subtle earl,
+as he led her to the gate, dwelt particularly on the intrusion of that
+person, and by the trembling of the hand which rested on his arm, he
+drew no delicious omen for his own hopes. "However," thought he, "the
+man goes to-morrow, and then the field will be clear; the girl's a child
+yet, and I forgive her folly." And with an air of chivalric veneration,
+Mauleverer bowed the object of his pardon into her carriage.
+
+As soon as Lucy felt herself alone with her father, the emotions so long
+pent within her forced themselves into vent, is and leaning back against
+the carriage, she wept, though in silence, tears, burning tears, of
+sorrow, comfort, agitation, anxiety.
+
+The good old squire was slow in perceiving his daughter's emotion; it
+would have escaped him altogether, if, actuated by a kindly warming of
+the heart towards her, originating in his new suspicion of her love for
+Clifford, he had not put his arm round her neck; and this unexpected
+caress so entirely unstrung her nerves that Lucy at once threw herself
+upon her father's breast, and her weeping, hitherto so quiet, became
+distinct and audible.
+
+"Be comforted, my dear, dear child!" said the squire, almost affected
+to tears himself; and his emotion, arousing him from his usual mental
+confusion, rendered his words less involved and equivocal than they were
+wont to be. "And now I do hope that you won't vex yourself; the young
+man is indeed--and, I do assure you, I always thought so--a very
+charming gentleman, there's no denying it. But what can we do? You see
+what they all say of him, and it really was--we must allow that--very
+improper in him to come without being asked. Moreover, my dearest child,
+it is very wrong, very wrong indeed, to love any one, and not know who
+he is; and--and--but don't cry, my dear love, don't cry so; all will be
+very well, I am sure,--quite sure!"
+
+As he said this, the kind old man drew his daughter nearer him, and
+feeling his hand hurt by something she wore unseen which pressed against
+it, he inquired, with some suspicion that the love might have proceeded
+to love-gifts, what it was.
+
+"It is my mother's picture," said Lucy, simply, and putting it aside.
+
+The old squire had loved his wife tenderly; and when Lucy made this
+reply, all the fond and warm recollections of his youth rushed upon
+him. He thought, too, how earnestly on her death-bed that wife had
+recommended to his vigilant care their only child now weeping on his
+bosom: he remembered how, dwelling on that which to all women seems the
+grand epoch of life, she had said, "Never let her affections be trifled
+with,--never be persuaded by your ambitious brother to make her marry
+where she loves not, or to oppose her, without strong reason, where
+she does: though she be but a child now, I know enough of her to feel
+convinced that if ever she love, she will love too well for her own
+happiness, even with all things in her favour." These words, these
+recollections, joined to the remembrance of the cold-hearted scheme of
+William Brandon, which he had allowed himself to favour, and of his own
+supineness towards Lucy's growing love for Clifford, till resistance
+became at once necessary and too late, all smote him with a remorseful
+sorrow, and fairly sobbing himself, he said, "Thy mother, child! ah,
+would that she were living, she would never have neglected thee as I
+have done!"
+
+The squire's self-reproach made Lucy's tears cease on the instant;
+and as she covered her father's hands with kisses, she replied only
+by vehement accusations against herself, and praises of his too great
+fatherly fondness and affection. This little burst, on both sides, of
+honest and simple-hearted love ended in a silence full of tender and
+mingled thoughts; and as Lucy still clung to the breast of the old man,
+uncouth as he was in temper, below even mediocrity in intellect, and
+altogether the last person in age or mind or habit that seemed fit for a
+confidant in the love of a young and enthusiastic girl, she felt the
+old homely truth that under all disadvantages there are, in this hollow
+world, few in whom trust can be so safely reposed, few who so delicately
+and subtilely respect the confidence, as those from whom we spring.
+
+The father and daughter had been silent for some minutes, and the former
+was about to speak, when the carriage suddenly stopped. The squire heard
+a rough voice at the horses' heads; he looked forth from the window to
+see, through the mist of the night, what could possibly be the matter,
+and he encountered in this action, just one inch from his forehead, the
+protruded and shining barrel of a horse-pistol. We may believe, without
+a reflection on his courage, that Mr. Brandon threw himself back into
+his carriage with all possible despatch; and at the same moment the
+door was opened, and a voice said, not in a threatening but a smooth
+accent,--
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, I am sorry to disturb you, but want is imperious;
+oblige me with your money, your watches, your rings, and any other
+little commodities of a similar nature!"
+
+So delicate a request the squire had not the heart to resist, the
+more especially as he knew himself without any weapons of defence;
+accordingly he drew out a purse, not very full, it must be
+owned,--together with an immense silver hunting-watch, with a piece of
+black ribbon attached to it.
+
+"There, sir," said he, with a groan, "don't frighten the young lady."
+
+The gentle applicant, who indeed was no other than the specious Augustus
+Tomlinson, slid the purse into his waistcoat-pocket, after feeling its
+contents with a rapid and scientific finger.
+
+"Your watch, sir," quoth he,--and as he spoke he thrust it carelessly
+into his coat-pocket, as a school-boy would thrust a peg-top,--"is
+heavy; but trusting to experience, since an accurate survey is denied
+me, I fear it is more valuable from its weight than its workmanship:
+however, I will not wound your vanity by affecting to be fastidious. But
+surely the young lady, as you call her,--for I pay you the compliment of
+believing your word as to her age, inasmuch as the night is too dark
+to allow me the happiness of a personal inspection,--the young lady
+has surely some little trinket she can dispense with. 'Beauty when
+unadorned,' you know, etc."
+
+Lucy, who, though greatly frightened, lost neither her senses nor her
+presence of mind, only answered by drawing forth a little silk purse,
+that contained still less than the leathern convenience of the squire;
+to this she added a gold chain; and Tomlinson, taking them with an
+affectionate squeeze of the hand and a polite apology, was about to
+withdraw, when his sagacious eyes were suddenly stricken by the gleam
+of jewels. The fact was that in altering the position of her mother's
+picture, which had been set in the few hereditary diamonds possessed by
+the Lord of Warlock, Lucy had allowed it to hang on the outside of her
+dress, and bending forward to give the robber her other possessions,
+the diamonds at once came in full sight, and gleamed the more invitingly
+from the darkness of the night.
+
+"Ah, madam," said Tomlinson, stretching forth his hand, "you would play
+me false, would you? Treachery should never go unpunished. Favour me
+instantly with the little ornament round your neck!"
+
+"I cannot,--I cannot!" said Lucy, grasping her treasure with both her
+hands; "it is my mother's picture, and my mother is dead!"
+
+"The wants of others, madam," returned Tomlinson, who could not for the
+life of him rob immorally, "are ever more worthy your attention than
+family prejudices. Seriously, give it, and that instantly; we are in a
+hurry, and your horses are plunging like devils: they will break your
+carriage in an instant,--despatch!"
+
+The squire was a brave man on the whole, though no hero; and the nerves
+of an old fox-hunter soon recover from a little alarm. The picture of
+his buried wife was yet more inestimable to him than it was to Lucy, and
+at this new demand his spirit was roused within him.
+
+He clenched his fists, and advancing himself as it were on his seat, he
+cried in a loud voice,--
+
+"Begone, fellow! I have given you--for my own part I think so--too much
+already; and, by God, you shall not have the picture!"
+
+"Don't force me to use violence," said Augustus; and putting one foot on
+the carriage-step, he brought his pistol within a few inches of Lucy's
+breast, rightly judging, perhaps, that the show of danger to her
+would be the best method to intimidate the squire. At that instant the
+valorous moralist found himself suddenly seized with a powerful gripe
+on the shoulder; and a low voice, trembling with passion, hissed in his
+ear. Whatever might be the words that startled his organs, they operated
+as an instantaneous charm; and to their astonishment, the squire and
+Lucy beheld their assailant abruptly withdraw. The door of the carriage
+was clapped to, and scarcely two minutes had elapsed before, the robber
+having remounted, his comrade, hitherto stationed at the horses' heads,
+set spurs to his own steed, and the welcome sound of receding hoofs
+smote upon the bewildered ears of the father and daughter.
+
+The door of the carriage was again opened; and a voice, which made Lucy
+paler than the preceding terror, said,--
+
+"I fear, Mr. Brandon, the robbers have frightened your daughter. There
+is now, however, nothing to fear; the ruffians are gone."
+
+"God bless me!" said the squire; "why, is that Captain Clifford?"
+
+"It is; and he conceives himself too fortunate to have been of the
+smallest service to Mr. and Miss Brandon."
+
+On having convinced himself that it was indeed to Mr. Clifford that he
+owed his safety as well as that of his daughter, whom he believed to
+have been in a far more imminent peril than she really was,--for to tell
+thee the truth, reader, the pistol of Tomlinson was rather calculated
+for show than use, having a peculiarly long bright barrel with nothing
+in it,--the squire was utterly at a loss how to express his gratitude;
+and when he turned to Lucy to beg she would herself thank their gallant
+deliverer, he found that, overpowered with various emotions, she had,
+for the first time in her life, fainted away.
+
+"Good heavens!" cried the alarmed father, "she is dead,--my Lucy, my
+Lucy, they have killed her!"
+
+To open the door nearest to Lucy, to bear her from the carriage in his
+arms, was to Clifford the work of an instant. Utterly unconscious of the
+presence of any one else,--unconscious even of what he said, he poured
+forth a thousand wild, passionate, yet half-audible expressions; and as
+he bore her to a bank by the roadside, and seating himself supported
+her against his bosom, it would be difficult perhaps to say, whether
+something of delight--of burning and thrilling delight--was not mingled
+with his anxiety and terror. He chafed her small hands in his own; his
+breath, all trembling and warm, glowed upon her cheek; and once, and but
+once, his lips drew nearer, and breathing aside the dishevelled richness
+of her tresses, clung in a long and silent kiss to her own.
+
+Meanwhile, by the help of the footman, who had now somewhat recovered
+his astonished senses, the squire descended from his carriage, and
+approached with faltering steps the place where his daughter reclined.
+At the instant that he took her hand, Lucy began to revive; and the
+first action, in the bewildered unconsciousness of awaking, was to throw
+her arm around the neck of her supporter.
+
+Could all the hours and realities of hope, joy, pleasure, in Clifford's
+previous life have been melted down and concentrated into a single
+emotion, that emotion would have been but tame to the rapture of Lucy's
+momentary and innocent caress! And at a later yet no distant period,
+when in the felon's cell the grim visage of Death scowled upon him, it
+may be questioned whether his thoughts dwelt not far more often on
+the remembrance of that delightful moment than on the bitterness and
+ignominy of an approaching doom.
+
+"She breathes,--she moves,--she wakes!" cried the father; and Lucy,
+attempting to rise, and recognizing the squire's voice, said faintly,--
+
+"Thank God, my dear father, you are not hurt! And are they really
+gone?--and where--where are we?"
+
+The squire, relieving Clifford of his charge, folded his child in his
+arms, while in his own elucidatory manner he informed her where she was,
+and with whom. The lovers stood face to face to each other; but what
+delicious blushes did the night, which concealed all but the outline of
+their forms, hide from the eyes of Clifford!
+
+The honest and kind heart of Mr. Brandon was glad of a release to the
+indulgent sentiments it had always cherished towards the suspected and
+maligned Clifford, and turning now from Lucy, it fairly poured itself
+forth upon her deliverer. He grasped him warmly by the hand, and
+insisted upon his accompanying them to Bath in the carriage, and
+allowing the footman to ride his horse. This offer was still pending,
+when the footman, who had been to see after the health and comfort of
+his fellow-servant, came to inform the party, in a dolorous accent, of
+something which, in the confusion and darkness of the night, they had
+not yet learned,--namely, that the horses and coachman were gone!
+
+"Gone!" said the squire, "gone! Why, the villains can't (for my part,
+I never believe, though I have heard such wonders of, those sleight of
+hand) have bagged them!"
+
+Here a low groan was audible; and the footman, sympathetically guided to
+the spot whence it emanated, found the huge body of the coachman safely
+deposited, with its face downward, in the middle of the kennel. After
+this worthy had been lifted to his legs, and had shaken himself into
+intelligence, it was found that when the robber had detained the horses,
+the coachman, who required very little to conquer his more bellicose
+faculties, had--he himself said, by a violent blow from the ruffian,
+though, perhaps, the cause lay nearer home--quitted the coach-box for
+the kennel, the horses grew frightened, and after plunging and rearing
+till he cared no longer to occupy himself with their arrest, the
+highwayman had very quietly cut the traces, and by the time present,
+it was not impossible that the horses were almost at the door of their
+stables at Bath.
+
+The footman who had apprised the squire of this misfortune was,
+unlike most news-tellers, the first to offer consolation. "There be an
+excellent public," quoth he, "about a half a mile on, where your honour
+could get horses; or, mayhap, if Miss Lucy, poor heart, be faint, you
+may like to stop for the night."
+
+Though a walk of half a mile in a dark night and under other
+circumstances would not have seemed a grateful proposition, yet at
+present, when the squire's imagination had only pictured to him the
+alternatives of passing the night in the carriage or of crawling on foot
+to Bath, it seemed but a very insignificant hardship; and tucking his
+daughter's arm under his own, while in a kind voice he told Clifford "to
+support her on the other side," the squire ordered the footman to lead
+the way with Clifford's horse, and the coachman to follow or be d---d,
+whichever he pleased.
+
+In silence Clifford offered his arm to Lucy, and silently she accepted
+the courtesy. The squire was the only talker; and the theme he chose was
+not ungrateful to Lucy, for it was the praise of her lover. But Clifford
+scarcely listened, for a thousand thoughts and feelings contested within
+him; and the light touch of Lucy's hand upon his arm would alone have
+been sufficient to distract and confuse his attention. The darkness of
+the night, the late excitement, the stolen kiss that still glowed upon
+his lips, the remembrance of Lucy's flattering agitation in the scene
+with her at Lord Mauleverer's, the yet warmer one of that unconscious
+embrace, which still tingled through every nerve of his frame, all
+conspired with the delicious emotion which he now experienced at her
+presence and her contact to intoxicate and inflame him. Oh, those
+burning moments in love, when romance has just mellowed into passion,
+and without losing anything of its luxurious vagueness mingles the
+enthusiasm of its dreams with the ardent desires of reality and earth!
+That is the exact time when love has reached its highest point,--when
+all feelings, all thoughts, the whole soul, and the whole mind, are
+seized and engrossed,--when every difficulty weighed in the opposite
+scale seems lighter than dust,--when to renounce the object beloved is
+the most deadly and lasting sacrifice,--and when in so many breasts,
+where honour, conscience, virtue, are far stronger than we can believe
+them ever to have been in a criminal like Clifford, honour, conscience,
+virtue, have perished at once and suddenly into ashes before that mighty
+and irresistible fire.
+
+The servant, who had had previous opportunities of ascertaining the
+topography of the "public" of which he spake, and who was perhaps
+tolerably reconciled to his late terror in the anticipation of renewing
+his intimacy with "the spirits of the past," now directed the attention
+of our travellers to a small inn just before them. Mine host had not yet
+retired to repose, and it was not necessary to knock twice before the
+door was opened.
+
+A bright fire, an officious landlady, a commiserate landlord, a warm
+potation, and the promise of excellent beds, all appeared to our squire
+to make ample amends for the intelligence that the inn was not licensed
+to let post-horses; and mine host having promised forthwith to send
+two stout fellows, a rope, and a cart-horse to bring the carriage under
+shelter (for the squire valued the vehicle because it was twenty years
+old), and moreover to have the harness repaired, and the horses ready
+by an early hour the next day, the good humour of Mr. Brandon rose into
+positive hilarity. Lucy retired under the auspices of the landlady to
+bed; and the squire having drunk a bowl of bishop, and discovered a
+thousand new virtues in Clifford, especially that of never interrupting
+a good story, clapped the captain on the shoulder, and making him
+promise not to leave the inn till he had seen him again, withdrew
+also to the repose of his pillow. Clifford remained below, gazing
+abstractedly on the fire for some time afterwards; nor was it till the
+drowsy chambermaid had thrice informed him of the prepared comforts of
+his bed, that he adjourned to his chamber. Even then it seems that sleep
+did not visit his eyelids; for a wealthy grazier, who lay in the room
+below, complained bitterly the next morning of some person walking
+overhead "in all manner of strides, just for all the world like a
+happarition in boots."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+     Viola.  And dost thou love me?
+     Lysander....  Love thee, Viola?  Do I not fly thee when my
+     being drinks Light from thine eyes?--that flight is all my answer!
+
+                                        The Bride, Act ii. sc. 1.
+
+The curtain meditations of the squire had not been without the produce
+of a resolve. His warm heart at once reopened to the liking he had
+formerly conceived for Clifford; he longed for an opportunity to atone
+for his past unkindness, and to testify his present gratitude; moreover,
+he felt at once indignant at, and ashamed of, his late conduct in
+joining the popular, and, as he now fully believed, the causeless
+prepossession against his young friend, and before a more present and
+a stronger sentiment his habitual deference for his brother's counsels
+faded easily away. Coupled with these favourable feelings towards
+Clifford were his sagacious suspicions, or rather certainty, of Lucy's
+attachment to her handsome deliverer; and he had at least sufficient
+penetration to perceive that she was not likely to love him the less for
+the night's adventure. To all this was added the tender recollection of
+his wife's parting words; and the tears and tell-tale agitation of Lucy
+in the carriage were sufficient to his simple mind, which knew not how
+lightly maiden's tears are shed and dried, to confirm the prediction
+of the dear deceased. Nor were the squire's more generous and kindly
+feelings utterly unmixed with selfish considerations. Proud, but not
+the least ambitious, he was always more ready to confer an honour
+than receive one, and at heart he was secretly glad at the notion of
+exchanging, as a son-in-law, the polished and unfamiliar Mauleverer for
+the agreeable and social Clifford. Such in "admired disorder," were the
+thoughts which rolled through the teeming brain of Joseph Brandon; and
+before he had turned on his left side, which he always did preparatory
+to surrendering himself to slumber, the squire had fully come to a
+determination most fatal to the schemes of the lawyer and the hopes of
+the earl.
+
+The next morning, as Lucy was knitting
+
+               "The loose train of her amber-dropping hair"
+
+before the little mirror of her chamber, which even through its dimmed
+and darkened glass gave back a face which might have shamed a Grecian
+vision of Aurora, a gentle tap at her door announced her father.
+There was in his rosy and comely countenance that expression generally
+characteristic of a man pleased with himself, and persuaded that he is
+about to give pleasure.
+
+"My dear child," said the squire, fondly stroking down the luxuriance of
+his Lucy's hair, and kissing her damask cheek, "I am come to have some
+little conversation with you. Sit down now, and (for my part, I love
+to talk at my ease; and, by the by, shut the window, my love, it is
+an easterly wind) I wish that we may come to a clear and distinct
+understanding. Hem!--give me your hand, my child,--I think on these
+matters one can scarcely speak too precisely and to the purpose;
+although I am well aware (for, for my own part, I always wish to act
+to every one, to you especially, my dearest child, with the greatest
+consideration) that we must go to work with as much delicacy as
+conciseness. You know this Captain Clifford,--'t is a brave youth, is
+it not? Well--nay, never blush so deeply; there is nothing (for in these
+matters one can't have all one's wishes, one can't have everything) to
+be ashamed of! Tell me now, child, dost think he is in love with thee?"
+
+If Lucy did not immediately answer by words, her pretty lips moved as if
+she could readily reply; and finally they settled into so sweet and
+so assured a smile that the squire, fond as he was of "precise"
+information, was in want of no fuller answer to his question.
+
+"Ay, ay, young lady," said he, looking at her with all a father's
+affection, "I see how it is. And, come now, what do you turn away for?
+Dost think, if, as I believe, though there are envious persons in
+the world, as there always are when a man's handsome or clever or
+brave,--though, by the way, which is a very droll thing in my eyes, they
+don't envy, at least not ill-naturedly, a man for being a lord or rich,
+but, quite on the contrary, rank and money seem to make them think one
+has all the cardinal virtues. Humph! If, I say, this Mr. Clifford should
+turn out to be a gentleman of family,--for you know that is essential,
+since the Brandons have, as my brother has probably told you, been a
+great race many centuries ago,--dost think, my child, that thou couldst
+give up (the cat is out of the bag) this old lord, and marry a simple
+gentleman?"
+
+The hand which the squire had held was now with an arch tenderness
+applied to his mouth, and when he again seized it Lucy hid her glowing
+face in his bosom; and it was only by a whisper, as if the very air was
+garrulous, that he could draw forth (for now he insisted on a verbal
+reply) her happy answer.
+
+We are not afraid that our reader will blame us for not detailing the
+rest of the interview between the father and daughter: it did not last
+above an hour longer; for the squire declared that, for his own part,
+he hated more words than were necessary. Mr. Brandon was the first to
+descend to the breakfast, muttering as he descended the stairs, "Well
+now, hang me if I am not glad that's off (for I do not like to think
+much of so silly a matter) my mind. And as for my brother, I sha' n't
+tell him till it's all over and settled. And if he is angry, he and the
+old lord may, though I don't mean to be unbrotherly, go to the devil
+together!"
+
+When the three were assembled at the breakfast-table, there could not,
+perhaps, have been found anywhere a stronger contrast than that which
+the radiant face of Lucy bore to the haggard and worn expression that
+disfigured the handsome features of her lover. So marked was the change
+that one night seemed to have wrought upon Clifford, that even the
+squire was startled and alarmed at it. But Lucy, whose innocent vanity
+pleased itself with accounting for the alteration, consoled herself
+with the hope of soon witnessing a very different expression on the
+countenance of her lover; and though she was silent, and her happiness
+lay quiet and deep within her, yet in her eyes and lip there was that
+which seemed to Clifford an insult to his own misery, and stung him to
+the heart. However, he exerted himself to meet the conversation of the
+squire, and to mask as well as he was able the evidence of the conflict
+which still raged within him.
+
+The morning was wet and gloomy; it was that drizzling and misty rain
+which is so especially nutritious to the growth of blue devils, and
+the jolly squire failed not to rally his young friend upon his feminine
+susceptibility to the influences of the weather. Clifford replied
+jestingly; and the jest, if bad, was good enough to content the railer.
+In this facetious manner passed the time, till Lucy, at the request of
+her father, left the room to prepare for their return home.
+
+Drawing his chair near to Clifford's, the squire then commenced in
+real and affectionate earnest his operations--these he had already
+planned--in the following order: they were first, to inquire into and
+to learn Clifford's rank, family, and prospects; secondly, having
+ascertained the proprieties of the outer man, they were to examine the
+state of the inner one; and thirdly, should our skilful inquirer find
+his guesses at Clifford's affection for Lucy confirmed, they were to
+expel the modest fear of a repulse, which the squire allowed was natural
+enough, and to lead the object of the inquiry to a knowledge of the
+happiness that, Lucy consenting, might be in store for him. While, with
+his wonted ingenuity, the squire was pursuing his benevolent designs,
+Lucy remained in her own room, in such meditation and such dreams as
+were natural to a heart so sanguine and enthusiastic.
+
+She had been more than half an hour alone, when the chambermaid of the
+hostelry knocked at her door, and delivered a message from the squire,
+begging her to come down to him in the parlour. With a heart that beat
+so violently it almost seemed to wear away its very life, Lucy slowly
+and with tremulous steps descended to the parlour. On opening the door
+she saw Clifford standing in the recess of the window; his face was
+partly turned from her, and his eyes downcast. The good old squire sat
+in an elbow-chair, and a sort of puzzled and half-satisfied complacency
+gave expression to his features.
+
+"Come hither, child," said he, clearing his throat; "Captain
+Clifford--ahem!--has done you the honour to--and I dare say you will be
+very much surprised--not that, for my own part, I think there is much to
+wonder at in it, but such may be my partial opinion (and it is certainly
+very natural in me)--to make you a declaration of love. He declares,
+moreover, that he is the most miserable of men, and that he would die
+sooner than have the presumption to hope. Therefore you see, my love, I
+have sent for you, to give him permission to destroy himself in any way
+he pleases; and I leave him to show cause why (it is a fate that sooner
+or later happens to all his fellowmen) sentence of death should not be
+passed against him." Having delivered this speech with more propriety of
+word than usually fell to his share, the squire rose hastily and hobbled
+out of the room.
+
+Lucy sank into the chair her father had quitted; and Clifford,
+approaching towards her, said in a hoarse and low voice,--
+
+"Your father, Miss Brandon, says rightly, that I would die rather than
+lift my eyes in hope to you. I thought yesterday that I had seen you for
+the last time; chance, not my own folly or presumption, has brought me
+again before you; and even the few hours I have passed under the same
+roof with you have made me feel as if my love, my madness, had never
+reached its height till now. Oh, Lucy!" continued Clifford, in a more
+impassioned tone, and, as if by a sudden and irresistible impulse,
+throwing himself at her feet, "if I could hope to merit you,--if I could
+hope to raise myself,--if I could--But no, no, no! I am cut off from all
+hope, and forever!"
+
+There was so deep, so bitter, so heartfelt an anguish and remorse in the
+voice with which these last words were spoken, that Lucy, hurried
+off her guard, and forgetting everything in wondering sympathy and
+compassion, answered, extending her hand towards Clifford, who, still
+kneeling, seized and covered it with kisses of fire,--
+
+"Do not speak thus, Mr. Clifford; do not accuse yourself of what I am
+sure, quite sure, you cannot deserve. Perhaps--forgive me--your birth,
+your fortune, are beneath your merits, and you have penetrated into my
+father's weakness on the former point; or perhaps you yourself have not
+avoided all the errors into which men are hurried,--perhaps you have
+been imprudent or thoughtless, perhaps you have (fashion is contagious)
+played beyond your means or incurred debts: these are faults, it is
+true, and to be regretted, yet surely not irreparable."
+
+For that instant can it be wondered that all Clifford's resolution and
+self-denial deserted him, and lifting his eyes, radiant with joy and
+gratitude, to the face which bent in benevolent innocence towards him,
+he exclaimed,--
+
+"No, Miss Brandon!--no, Lucy!--dear, angel Lucy! my faults are less
+venial than these, but perhaps they are no less the consequence of
+circumstances and contagion; perhaps it may not be too late to repair
+them. Would you--you indeed deign to be my guardian, I might not despair
+of being saved!"
+
+"If," said Lucy, blushing deeply and looking down, while she spoke
+quick and eagerly, as if to avoid humbling him by her offer,--"if, Mr.
+Clifford, the want of wealth has in any way occasioned you uneasiness
+or--or error, do believe me--I mean us--so much your friends as not for
+an instant to scruple in relieving us of some little portion of our last
+night's debt to you."
+
+"Dear, noble girl!" said Clifford, while there writhed upon his lips
+one of those smiles of powerful sarcasm that sometimes distorted his
+features, and thrillingly impressed upon Lucy a resemblance to one very
+different in reputation and character to her lover,--"do not attribute
+my misfortunes to so petty a source; it is not money that I shall want
+while I live, though I shall to my last breath remember this delicacy in
+you, and compare it with certain base remembrances in my own mind. Yes!
+all past thoughts and recollections will make me hereafter worship you
+even more than I do now; while in your heart they will--unless Heaven
+grant me one prayer--make you scorn and detest me!"
+
+"For mercy's sake, do not speak thus!" said Lucy, gazing in indistinct
+alarm upon the dark and working features of her lover. "Scorn, detest
+you! Impossible! How could I, after the remembrance of last night?"
+
+"Ay! of last night," said Clifford, speaking through his ground
+teeth,--"there is much in that remembrance to live long in both of us;
+but you--you--fair angel" (and all harshness and irony vanishing at once
+from his voice and countenance, yielded to a tender and deep sadness,
+mingled with a respect that bordered on reverence),--"you never could
+have dreamed of more than pity for one like me,--you never could have
+stooped from your high and dazzling purity to know for me one such
+thought as that which burns at my heart for you,--you--Yes, withdraw
+your hand, I am not worthy to touch it!" And clasping his own hands
+before his face, he became abruptly silent; but his emotions were but
+ill-concealed, and Lucy saw the muscular frame before her heaved and
+convulsed by passions which were more intense and rending because it was
+only for a few moments that they conquered his self-will and struggled
+into vent.
+
+If afterwards, but long afterwards, Lucy, recalling the mystery of his
+words, confessed to herself that they betrayed guilt, she was then too
+much affected to think of anything but her love and his emotion. She
+bent down, and with a girlish and fond self-abandonment which none could
+have resisted, placed both her hands on his. Clifford started, looked
+up, and in the next moment he had clasped her to his heart; and while
+the only tears he had shed since his career of crime fell fast and hot
+upon her countenance, he kissed her forehead, her cheek, her lips in a
+passionate and wild transport. His voice died within him,--he could
+not trust himself to speak; only one thought, even in that seeming
+forgetfulness of her and of himself, stirred and spoke at his
+breast,--flight. The more he felt he loved, the more tender and the more
+confiding the object of his love, the more urgent became the necessity
+to leave her. All other duties had been neglected, but he loved with a
+real love; and love, which taught him one duty, bore him triumphantly
+through its bitter ordeal.
+
+"You will hear from me to-night," he muttered; "believe that I am mad,
+accursed, criminal, but not utterly a monster! I ask no more merciful
+opinion!" He drew himself from his perilous position, and abruptly
+departed.
+
+When Clifford reached his home, he found his worthy coadjutors waiting
+for him with alarm and terror on their countenances. An old feat, in
+which they had signalized themselves, had long attracted the rigid
+attention of the police, and certain officers had now been seen at Bath,
+and certain inquiries had been set on foot, which portended no good
+to the safety of the sagacious Tomlinson and the valorous Pepper. They
+came, humbly and penitentially demanding pardon for their unconscious
+aggression of the squire's carriage, and entreating their captain's
+instant advice. If Clifford had before wavered in his disinterested
+determination,--if visions of Lucy, of happiness, and reform had
+floated in his solitary ride too frequently and too glowingly before
+his eyes,--the sight of these men, their conversation, their danger, all
+sufficed to restore his resolution. "Merciful God!" thought he, "and is
+it to the comrade of such lawless villains, to a man, like them, exposed
+hourly to the most ignominious of deaths, that I have for one section
+of a moment dreamed of consigning the innocent and generous girl, whose
+trust or love is the only crime that could deprive her of the most
+brilliant destiny?"
+
+Short were Clifford's instructions to his followers, and so much do we
+do mechanically, that they were delivered with his usual forethought and
+precision. "You will leave the town instantly; go not, for your lives,
+to London, or to rejoin any of your comrades. Ride for the Red Cave;
+provisions are stored there, and, since our late alteration of the
+interior, it will afford ample room to conceal your horses. On the night
+of the second day from this I will join you. But be sure that you enter
+the cave at night, and quit it upon no account till I come!"
+
+"Yes!" said he, when he was alone, "I will join you again, but only to
+quit you. One more offence against the law, or at least one sum wrested
+from the swollen hands of the rich sufficient to equip me for a foreign
+army, and I quit the country of my birth and my crimes. If I cannot
+deserve Lucy Brandon, I will be somewhat less unworthy. Perhaps--why
+not? I am young, my nerves are not weak, my brain is not dull,--perhaps
+I may in some field of honourable adventure win a name that before my
+death-bed I may not blush to acknowledge to her!"
+
+While this resolve beat high within Clifford's breast, Lucy sadly and
+in silence was continuing with the squire her short journey to Bath. The
+latter was very inquisitive to know why Clifford had gone, and what he
+had avowed; and Lucy, scarcely able to answer, threw everything on the
+promised letter of the night.
+
+"I am glad," muttered the squire to her, "that he is going to write;
+for, somehow or other, though I questioned him very tightly, he slipped
+through my cross-examination, and bursting out at once as to his love
+for you, left me as wise about himself as I was before: no doubt (for
+my own part I don't see what should prevent his being a great man
+incog.)this letter will explain all!"
+
+Late that night the letter came. Lucy, fortunately for her, was alone in
+her room; she opened it, and read as follows:--
+
+                            CLIFFORD'S LETTER.
+
+     I have promised to write to you, and I sit down to perform that
+     promise.  At this moment the recollection of your goodness, your
+     generous consideration, is warm within me: and while I must choose
+     calm and common words to express what I ought to say, my heart is
+     alternately melted and torn by thoughts which would ask words, oh
+     how different!  Your father has questioned me often of my parentage
+     and birth,--I have hitherto eluded his interrogatories.  Learn now
+     who I am.  In a wretched abode, surrounded by the inhabitants of
+     poverty and vice, I recall my earliest recollections.  My father is
+     unknown to me as to every one; my mother,--to you I dare not mention
+     who or what she was,--she died in my infancy.  Without a name, but
+     not without an inheritance (my inheritance was large,--it was
+     infamy!), I was thrown upon the world.  I had received by accident
+     some education, and imbibed some ideas not natural to my situation;
+     since then I have played many parts in life.  Books and men I have
+     not so neglected but that I have gleaned at intervals some little
+     knowledge from both.  Hence, if I have seemed to you better than I
+     am, you will perceive the cause.  Circumstances made me soon my own
+     master; they made me also one whom honest men do not love to look
+     upon; my deeds have been, and my character is, of a par with my
+     birth and my fortunes.  I came, in the noble hope to raise and
+     redeem myself by gilding my fate with a wealthy marriage, to this
+     city.  I saw you, whom I had once before met.  I heard you were
+     rich.  Hate me, Miss Brandon, hate me!--I resolved to make your ruin
+     the cause of my redemption.  Happily for you, I scarcely knew you
+     before I loved you; that love deepened,--it caught something pure
+     and elevated from yourself.  My resolution forsook me; even now I
+     could throw myself on my knees and thank God that you--you, dearest
+     and noblest of human beings--are not my wife.  Now, is my conduct
+     clear to you?  If not, imagine me all that is villanous, save in one
+     point, where you are concerned, and not a shadow of mystery will
+     remain.  Your kind father, overrating the paltry service I rendered
+     you, would have consented to submit my fate to your decision.  I
+     blush indignantly for him--for you--that any living man should have
+     dreamed of such profanation for Miss Brandon.  Yet I myself was
+     carried away and intoxicated by so sudden and so soft a hope,--even
+     I dared to lift my eyes to you, to press you to this guilty heart,
+     to forget myself, and to dream that you might be mine!  Can you
+     forgive me for this madness?  And hereafter, when in your lofty and
+     glittering sphere of wedded happiness, can you remember my
+     presumption and check your scorn?  Perhaps you think that by so late
+     a confession I have already deceived you.  Alas! you know not what
+     it costs me now to confess!  I had only one hope in life,--it was
+     that you might still, long after you had ceased to see me, fancy me
+     not utterly beneath the herd with whom you live.  This burning yet
+     selfish vanity I tear from me, and now I go where no hope can pursue
+     me.  No hope for myself, save one which can scarcely deserve the
+     name, for it is rather a rude and visionary wish than an
+     expectation,--it is that under another name and under different
+     auspices you may hear of me at some distant time; and when I apprise
+     you that under that name you may recognize one who loves you better
+     than all created things, you may feel then, at least, no cause for
+     shame at your lover.  What will you be then?  A happy wife, a
+     mother, the centre of a thousand joys, beloved, admired, blest when
+     the eye sees you and the ear hears!  And this is what I ought to
+     hope, this is the consolation that ought to cheer me; perhaps a
+     little time hence it will.  Not that I shall love you less, but that
+     I shall love you less burningly, and therefore less selfishly.  I
+     have now written to you all that it becomes you to receive from me.
+     My horse waits below to bear me from this city, and forever from
+     your vicinity.  For ever!---ay, you are the only blessing forever
+     forbidden me.  Wealth I may gain, a fair name, even glory I may
+     perhaps aspire to,--to heaven itself I may find a path; but of you
+     my very dreams cannot give me the shadow of a hope.  I do not say,
+     if you could pierce my soul while I write, that you would pity me.
+     You may think it strange, but I would not have your pity for worlds;
+     I think I would even rather have your hate,--pity seems so much like
+     contempt.  But if you knew what an effort has enabled me to tame
+     down my language, to curb my thoughts, to prevent me from embodying
+     that which now makes my brain whirl, and my hand feel as if the
+     living fire consumed it; if you knew what has enabled me to triumph
+     over the madness at my heart, and spare you what, if writ or spoken,
+     would seem like the ravings of insanity, you would not and you could
+     not despise me, though you might abhor.
+
+     And now Heaven guard and bless you!  Nothing on earth could injure
+     you.  And even the wicked who have looked upon you learn to pray,--I
+     have prayed for you!
+
+Thus, abrupt and signatureless, ended the expected letter. Lucy came
+down the next morning at her usual hour, and, except that she was
+very pale, nothing in her appearance seemed to announce past grief or
+emotion. The squire asked her if she had received the promised letter.
+She answered, in a clear though faint voice, that she had,--that Mr.
+Clifford had confessed himself of too low an origin to hope for marriage
+with Mr. Brandon's family; that she trusted the squire would keep his
+secret; and that the subject might never again be alluded to by
+either. If in this speech there was something alien to Lucy's ingenuous
+character, and painful to her mind, she felt it as it were a duty to
+her former lover not to betray the whole of that confession so bitterly
+wrung from him. Perhaps, too, there was in that letter a charm which
+seemed to her too sacred to be revealed to any one; and mysteries were
+not excluded even from a love so ill-placed and seemingly so transitory
+as hers.
+
+Lucy's answer touched the squire in his weak point. "A man of
+decidedly low origin," he confessed, "was utterly out of the question;
+nevertheless, the young man showed a great deal of candour in his
+disclosure." He readily promised never to broach a subject necessarily
+so unpleasant; and though he sighed as he finished his speech, yet the
+extreme quiet of Lucy's manner reassured him; and when he perceived that
+she resumed, though languidly, her wonted avocations, he felt but little
+doubt of her soon overcoming the remembrance of what he hoped was but a
+girlish and fleeting fancy. He yielded, with avidity, to her proposal
+to return to Warlock; and in the same week as that in which Lucy
+had received her lover's mysterious letter, the father and daughter
+commenced their journey home.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+          Butler.  What are these, sir?
+
+          Yeoman.  And of what nature, to what use?
+
+          Latroc.  Imagine.
+                                        The Tragedy of Rollo.
+
+          Quickly.  He's in Arthur's bosom, if ever man went
+          to Arthur's bosom.
+                                        Henry V.
+
+The stream of our narrative now conducts us back to William Brandon. The
+law-promotions previously intended were completed; and to the surprise
+of the public, the envied barrister, undergoing the degradation of
+knighthood, had, at the time we return to him, just changed his toilsome
+occupations for the serene dignity of the bench. Whatever regret this
+wily and aspiring schemer might otherwise have felt at an elevation
+considerably less distinguished than he might reasonably have
+expected, was entirely removed by the hopes afforded to him of a speedy
+translation to a more brilliant office: it was whispered among those
+not unlikely to foresee such events, that the interest of the government
+required his talents in the house of peers. Just at this moment, too,
+the fell disease, whose ravages Brandon endeavoured, as jealously as
+possible, to hide from the public, had appeared suddenly to yield to the
+skill of a new physician; and by the administration of medicines which a
+man less stern or resolute might have trembled to adopt (so powerful and
+for the most part deadly was their nature), he passed from a state of
+almost insufferable torture to an elysium of tranquillity and ease.
+Perhaps, however, the medicines which altered also decayed his
+constitution; and it was observable that in two cases where the
+physician had attained a like success by the same means, the patients
+had died suddenly, exactly at the time when their cure seemed to be
+finally completed. However, Sir William Brandon appeared very little
+anticipative of danger. His manner became more cheerful and even than
+it had ever been before; there was a certain lightness in his gait, a
+certain exhilaration in his voice and eye, which seemed the tokens of
+one from whom a heavy burden had been suddenly raised, and who was no
+longer prevented from the eagerness of hope by the engrossing claims of
+a bodily pain. He had always been bland in society, but now his
+courtesy breathed less of artifice,--it took a more hearty tone. Another
+alteration was discernible in him, and that was precisely the reverse of
+what might have been expected. He became more thrifty, more attentive
+to the expenses of life than he had been. Though a despiser of show and
+ostentation, and far too hard to be luxurious, he was too scientific an
+architect of the weaknesses of others not to have maintained during
+his public career an opulent appearance and a hospitable table. The
+profession he had adopted requires, perhaps, less of externals to aid it
+than any other; still Brandon had affected to preserve parliamentary as
+well as legal importance; and though his house was situated in a quarter
+entirely professional, he had been accustomed to assemble around his
+hospitable board all who were eminent, in his political party, for rank
+or for talent. Now, however, when hospitality and a certain largeness of
+expenses better became his station, he grew closer and more exact in his
+economy. Brandon never could have degenerated into a miser; money, to
+one so habitually wise as he was, could never have passed from means
+into an object; but he had evidently, for some cause or another, formed
+the resolution to save. Some said it was the result of returning health,
+and the hope of a prolonged life, to which many objects for which wealth
+is desirable might occur. But when it was accidentally ascertained that
+Brandon had been making several inquiries respecting a large estate in
+the neighbourhood of Warlock, formerly in the possession of his family,
+the gossips (for Brandon was a man to be gossiped about) were no longer
+in want of a motive, false or real, for the judge's thrift.
+
+It was shortly after his elevation to the bench, and ere these signs of
+change had become noticeable, that the same strange ragamuffin whom
+we have mentioned before, as introduced by Mr. Swoppem to a private
+conference with Brandon, was admitted to the judge's presence.
+
+"Well," said Brandon, impatiently, the moment the door was closed, "your
+news?"
+
+"Vy, your 'onor," said the man, bashfully, twirling a thing that stood
+proxy for a hat, "I thinks as 'ow I shall be hable to satisfy your
+vorship's 'onor.'!" Then, approaching the judge and assuming an
+important air, he whispered, "'T is as 'ow I thought!"
+
+"My God!" cried Brandon, with vehemence. "And he is alive,--and where?"
+
+"I believes," answered the seemly confidant of Sir William Brandon,
+"that he be's alive; and if he be's alive, may I flash my ivories in a
+glass case, if I does not ferret him out; but as to saying vhere he be
+at this nick o' the moment, smash me if I can!"
+
+"Is he in this country," said Brandon; "or do you believe that he has
+gone abroad?"
+
+"Vy, much of one and not a little of the other!" said the euphonious
+confidant.
+
+"How! speak plain, man; what do you mean?"
+
+"Vy, I means, your 'oner, that I can't say vhere he is."
+
+"And this," said Brandon, with a muttered oath,--"this is your boasted
+news, is it? Dog! damned, damned dog! if you trifle with me or play me
+false, I will hang you,--by the living God, I will!"
+
+The man shrank back involuntarily from Brandon's vindictive forehead
+and kindled eyes; but with the cunning peculiar to low vice, answered,
+though in a humbler tone,--
+
+"And vet good vill that do your 'oner? If so be as how you scrags I,
+will that put your vorship in the vay of finding he?"
+
+Never was there an obstacle in grammar through which a sturdy truth
+could not break; and Brandon, after a moody pause, said in a milder
+voice,--
+
+"I did not mean to frighten you! Never mind what I said; but you can
+surely guess whereabouts he is, or what means of life he pursues.
+Perhaps,"--and a momentary paleness crossed Brandon's swarthy
+visage,--"perhaps he may have been driven into dishonesty in order to
+maintain himself!"
+
+The informant replied with great naivete that such a thing was not
+impossible! And Brandon then entered into a series of seemingly careless
+but artful cross-questionings, which either the ignorance or the craft
+of the man enabled him to baffle. After some time Brandon, disappointed
+and dissatisfied, gave up his professional task; and bestowing on the
+man many sagacious and minute instructions as well as a very liberal
+donation, he was forced to dismiss his mysterious visitor, and to
+content himself with an assured assertion that if the object of his
+inquiries should not already be gone to the devil, the strange gentleman
+employed to discover him would certainly, sooner or later, bring him to
+the judge.
+
+This assertion, and the interview preceding it, certainly inspired Sir
+William Brandon with a feeling like complacency, although it was mingled
+with a considerable alloy.
+
+"I do not," thought he, concluding his meditations when he was left
+alone,--"I do not see what else I can do! Since it appears that the boy
+had not even a name when he set out alone from his wretched abode,
+I fear that an advertisement would have but little chance of even
+designating, much less of finding him, after so long an absence.
+Besides, it might make me the prey to impostors; and in all probability
+he has either left the country, or adopted some mode of living which
+would prevent his daring to disclose himself!" This thought plunged the
+soliloquist into a gloomy abstraction, which lasted several minutes, and
+from which he started, muttering aloud,--
+
+"Yes, yes! I dare to believe, to hope it. Now for the minister and the
+peerage!" And from that time the root of Sir William Brandon's ambition
+spread with a firmer and more extended grasp over his mind.
+
+We grieve very much that the course of our story should now oblige us to
+record an event which we would willingly have spared ourselves the pain
+of narrating. The good old Squire of Warlock Manor-house had scarcely
+reached his home on his return from Bath, before William Brandon
+received the following letter from his brother's gray-headed butler:--
+
+     HONNURED SUR,--I send this with all speede, thof with a hevy bart,
+     to axquainte you with the sudden (and it is feered by his loving
+     friends and well-wishers, which latter, to be sur, is all as knows
+     him) dangeros ilness of the Squire.  He was seezed, poor deer
+     gentleman (for God never made a better, no offence to your Honnur),
+     the moment he set footing in his Own Hall, and what has hung rond me
+     like a millston ever sin, is that instead of his saying, "How do you
+     do, Sampson?" as was his wont, whenever he returned from forren
+     parts, sich as Bath, Lunnun, and the like, he said, "God bless you,
+     Sampson!" which makes me think sumhow that it will be his last
+     wurds; for he has never spoke sin, for all Miss Lucy be by his
+     bedside continual.  She, poor deer, don't take on at all, in regard
+     of crying and such woman's wurk, but looks nevertheless, for all the
+     wurld, just like a copse.  I sends Tom the postilion with this
+     hexpress, nowing he is a good hand at a gallop, having, not sixteen
+     years ago, beat some o' the best on 'un at a raceng.  Hoping as yer
+     Honnur will lose no time in coming to this "house of mourning," I
+     remane, with all respect,
+                         Your Honnur's humble servant to command,
+                                                       JOHN SAMPSON.
+
+     [The reader, who has doubtless noticed how invariably servants of
+     long standing acquire a certain tone from that of their master, may
+     observe that honest John Sampson had caught from the squire the
+     habit of parenthetical composition.]
+
+Sir William Brandon did not give himself time to re-read this letter,
+in order to make it more intelligible, before he wrote to one of his
+professional compeers, requesting him to fill his place during his
+unavoidable absence, on the melancholy occasion of his brother's
+expected death; and having so done, he immediately set off for Warlock.
+Inexplicable even to himself was that feeling, so nearly approaching to
+real sorrow, which the worldly lawyer felt at the prospect of losing his
+guileless and unspeculating brother. Whether it be that turbulent and
+ambitious minds, in choosing for their wavering affections the very
+opposites of themselves, feel (on losing the fellowship of those calm,
+fair characters that have never crossed their rugged path) as if they
+lost, in losing them, a kind of haven for their own restless thoughts
+and tempest-worn designs!--be this as it may, certain it is that when
+William Brandon arrived at his brother's door, and was informed by
+the old butler, who for the first time was slow to greet him, that the
+squire had just breathed his last, his austere nature forsook him at
+once, and he felt the shock with a severity perhaps still keener than
+that which a more genial and affectionate heart would have experienced.
+
+As soon as he had recovered his self-possession, Sir William made
+question of his niece; and finding that after an unrelaxing watch during
+the whole of the squire's brief illness, nature had failed her at his
+death, and she had been borne senseless from his chamber to her own,
+Brandon walked with a step far different from his usual stately gait to
+the room where his brother lay. It was one of the oldest apartments
+in the house, and much of the ancient splendour that belonged to
+the mansion ere its size had been reduced, with the fortunes of its
+successive owners, still distinguished the chamber. The huge mantelpiece
+ascending to the carved ceiling in grotesque pilasters, and scroll-work
+of the blackest oak, with the quartered arms of Brandon and Saville
+escutcheoned in the centre; the panelled walls of the same dark
+wainscot; the armorie of ebony; the high-backed chairs, with their
+tapestried seats; the lofty bed, with its hearse-like plumes and
+draperies of a crimson damask that seemed, so massy was the substance
+and so prominent the flowers, as if it were rather a carving than a
+silk,--all conspired with the size of the room to give it a feudal
+solemnity, not perhaps suited to the rest of the house, but well
+calculated to strike a gloomy awe into the breast of the worldly and
+proud man who now entered the death-chamber of his brother.
+
+Silently William Brandon motioned away the attendants, and silently he
+seated himself by the bed, and looked long and wistfully upon the calm
+and placid face of the deceased. It is difficult to guess at what passed
+within him during the space of time in which he remained alone in that
+room. The apartment itself he could not at another period have tenanted
+without secret emotion. It was that in which, as a boy, he had himself
+been accustomed to sleep; and, even then a schemer and an aspirant, the
+very sight of the room sufficed to call back all the hopes and visions,
+the restless projects and the feverish desires, which had now brought
+him to the envied state of an acknowledged celebrity and a shattered
+frame. There must have been something awful in the combination of those
+active remembrances with the cause which had led him to that apartment;
+and there was a homily in the serene countenance of the dead, which
+preached more effectually to the heart of the living than William
+Brandon would ever have cared to own. He had been more than an hour in
+the room, and the evening had already begun to cast deep shadows through
+the small panes of the half-closed window, when Brandon was startled by
+a slight noise. He looked up, and beheld Lucy opposite to him. She did
+not see him; but throwing herself upon the bed, she took the cold hand
+of the deceased, and after a long silence burst into a passion of tears.
+
+"My father!" she sobbed,--"my kind, good father! who will love me now?"
+
+"I!" said Brandon, deeply affected; and passing round the bed, he took
+his niece in his arms: "I will be your father, Lucy, and you--the last
+of our race--shall be to me as a daughter!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+          Falsehood in him was not the useless lie
+          Of boasting pride or laughing vanity:
+          It was the gainful, the persuading art, etc.
+
+                                        CRABBE.
+
+          On with the horses--off to Canterbury,
+          Tramp, tramp o'er pebble, and splash, splash thro' puddle;
+          Hurrah! how swiftly speeds the post so merry!
+           ...............
+          "Here laws are all inviolate: none lay
+          Traps for the traveller; every highway's clear;
+          Here--" he was interrupted by a knife,
+          With "D---your eyes! your money or your life!"
+
+                                        Don Juan.
+
+Misfortunes are like the creations of Cadmus,--they destroy one another!
+Roused from the torpor of mind occasioned by the loss of her lover at
+the sudden illness of the squire, Lucy had no thought for herself, no
+thought for any one, for anything but her father, till long after the
+earth had closed over his remains. The very activity of the latter grief
+was less dangerous than the quiet of the former; and when the first
+keenness of sorrow passed away, and her mind gradually and mechanically
+returned to the remembrance of Clifford, it was with an intensity less
+strong, and less fatal to her health and happiness than before. She
+thought it unnatural and criminal to allow anything else to grieve her,
+while she had so sacred a grief as that of her loss; and her mind, once
+aroused into resistance to passion, betrayed a native strength little to
+have been expected from her apparent character. Sir William Brandon
+lost no time in returning to town after the burial of his brother.
+He insisted upon taking his niece with him; and, though with real
+reluctance, she yielded to his wishes, and accompanied him. By the
+squire's will, indeed, Sir William was appointed guardian to Lucy,
+and she yet wanted more than a year of her majority. Brandon, with
+a delicacy very uncommon to him where women (for he was a confirmed
+woman-hater) were concerned, provided everything that he thought could
+in any way conduce to her comfort. He ordered it to be understood in
+his establishment that she was its mistress. He arranged and furnished,
+according to what he imagined to be her taste, a suite of apartments
+for her sole accommodation; a separate carriage and servants were
+appropriated to her use; and he sought, by perpetual presents of books
+or flowers or music, to occupy her thoughts, and atone for the solitude
+to which his professional duties obliged him so constantly to consign
+her. These attentions, which showed this strange man in a new light,
+seemed to bring out many little latent amiabilities, which were usually
+imbedded in the callosities of his rocky nature; and, even despite her
+causes for grief and the deep melancholy which consumed her, Lucy was
+touched with gratitude at kindness doubly soothing in one who, however
+urbane and polished, was by no means addicted to the little attentions
+that are considered so gratifying by women, and yet for which they so
+often despise, while they like, him who affords them. There was much
+in Brandon that wound itself insensibly around the heart. To one more
+experienced than Lucy, this involuntary attraction might not have been
+incompatible with suspicion, and could scarcely have been associated
+with esteem; and yet for all who knew him intimately, even for
+the penetrating and selfish Mauleverer, the attraction existed.
+Unprincipled, crafty, hypocritical, even base when it suited his
+purpose; secretly sneering at the dupes he made, and knowing no code
+save that of interest and ambition; viewing men only as machines, and
+opinions only as ladders,--there was yet a tone of powerful feeling
+sometimes elicited from a heart that could at the same moment have
+sacrificed a whole people to the pettiest personal object: and sometimes
+with Lucy the eloquence or irony of his conversation deepened into a
+melancholy, a half-suppressed gentleness of sentiment, that accorded
+with the state of her own mind and interested her kind feelings
+powerfully in his. It was these peculiarities in his converse which made
+Lucy love to hear him; and she gradually learned to anticipate with a
+gloomy pleasure the hour in which, after the occupations of the day, he
+was accustomed to join her.
+
+"You look unwell, uncle, to-night," she said, when one evening he
+entered the room with looks more fatigued than usual; and rising, she
+leaned tenderly over him, and kissed his forehead.
+
+"Ay!" said Brandon, utterly unwon by, and even unheeding, the caress,
+"our way of life soon passes into the sear and yellow leaf; and when
+Macbeth grieved that he might not look to have that which should
+accompany old age, he had grown doting, and grieved for what was
+worthless."
+
+"Nay, uncle, 'honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,' these surely
+were worth the sighing for?"
+
+"Pooh! not worth a single sigh! The foolish wishes we form in youth have
+something noble and something bodily in them; but those of age are utter
+shadows, and the shadows of pygmies! Why, what is honour, after all?
+What is this good name among men? Only a sort of heathenish idol, set
+up to be adored by one set of fools and scorned by another. Do you not
+observe, Lucy, that the man you hear most praised by the party you meet
+to-day is most abused by that which you meet to-morrow? Public men are
+only praised by their party; and their party, sweet Lucy, are such base
+minions that it moves one's spleen to think one is so little as to be
+useful to them. Thus a good name is only the good name of a sect, and
+the members of that sect are only marvellous proper knaves."
+
+"But posterity does justice to those who really deserve fame."
+
+"Posterity! Can you believe that a man who knows what life is cares
+for the penny whistles of grown children after his death? Posterity,
+Lucy,--no! Posterity is but the same perpetuity of fools and rascals;
+and even were justice desirable at their hands, they could not deal it.
+Do men agree whether Charles Stuart was a liar or a martyr? For how
+many ages have we believed Nero a monster! A writer now asks, as if
+demonstrating a problem, what real historian could doubt that Nero was
+a paragon? The patriarchs of Scripture have been declared by modern
+philosophy to be a series of astronomical hieroglyphs; and, with greater
+show of truth, we are assured that the patriot Tell never existed!
+Posterity! the word has gulled men enough without my adding to the
+number. I, who loathe the living, can scarcely venerate the unborn.
+Lucy, believe me that no man can mix largely with men in political life,
+and not despise everything that in youth he adored! Age leaves us only
+one feeling,--contempt!"
+
+"Are you belied, then?" said Lucy, pointing to a newspaper, the organ of
+the party opposed to Brandon: "are you belied when you are here called
+'ambitious'? When they call you 'selfish' and 'grasping,' I know they
+wrong you; but I confess that I have thought you ambitious; yet can he
+who despises men desire their good opinion?"
+
+"Their good opinion!" repeated Brandon, mockingly: "do we want the bray
+of the asses we ride? No!" he resumed, after a pause. "It is power, not
+honour; it is the hope of elevating oneself in every respect, in the
+world without as well as in the world of one's own mind: it is this hope
+which makes me labour where I might rest, and will continue the labour
+to my grave. Lucy," continued Brandon, fixing his keen eyes on his
+niece, "have you no ambition,--have power and pomp and place no charm
+for your mind?"
+
+"None!" said Lucy, quietly and simply.
+
+"Indeed! yet there are times when I have thought I recognized my blood
+in your veins. You are sprung from a once noble, but a fallen race. Are
+you ever susceptible to the weakness of ancestral pride?"
+
+"You say," answered Lucy, "that we should care not for those who live
+after us; much less, I imagine, should we care for those who have lived
+ages before!"
+
+"Prettily answered," said Brandon, smiling. "I will tell you at one time
+or another what effect that weakness you despise already once had, long
+after your age, upon me. You are early wise on some points; profit by my
+experience, and be so on all."
+
+"That is to say, in despising all men and all things!" said Lucy, also
+smiling.
+
+"Well, never mind my creed,--you may be wise after your own; but trust
+one, dearest Lucy, who loves you purely and disinterestedly, and who has
+weighed with scales balanced to a hair all the advantages to be gleaned
+from an earth in which I verily think the harvest was gathered before we
+were put into it,--trust me, Lucy, and never think love, that maiden's
+dream, so valuable as rank and power: pause well before you yield to the
+former; accept the latter the moment they are offered you. Love puts
+you at the feet of another, and that other a tyrant; rank puts others at
+your feet, and all those thus subjected are your slaves!"
+
+Lucy moved her chair so that the new position concealed her face, and
+did not answer; and Brandon, in an altered tone, continued,--
+
+"Would you think, Lucy, that I once was fool enough to imagine that love
+was a blessing, and to be eagerly sought for? I gave up my hopes, my
+chances of wealth, of distinction,--all that had burned from the years
+of boyhood into my very heart. I chose poverty, obscurity, humiliation;
+but I chose also love. What was my reward? Lucy Brandon, I was
+deceived,--deceived!"
+
+Brandon paused; and Lucy took his hand affectionately, but did not break
+the silence. Brandon resumed:--
+
+"Yes, I was deceived! But I in my turn had a revenge, and a fitting
+revenge; for it was not the revenge of hatred, but" (and the speaker
+laughed sardonically) "of contempt. Enough of this, Lucy! What I wished
+to say to you is this,--grown men and women know more of the truth of
+things than ye young persons think for. Love is a mere bauble, and
+no human being ever exchanged for it one solid advantage without
+repentance. Believe this; and if rank ever puts itself under those
+pretty feet, be sure not to spurn the footstool."
+
+So saying, with a slight laugh, Brandon lighted his chamber candle, and
+left the room for the night.
+
+As soon as the lawyer reached his own apartment, he indited to Lord
+Mauleverer the following epistle:
+
+     "Why, dear Mauleverer, do you not come to town?  I want you, your
+     party wants you; perhaps the K--g wants you; and certainly, if you
+     are serious about my niece, the care of your own love-suit should
+     induce you yourself to want to come hither.  I have paved the way
+     for you; and I think, with a little management, you may anticipate a
+     speedy success.  But Lucy is a strange girl; and, perhaps, after
+     all, though you ought to be on the spot, you had better leave her as
+     much as possible in my hands.  I know human nature, Mauleverer, and
+     that knowledge is the engine by which I will work your triumph.  As
+     for the young lover, I am not quite sure whether it be not better
+     for our sake that Lucy should have experienced a disappointment on
+     that score; for when a woman has once loved, and the love is utterly
+     hopeless, she puts all vague ideas of other lovers altogether out of
+     her head; she becomes contented with a husband whom she can esteem!
+     Sweet canter!  But you, Mauleverer, want Lucy to love you!  And so
+     she will--after you have married her!  She will love you partly from
+     the advantages she derives from you, partly from familiarity (to say
+     nothing of your good qualities).  For my part, I think domesticity
+     goes so far that I believe a woman always inclined to be
+     affectionate to a man whom she has once seen in his nightcap.
+     However, you should come to town; my poor brother's recent death
+     allows us to see no one,--the coast will be clear from rivals; grief
+     has softened my niece's heart; in a word, you could not have a
+     better opportunity.  Come!
+
+     "By the way, you say one of the reasons which made you think ill of
+     this Captain Clifford was your impression that in the figure of one
+     of his comrades you recognized something that appeared to you to
+     resemble one of the fellows who robbed you a few months ago.  I
+     understand that at this moment the police are in active pursuit of
+     three most accomplished robbers; nor should I be at all surprised if
+     in this very Clifford were to be found the leader of the gang,
+     namely, the notorious Lovett.  I hear that the said leader is a
+     clever and a handsome fellow, of a gentlemanlike address, and that
+     his general associates are two men of the exact stamp of the
+     worthies you have so amusingly described to me.  I heard this
+     yesterday from Nabbem, the police-officer with whom I once scraped
+     acquaintance on a trial; and in my grudge against your rival, I
+     hinted at my suspicion that he, Captain Clifford, might not
+     impossibly prove this Rinaldo Rinaldini of the roads.  Nabbem caught
+     at my hint at once; so that, if it be founded on a true guess, I may
+     flatter my conscience as well as my friendship by the hope that I
+     have had some hand in hanging this Adonis of my niece's.  Whether my
+     guess be true or not, Nabbem says he is sure of this Lovett; for one
+     of his gang has promised to betray him.  Hang these aspiring dogs!
+     I thought treachery was confined to politics; and that thought makes
+     me turn to public matters, in which all people are turning with the
+     most edifying celerity...."
+
+Sir William Brandon's epistle found Mauleverer in a fitting mood for
+Lucy and for London. Our worthy peer had been not a little chagrined by
+Lucy's sudden departure from Bath; and while in doubt whether or not
+to follow her, the papers had informed him of the squire's death.
+Mauleverer, being then fully aware of the impossibility of immediately
+urging his suit, endeavoured, like the true philosopher he was, to
+reconcile himself to his hope deferred. Few people were more easily
+susceptible of consolation than Lord Mauleverer. He found an agreeable
+lady, of a face more unfaded than her reputation, to whom he intrusted
+the care of relieving his leisure moments from ennui; and being a lively
+woman, the confidante discharged the trust with great satisfaction to
+Lord Mauleverer, for the space of a fortnight, so that he naturally
+began to feel his love for Lucy gradually wearing away, by absence and
+other ties; but just as the triumph of time over passion was growing
+decisive, the lady left Bath in company with a tall guardsman, and
+Mauleverer received Brandon's letter. These two events recalled our
+excellent lover to a sense of his allegiance; and there being now
+at Bath no particular attraction to counterbalance the ardour of his
+affection, Lord Mauleverer ordered the horses to his carriage, and
+attended only by his valet, set out for London.
+
+Nothing, perhaps, could convey a better portrait of the world's spoiled
+darling than a sight of Lord Mauleverer's thin, fastidious
+features, peering forth through the closed window of his luxurious
+travelling-chariot; the rest of the outer man being carefully enveloped
+in furs, half-a-dozen novels strewing the seat of the carriage, and a
+lean French dog, exceedingly like its master, sniffing in vain for the
+fresh air, which, to the imagination of Mauleverer, was peopled with
+all sorts of asthmas and catarrhs! Mauleverer got out of his carriage at
+Salisbury, to stretch his limbs, and to amuse himself with a cutlet.
+Our nobleman was well known on the roads; and as nobody could be more
+affable, he was equally popular. The officious landlord bustled into the
+room, to wait himself upon his lordship and to tell all the news of the
+place.
+
+"Well, Mr. Cheerly," said Mauleverer, bestowing a penetrating glance on
+his cutlet, "the bad times, I see, have not ruined your cook."
+
+"Indeed, my lord, your lordship is very good, and the times, indeed, are
+very bad,--very bad indeed. Is there enough gravy? Perhaps your lordship
+will try the pickled onions?"
+
+"The what? Onions!--oh! ah! nothing can be better; but I never touch
+them. So, are the roads good?"
+
+"Your lordship has, I hope, found them good to Salisbury?"
+
+"Ah! I believe so. Oh! to be sure, excellent to Salisbury. But how are
+they to London? We have had wet weather lately, I think!"
+
+"No, my lord. Here the weather has been dry as a bone."
+
+"Or a cutlet!" muttered Mauleverer; and the host continued,--
+
+"As for the roads themselves, my lord, so far as the roads are
+concerned, they are pretty good, my lord; but I can't say as how there
+is not something about them that might be mended."
+
+"By no means improbable! You mean the inns and the turnpikes?" rejoined
+Mauleverer.
+
+"Your lordship is pleased to be facetious; no! I meant something worse
+than them."
+
+"What! the cooks?"
+
+"No, my lord, the highwaymen!"
+
+"The highwaymen! indeed?" said Mauleverer, anxiously; for he had with
+him a case of diamonds, which at that time were on grand occasions often
+the ornaments of a gentleman's dress, in the shape of buttons, buckles,
+etc. He had also a tolerably large sum of ready money about him,--a
+blessing he had lately begun to find very rare. "By the way, the rascals
+robbed me before on this very road. My pistols shall be loaded this
+time. Mr. Cheerly, you had better order the horses; one may as well
+escape the nightfall."
+
+"Certainly, my lord, certainly.--Jem, the horses immediately!--Your
+lordship will have another cutlet?"
+
+"Not a morsel!"
+
+"A tart?"
+
+"A dev--! not for the world!"
+
+"Bring the cheese, John!"
+
+"Much obliged to you, Mr. Cheerly, but I have dined; and if I have not
+done justice to your good cheer, thank yourself and the highwaymen.
+Where do these highwaymen attack one?"
+
+"Why, my lord, the neighbourhood of Reading is, I believe, the worst
+part; but they are very troublesome all the way to Salthill."
+
+"Damnation! the very neighbourhood in which the knaves robbed me before!
+You may well call them troublesome! Why the deuce don't the police clear
+the country of such a movable species of trouble?"
+
+"Indeed, my lord, I don't know; but they say as how Captain Lovett, the
+famous robber, be one of the set; and nobody can catch him, I fear!"
+
+"Because, I suppose, the dog has the sense to bribe as well as bully.
+What is the general number of these ruffians?"
+
+"Why, my lord, sometimes one, sometimes two, but seldom more than
+three."
+
+Mauleverer drew himself up. "My dear diamonds and my pretty purse!"
+thought he; "I may save you yet!"
+
+"Have you been long plagued with the fellows?" he asked, after a pause,
+as he was paying his bill.
+
+"Why, my lord, we have and we have not. I fancy as how they have a sort
+of a haunt near Reading, for sometimes they are intolerable just about
+there, and sometimes they are quiet for months together! For instance,
+my lord, we thought them all gone some time ago; but lately they have
+regularly stopped every one, though I hear as how they have cleared no
+great booty as yet."
+
+Here the waiter announced the horses, and Mauleverer slowly re-entered
+his carriage, among the bows and smiles of the charmed spirits of the
+hostelry.
+
+During the daylight Mauleverer, who was naturally of a gallant and
+fearless temper, thought no more of the highwaymen,--a species of danger
+so common at that time that men almost considered it disgraceful to
+suffer the dread of it to be a cause of delay on the road. Travellers
+seldom deemed it best to lose time in order to save money; and they
+carried with them a stout heart and a brace of pistols, instead of
+sleeping all night on the road. Mauleverer, rather a preux chevalier,
+was precisely of this order of wayfarers; and a night at an inn, when
+it was possible to avoid it, was to him, as to most rich Englishmen, a
+tedious torture zealously to be shunned. It never, therefore, entered
+into the head of our excellent nobleman, despite his experience, that
+his diamonds and his purse might be saved from all danger if he
+would consent to deposit them, with his own person, at some place of
+hospitable reception; nor, indeed, was it till he was within a stage of
+Reading, and the twilight had entirely closed in, that he troubled
+his head much on the matter. But while the horses were putting to, he
+summoned the postboys to him; and after regarding their countenances
+with the eye of a man accustomed to read physiognomies, he thus
+eloquently addressed them,--
+
+"Gentlemen, I am informed that there is some danger of being robbed
+between this town and Salthill. Now, I beg to inform you that I think it
+next to impossible for four horses, properly directed, to be stopped
+by less than four men. To that number I shall probably yield; to a less
+number I shall most assuredly give nothing but bullets. You understand
+me?"
+
+The post-boys grinned, touched their hats; and Mauleverer slowly
+continued,--
+
+"If, therefore,--mark me!--one, two, or three men stop your horses, and
+I find that the use of your whips and spurs are ineffectual in
+releasing the animals from the hold of the robbers, I intend with these
+pistols--you observe them!---to shoot at the gentlemen who detain you;
+but as, though I am generally a dead shot, my eyesight wavers a little
+in the dark, I think it very possible that I may have the misfortune to
+shoot you, gentlemen, instead of the robbers! You see the rascals will
+be close by you, sufficiently so to put you in jeopardy, unless indeed
+you knock them down with the but-end of your whips. I merely mention
+this, that you may be prepared. Should such a mistake occur, you need
+not be uneasy beforehand, for I will take every possible care of your
+widows; should it not, and should we reach Salthill in safety, I intend
+to testify my sense of the excellence of your driving by a present
+of ten guineas apiece! Gentlemen, I have done with you. I give you my
+honour that I am serious in what I have said to you. Do me the favour to
+mount."
+
+Mauleverer then called his favourite servant, who sat in the dickey in
+front (rumble-tumbles not being then in use). "Smoothson," said he, "the
+last time we were attacked on this very road, you behaved damnably. See
+that you do better this time, or it may be the worse for you. You have
+pistols to-night about you, eh? Well, that's right! And you are sure
+they're loaded? Very well! Now, then, if we are stopped, don't lose a
+moment. Jump down, and fire one of your pistols at the first robber.
+Keep the other for a sure aim. One shot is to intimidate, the second to
+slay. You comprehend? My pistols are in excellent order, I suppose. Lend
+me the ramrod. So, so! No trick this time!"
+
+"They would kill a fly, my lord, provided your lordship fired straight
+upon it."
+
+"I do not doubt you," said Mauleverer; "light the lanterns, and tell the
+postboys to drive on."
+
+It was a frosty and tolerably clear night. The dusk of the twilight had
+melted away beneath the moon which had just risen, and the hoary rime
+glittered from the bushes and the sward, breaking into a thousand
+diamonds as it caught the rays of the stars. On went the horses briskly,
+their breath steaming against the fresh air, and their hoofs sounding
+cheerily on the hard ground. The rapid motion of the carriage, the
+bracing coolness of the night, and the excitement occasioned by anxiety
+and the forethought of danger, all conspired to stir the languid blood
+of Lord Mauleverer into a vigorous and exhilarated sensation, natural
+in youth to his character, but utterly contrary to the nature he had
+imbibed from the customs of his manhood.
+
+He felt his pistols, and his hands trembled a little as he did so,--not
+the least from fear, but from that restlessness and eagerness peculiar
+to nervous persons placed in a new situation.
+
+"In this country," said he to himself, "I have been only once robbed in
+the course of my life. It was then a little my fault; for before I took
+to my pistols, I should have been certain they were loaded. To-night
+I shall be sure to avoid a similar blunder; and my pistols have an
+eloquence in their barrels which is exceedingly moving. Humph,
+another milestone! These fellows drive well; but we are entering a
+pretty-looking spot for Messieurs the disciples of Robin Hood!"
+
+It was, indeed, a picturesque spot by which the carriage was now rapidly
+whirling. A few miles from Maidenhead, on the Henley Road, our readers
+will probably remember a small tract of forest-like land, lying on
+either side of the road. To the left the green waste bears away among
+the trees and bushes; and one skilled in the country may pass from
+that spot, through a landscape as little tenanted as green Sherwood
+was formerly, into the chains of wild common and deep beech-woods which
+border a certain portion of Oxfordshire, and contrast so beautifully the
+general characteristics of that county.
+
+At the time we speak of, the country was even far wilder than it is now;
+and just on that point where the Henley and the Reading roads unite was
+a spot (communicating then with the waste land we have described), than
+which, perhaps, few places could be more adapted to the purposes of such
+true men as have recourse to the primary law of nature. Certain it was
+that at this part of the road Mauleverer looked more anxiously from
+his window than he had hitherto done, and apparently the increased
+earnestness of his survey was not altogether without meeting its reward.
+
+About a hundred yards to the left, three dark objects were just
+discernible in the shade; a moment more, and the objects emerging grew
+into the forms of three men, well mounted, and riding at a brisk trot.
+
+"Only three!" thought Mauleverer, "that is well;" and leaning from the
+front window with a pistol in either hand, Mauleverer cried out to
+the postboys in a stern tone, "Drive on, and recollect what I told
+you!--Remember!" he added to his servant. The postboys scarcely looked
+round; but their spurs were buried in their horses, and the animals flew
+on like lightning.
+
+The three strangers made a halt, as if in conference; their decision was
+prompt. Two wheeled round from their comrade, and darted at full gallop
+by the carriage. Mauleverer's pistol was already protruded from the
+front window, when to his astonishment, and to the utter baffling of his
+ingenious admonition to his drivers, he beheld the two postboys knocked
+from their horses one after the other with a celerity that scarcely
+allowed him an exclamation; and before he had recovered his
+self-possession, the horses taking fright (and their fright being
+skilfully taken advantage of by the highwaymen), the carriage was fairly
+whirled into a ditch on the right side of the road, and upset. Meanwhile
+Smoothson had leaped from his station in the front; and having fired,
+though without effect, at the third robber, who approached menacingly
+towards him, he gained the time to open the carriage door and extricate
+his master.
+
+The moment Mauleverer found himself on terra firma, he prepared his
+courage for offensive measures; and he and Smoothson, standing side
+by side in front of the unfortunate vehicle, presented no unformidable
+aspect to the enemy. The two robbers who had so decisively rid
+themselves of the postboys acted with no less determination towards
+the horses. One of them dismounted, cut the traces, and suffered the
+plunging quadrupeds to go whither they listed. This measure was not,
+however, allowed to be taken with impunity; a ball from Mauleverer's
+pistol passed through the hat of the highwayman with an aim so slightly
+erring that it whizzed among the locks of the astounded hero with a
+sound that sent a terror to his heart, no less from a love of his head
+than from anxiety for his hair. The shock staggered him for a moment;
+and a second shot from the hands of Mauleverer would have probably
+finished his earthly career, had not the third robber, who had hitherto
+remained almost inactive, thrown himself from his horse, which, tutored
+to such docility, remained perfectly still, and advancing with a bold
+step and a levelled pistol towards Mauleverer and his servant, said in
+a resolute voice, "Gentlemen, it is useless to struggle; we are well
+armed, and resolved on effecting our purpose. Your persons shall be safe
+if you lay down your arms, and also such part of your property as you
+may particularly wish to retain; but if you resist, I cannot answer for
+your lives!"
+
+Mauleverer had listened patiently to this speech in order that he might
+have more time for adjusting his aim. His reply was a bullet, which
+grazed the side of the speaker and tore away the skin, without
+inflicting any more dangerous wound. Muttering a curse upon the error of
+his aim, and resolute to the last when his blood was once up, Mauleverer
+backed one pace, drew his sword, and threw himself into the attitude of
+a champion well skilled in the use of the instrument he wore.
+
+But that incomparable personage was in a fair way of ascertaining what
+happiness in the world to come is reserved for a man who has spared no
+pains to make himself comfortable in this. For the two first and most
+active robbers having finished the achievement of the horses, now
+approached Mauleverer; and the taller of them, still indignant at the
+late peril to his hair, cried out in a stentorian voice,--
+
+"By Jove! you old fool, if you don't throw down your toasting-fork, I'll
+be the death of you!"
+
+The speaker suited the action to the word by cocking an immense pistol.
+Mauleverer stood his ground; but Smoothson retreated, and stumbling
+against the wheel of the carriage, fell backward; the next instant, the
+second highwayman had possessed himself of the valet's pistols, and,
+quietly seated on the fallen man's stomach, amused himself by inspecting
+the contents of the domestic's pockets. Mauleverer was now alone; and
+his stubbornness so enraged the tall bully that his hand was already on
+his trigger, when the third robber, whose side Mauleverer's bullet had
+grazed, thrust himself between the two.
+
+"Hold, Ned!" said he, pushing back his comrade's pistol. "And you, my
+lord, whose rashness ought to cost you your life, learn that men can
+rob generously." So saying, with one dexterous stroke from the robber's
+riding-whip, Mauleverer's sword flew upwards, and alighted at the
+distance of ten yards from its owner.
+
+"Approach now," said the victor to his comrades. "Rifle the carriage,
+and with all despatch!"
+
+The tall highwayman hastened to execute this order; and the lesser one
+having satisfactorily finished the inquisition into Mr. Smoothson's
+pockets, drew forth from his own pouch a tolerably thick rope; with this
+he tied the hands of the prostrate valet, moralizing as he wound the
+rope round and round the wrists of the fallen man, in the following
+edifying strain:--
+
+"Lie still, sir,--lie still, I beseech you! All wise men are fatalists;
+and no proverb is more pithy than that which says, 'What can't be cured
+must be endured.' Lie still, I tell you! Little, perhaps, do you think
+that you are performing one of the noblest functions of humanity; yes,
+sir, you are filling the pockets of the destitute; and by my present
+action I am securing you from any weakness of the flesh likely to impede
+so praiseworthy an end, and so hazard the excellence of your action.
+There, sir, your hands are tight,--lie still and reflect."
+
+As he said this, with three gentle applications of his feet, the
+moralist rolled Mr. Smoothson into the ditch, and hastened to join his
+lengthy comrade in his pleasing occupation.
+
+In the interim Mauleverer and the third robber (who, in the true spirit
+of government, remained dignified and inactive while his followers
+plundered what he certainly designed to share, if not to monopolize)
+stood within a few feet of each other, face to face.
+
+Mauleverer had now convinced himself that all endeavour to save his
+property was hopeless, and he had also the consolation of thinking
+he had done his best to defend it. He therefore bade all his thoughts
+return to the care of his person. He adjusted his fur collar around
+his neck with great sang froid, drew on his gloves, and, patting his
+terrified poodle, who sat shivering on its haunches with one paw raised
+and nervously trembling, he said,--
+
+"You, sir, seem to be a civil person, and I really should have felt
+quite sorry if I had had the misfortune to wound you. You are not hurt,
+I trust. Pray, if I may inquire, how am I to proceed? My carriage is
+in the ditch, and my horses by this time are probably at the end of the
+world."
+
+"As for that matter," said the robber, whose face, like those of his
+comrades, was closely masked in the approved fashion of highwaymen of
+that day, "I believe you will have to walk to Maidenhead,--it is not
+far, and the night is fine!"
+
+"A very trifling hardship, indeed!" said Mauleverer, ironically; but
+his new acquaintance made no reply, nor did he appear at all desirous of
+entering into any further conversation with Mauleverer.
+
+The earl, therefore, after watching the operations of the other robbers
+for some moments, turned on his heel, and remained humming an opera
+tune with dignified indifference until the pair had finished rifling the
+carriage, and seizing Mauleverer, proceeded to rifle him.
+
+With a curled lip and a raised brow, that supreme personage suffered
+himself to be, as the taller robber expressed it, "cleaned out." His
+watch, his rings, his purse, and his snuff-box, all went. It was long
+since the rascals had captured such a booty.
+
+They had scarcely finished when the postboys, who had now begun to look
+about them, uttered a simultaneous cry, and at some distance a wagon
+was seen heavily approaching. Mauleverer really wanted his money, to say
+nothing of his diamonds; and so soon as he perceived assistance at hand,
+a new hope darted within him. His sword still lay on the ground; he
+sprang towards it, seized it, uttered a shout for help, and threw
+himself fiercely on the highwayman who had disarmed him; but the robber,
+warding off the blade with his whip, retreated to his saddle, which he
+managed, despite of Mauleverer's lunges, to regain with impunity.
+
+The other two had already mounted, and within a minute afterwards not
+a vestige of the trio was visible. "This is what may fairly be called
+single blessedness!" said Mauleverer, as, dropping his useless sword, he
+thrust his hands into his pockets.
+
+Leaving our peerless peer to find his way to Maidenhead on foot,
+accompanied (to say nothing of the poodle) by one wagoner, two postboys,
+and the released Mr. Smoothson, all four charming him with their
+condolences, we follow with our story the steps of the three alieni
+appetentes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+     The rogues were very merry on their booty.  They said a thousand
+     things that showed the wickedness of their morals.---Gil Bias.
+
+     They fixed on a spot where they made a cave, which was large enough
+     to receive them and their horses.  This cave was inclosed within a
+     sort of thicket of bushes and brambles.  From this station they used
+     to issue, etc.---Memoirs of Richard Turpin.
+
+It was not for several minutes after their flight had commenced that any
+conversation passed between the robbers. Their horses flew on like wind;
+and the country through which they rode presented to their speed no
+other obstacle than an occasional hedge, or a short cut through the
+thicknesses of some leafless beechwood. The stars lent them a merry
+light, and the spirits of two of them at least were fully in sympathy
+with the exhilaration of the pace and the air. Perhaps, in the third, a
+certain presentiment that the present adventure would end less merrily
+than it had begun, conspired, with other causes of gloom, to check that
+exaltation of the blood which generally follows a successful exploit.
+
+The path which the robbers took wound by the sides of long woods
+or across large tracts of uncultivated land; nor did they encounter
+anything living by the road, save now and then a solitary owl, wheeling
+its gray body around the skirts of the bare woods, or occasionally
+troops of conies, pursuing their sports and enjoying their midnight food
+in the fields.
+
+"Heavens!" cried the tall robber, whose incognito we need no longer
+preserve, and who, as our readers are doubtless aware, answered to the
+name of Pepper,--"heavens!" cried he, looking upward at the starry skies
+in a sort of ecstasy, "what a jolly life this is! Some fellows like
+hunting; d---it! what hunting is like the road? If there be sport in
+hunting down a nasty fox, how much more is there in hunting down a nice,
+clean nobleman's carriage! If there be joy in getting a brush, how much
+more is there in getting a purse! If it be pleasant to fly over a hedge
+in the broad daylight, hang me if it be not ten times finer sport to
+skim it by night,--here goes! Look how the hedges run away from us! and
+the silly old moon dances about, as if the sight of us put the good lady
+in spirits! Those old maids are always glad to have an eye upon such
+fine, dashing young fellows."
+
+"Ay," cried the more erudite and sententious Augustus Tomlinson,
+roused by success from his usual philosophical sobriety; "no work is so
+pleasant as night-work, and the witches our ancestors burned were in the
+right to ride out on their broomsticks with the awls and the stars. We
+are their successors now, Ned. We are your true fly-by-nights!"
+
+"Only," quoth Ned, "we are a cursed deal more clever than they were; for
+they played their game without being a bit the richer for it, and we--I
+say, Tomlinson, where the devil did you put that red morocco case?"
+
+"Experience never enlightens the foolish," said Tomlinson, "or you would
+have known, without asking, that I had put it in the very safest pocket
+in my coat. 'Gad, how heavy it is!
+
+"Well," cried Pepper, "I can't say I wish it were lighter! Only think of
+our robbing my lord twice, and on the same road too!"
+
+"I say, Lovett," exclaimed Tomlinson, "was it not odd that we should
+have stumbled upon our Bath friend so unceremoniously? Lucky for us
+that we are so strict in robbing in masks! He would not have thought the
+better of Bath company if he had seen our faces."
+
+Lovett, or rather Clifford, had hitherto been silent. He now turned
+slowly in his saddle, and said: "As it was, the poor devil was very
+nearly despatched. Long Ned was making short work with him, if I had not
+interposed!"
+
+"And why did you?" said Ned.
+
+"Because I will have no killing; it is the curse of the noble art of our
+profession to have passionate professors like thee."
+
+"Passionate!" repeated Ned. "Well, I am a little choleric, I own it;
+but that is not so great a fault on the road as it would be in
+housebreaking. I don't know a thing that requires so much coolness and
+self-possession as cleaning out a house from top to bottom,--quietly and
+civilly, mind you!"
+
+"That is the reason, I suppose, then," said Augustus, "that you
+altogether renounced that career. Your first adventure was house
+breaking, I think I have heard you say. I confess it was a vulgar
+debut,--not worthy of you!"
+
+"No! Harry Cook seduced me; but the specimen I saw that night disgusted
+me of picking locks; it brings one in contact with such low companions.
+Only think, there was a merchant, a rag-merchant, one of the party!"
+
+"Faugh!" said Tomlinson, in solemn disgust.
+
+"Ay, you may well turn up your lip; I never broke into a house again."
+
+"Who were your other companions?" asked Augustus. "Only Harry Cook,--[A
+noted highwayman.]--and a very singular woman--"
+
+Here Ned's narrative was interrupted by a dark defile through a wood,
+allowing room for only one horseman at a time. They continued this
+gloomy path for several minutes, until at length it brought them to
+the brink of a large dell, overgrown with bushes, and spreading around
+somewhat in the form of a rude semicircle. Here the robbers dismounted,
+and led their reeking horses down the descent. Long Ned, who went
+first, paused at a cluster of bushes, which seemed so thick as to defy
+intrusion, but which, yielding on either side to the experienced hand of
+the robber, presented what appeared the mouth of a cavern. A few steps
+along the passage of this gulf brought them to a door, which, even seen
+by torchlight, would have appeared so exactly similar in colour and
+material to the rude walls on either side as to have deceived any
+unsuspecting eye, and which, in the customary darkness brooding over it,
+might have remained for centuries undiscovered. Touching a secret latch,
+the door opened, and the robbers were in the secure precincts of the
+"Red Cave." It may be remembered that among the early studies of our
+exemplary hero the memoirs of Richard Turpin had formed a conspicuous
+portion; and it may also be remembered that in the miscellaneous
+adventures of that gentleman nothing had more delighted the juvenile
+imagination of the student than the description of the forest cave in
+which the gallant Turpin had been accustomed to conceal himself, his
+friend, his horse,
+
+          "And that sweet saint who lay by Turpin's side;"
+
+or, to speak more domestically, the respectable Mrs. Turpin. So strong
+a hold, indeed, had that early reminiscence fixed upon our hero's mind,
+that no sooner had he risen to eminence among his friends than he had
+put the project of his childhood into execution. He had selected for the
+scene of his ingenuity an admirable spot. In a thinly peopled country,
+surrounded by commons and woods, and yet, as Mr. Robins would say if he
+had to dispose of it by auction, "within an easy ride" of populous and
+well-frequented roads, it possessed all the advantages of secrecy for
+itself and convenience for depredation. Very few of the gang, and those
+only who had been employed in its construction, were made acquainted
+with the secret of this cavern; and as our adventurers rarely visited
+it, and only on occasions of urgent want or secure concealment, it had
+continued for more than two years undiscovered and unsuspected.
+
+The cavern, originally hollowed by nature, owed but little to the
+decorations of art; nevertheless, the roughness of the walls was
+concealed by a rude but comfortable arras of matting; four or five of
+such seats as the robbers themselves could construct were drawn around
+a small but bright wood-fire, which, as there was no chimney, spread a
+thin volume of smoke over the apartment. The height of the cave, added
+to the universal reconciler (custom), prevented, however, this evil from
+being seriously unpleasant; and, indeed, like the tenants of an
+Irish cabin, perhaps the inmates attached a degree of comfort to
+a circumstance which was coupled with their dearest household
+associations. A table, formed of a board coarsely planed, and supported
+by four legs of irregular size, made equal by the introduction of blocks
+or wedges between the legs and the floor, stood warming its uncouth self
+by the fire. At one corner a covered cart made a conspicuous article of
+furniture, no doubt useful either in conveying plunder or provisions;
+beside the wheels were carelessly thrown two or three coarse carpenter's
+tools, and the more warlike utilities of a blunderbuss, a rifle, and two
+broadswords. In the other corner was an open cupboard, containing rows
+of pewter platters, mugs, etc. Opposite the fireplace, which was to the
+left of the entrance, an excavation had been turned into a dormitory;
+and fronting the entrance was a pair of broad, strong wooden steps,
+ascending to a large hollow about eight feet from the ground. This was
+the entrance to the stables; and as soon as their owners released the
+reins of the horses, the docile animals proceeded one by one leisurely
+up the steps, in the manner of quadrupeds educated at the public
+seminary of Astley's, and disappeared within the aperture.
+
+These steps, when drawn up,--which, however, from their extreme
+clumsiness, required the united strength of two ordinary men, and was
+not that instantaneous work which it should have been,--made the place
+above a tolerably strong hold; for the wall was perfectly perpendicular
+and level, and it was only by placing his hands upon the ledge, and so
+lifting himself gymnastically upward, that an active assailant could
+have reached the eminence,--a work which defenders equally active, it
+may easily be supposed, would not be likely to allow.
+
+This upper cave--for our robbers paid more attention to their horses
+than themselves, as the nobler animals of the two species--was evidently
+fitted up with some labour. The stalls were rudely divided, the litter
+of dry fern was clean, troughs were filled with oats, and a large tub
+had been supplied from a pond at a little distance. A cart-harness and
+some old wagoners' frocks were fixed on pegs to the wall; while at the
+far end of these singular stables was a door strongly barred, and only
+just large enough to admit the body of a man. The confederates had made
+it an express law never to enter their domain by this door, or to use
+it, except for the purpose of escape, should the cave ever be attacked;
+in which case, while one or two defended the entrance from the inner
+cave, another might unbar the door, and as it opened upon the thickest
+part of the wood, through which with great ingenuity a labyrinthine path
+had been cut, not easily tracked by ignorant pursuers, these precautions
+of the highwaymen had provided a fair hope of at least a temporary
+escape from any invading enemies.
+
+Such were the domestic arrangements of the Red Cave; and it will be
+conceded that at least some skill had been shown in the choice of the
+spot, if there were a lack of taste in its adornments.
+
+While the horses were performing their nightly ascent, our three heroes,
+after securing the door, made at once to the fire. And there, O reader!
+they were greeted in welcome by one--an old and revered acquaintance of
+thine--whom in such a scene it will equally astound and wound thee to
+re-behold.
+
+Know, then--But first we will describe to thee the occupation and the
+garb of the August personage to whom we allude. Bending over a large
+gridiron, daintily bespread with steaks of the fatted rump, the
+INDIVIDUAL stood, with his right arm bared above the elbow, and his
+right hand grasping that mimic trident known unto gastronomers by
+the monosyllable "fork." His wigless head was adorned with a cotton
+nightcap. His upper vestment was discarded, and a whitish apron flowed
+gracefully down his middle man. His stockings were ungartered, and
+permitted between the knee and the calf interesting glances of the rude
+carnal. One list shoe and one of leathern manufacture cased his ample
+feet. Enterprise, or the noble glow of his present culinary profession,
+spread a yet rosier blush over a countenance early tinged by generous
+libations, and from beneath the curtain of his pallid eyelashes his
+large and rotund orbs gleamed dazzlingly on the new comers. Such, O
+reader! was the aspect and the occupation of the venerable man whom we
+have long since taught thee to admire; such, alas for the mutabilities
+of earth! was--A new chapter only can contain the name.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+          Caliban.  Hast thou not dropped from heaven?
+                                             Tempest.
+
+PETER MacGRAWLER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
+!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
+!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
+!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+               God bless our King and Parliament,
+               And send he may make such knaves repent!
+                         Loyal Songs against the Rump Parliament.
+
+               Ho, treachery! my guards, my cimeter!
+                                                  BYRON.
+
+When the irreverent Mr. Pepper had warmed his hands sufficiently to be
+able to transfer them from the fire, he lifted the right palm, and with
+an indecent jocularity of spirits, accosted the ci-devant ornament of
+"The Asinaeum" with a sounding slap on his back, or some such part of
+his conformation.
+
+"Ah, old boy!" said he, "is this the way you keep house for us? A fire
+not large enough to roast a nit, and a supper too small to fatten him
+beforehand! But how the deuce should you know how to provender for
+gentlemen? You thought you were in Scotland, I'll be bound!"
+
+"Perhaps he did when he looked upon you, Ned!" said Tomlinson, gravely;
+"'t is but rarely out of Scotland that a man can see so big a rogue in
+so little a compass!"
+
+Mr. MacGrawler, into whose eyes the palmistry of Long Ned had brought
+tears of sincere feeling, and who had hitherto been rubbing the
+afflicted part, now grumbled forth,--
+
+"You may say what you please, Mr. Pepper, but it is not often in my
+country that men of genius are seen performing the part of cook to
+robbers!"
+
+"No!" quoth Tomlinson, "they are performing the more profitable part of
+robbers to cooks, eh!"
+
+"Damme, you're out," cried Long Ned,--"for in that country there are
+either no robbers, because there is nothing to rob; or the inhabitants
+are all robbers, who have plundered one another, and made away with the
+booty!"
+
+"May the de'il catch thee!" said MacGrawler, stung to the quick,--for,
+like all Scots, he was a patriot; much on the same principle as a woman
+who has the worst children makes the best mother.
+
+"The de'il," said Ned, mimicking the "silver sound," as Sir W. Scott
+had been pleased facetiously to call the "mountain tongue" (the Scots
+in general seem to think it is silver, they keep it so carefully)
+"the de'il,--MacDeil, you mean, sure, the gentleman must have been a
+Scotchman!"
+
+The sage grinned in spite; but remembering the patience of Epictetus
+when a slave, and mindful also of the strong arm of Long Ned, he curbed
+his temper, and turned the beefsteaks with his fork.
+
+"Well, Ned," said Augustus, throwing himself into a chair, which he drew
+to the fire, while he gently patted the huge limbs of Mr. Pepper, as if
+to admonish him that they were not so transparent as glass, "let us look
+at the fire; and, by the by, it is your turn to see to the horses."
+
+"Plague on it!" cried Ned; "it is always my turn, I think. Holla, you
+Scot of the pot! can't you prove that I groomed the beasts last? I'll
+give you a crown to do it."
+
+The wise MacGrawler pricked up his ears.
+
+"A crown!" said he,--"a crown! Do you mean to insult me, Mr. Pepper?
+But, to be sure, you did see to the horses last; and this worthy
+gentleman, Mr. Tomlinson, must remember it too."
+
+"How!" cried Augustus; "you are mistaken, and I'll give you half a
+guinea to prove it."
+
+MacGrawler opened his eyes larger and larger, even as you may see
+a small circle in the water widen into enormity, if you disturb the
+equanimity of the surface by the obtrusion of a foreign substance.
+
+"Half a guinea!" said he; "nay, nay, you joke. I'm not mercenary. You
+think I am! Pooh, pooh! you are mistaken; I'm a man who means weel,
+a man of veracity, and will speak the truth in spite of all the
+half-guineas in the world. But certainly, now I begin to think of it,
+Mr. Tomlinson did see to the creatures last; and, Mr. Pepper, it is your
+turn."
+
+"A very Daniel!" said Tomlinson, chuckling in his usual dry manner.
+"Ned, don't you hear the horses neigh?"
+
+"Oh, hang the horses!" said the volatile Pepper, forgetting everything
+else, as he thrust his hands in his pockets, and felt the gains of the
+night; "let us first look to our winnings!"
+
+So saying, he marched towards the table, and emptied his pockets
+thereon. Tomlinson, nothing loath, followed the example. Heavens! what
+exclamations of delight issued from the scoundrels' lips, as, one by
+one, they inspected their new acquisitions!
+
+"Here's a magnificent creature!" cried Ned, handling that superb watch
+studded with jewels which the poor earl had once before unavailingly
+redeemed,--"a repeater, by Jove!"
+
+"I hope not," said the phlegmatic Augustus; "repeaters will not tell
+well for your conversation, Ned! But, powers that be! look at this
+ring,--a diamond of the first water!"
+
+"Oh, the sparkler! it makes one's mouth water as much as itself.
+'Sdeath, here's a precious box for a sneezer,--a picture inside, and
+rubies outside! The old fellow had excellent taste; it would charm him
+to see how pleased we are with his choice of jewelry!"
+
+"Talking of jewelry," said Tomlinson, "I had almost forgotten the
+morocco case. Between you and me, I imagine we have a prize there; it
+looks like a jewel casket!"
+
+So saying, the robber opened that case which on many a gala day had lent
+lustre to the polished person of Mauleverer. Oh, reader, the burst of
+rapture that ensued! Imagine it! we cannot express it. Like the Grecian
+painter, we drop a veil over emotions too deep for words.
+
+"But here," said Pepper, when they had almost exhausted their transports
+at sight of the diamonds,--"here's a purse,--fifty guineas! And what's
+this? Notes, by Jupiter! We must change them to-morrow before they are
+stopped. Curse those fellows at the Bank! they are always imitating us,
+we stop their money, and they don't lose a moment in stopping it too.
+Three hundred pounds! Captain, what say you to our luck?" Clifford had
+sat gloomily looking on during the operations of the robbers; he now,
+assuming a correspondent cheerfulness of manner, made a suitable reply,
+and after some general conversation the work of division took place.
+
+"We are the best arithmeticians in the world," said Augustus, as he
+pouched his share; "addition, subtraction, division, reduction,--we have
+them all as pat as 'The Tutor's Assistant;' and, what is better, we make
+them all applicable to the Rule of Three."
+
+"You have left out multiplication!" said Clifford, smiling. "Ah! because
+that works differently. The other rules apply to the specie-s of the
+kingdom; but as for multiplication, we multiply, I fear, no species but
+our own!"
+
+"Fie, gentlemen!" said MacGrawler, austerely,--for there is a wonderful
+decorum in your true Scotsmen. "Actions are trifles; nothing can be
+cleaner than their words!"
+
+"Oh, you thrust in your wisdom, do you?" said Ned. "I suppose you want
+your part of the booty!"
+
+"Part!" said the subtilizing Tomlinson. "He has nine times as many parts
+as we have already. Is he not a critic, and has he not the parts of
+speech at his fingers' end?"
+
+"Nonsense!" said MacGrawler, instinctively holding up his hands, with
+the fork dropping between the outstretched fingers of the right palm.
+
+"Nonsense yourself," cried Ned; "you have a share in what you never
+took! A pretty fellow, truly! Mind your business, Mr. Scot, and fork
+nothing but the beefsteaks!"
+
+With this Ned turned to the stables, and soon disappeared among the
+horses; but Clifford, eying the disappointed and eager face of the
+culinary sage, took ten guineas from his own share, and pushed them
+towards his quondam tutor.
+
+"There!" said he, emphatically.
+
+"Nay, nay," grunted MacGrawler; "I don't want the money,--it is my way
+to scorn such dross!" So saying, he pocketed the coins, and turned,
+muttering to himself, to the renewal of his festive preparations.
+
+Meanwhile a whispered conversation took place between Augustus and the
+captain, and continued till Ned returned.
+
+"And the night's viands smoked along the board!"
+
+Souls of Don Raphael and Ambrose Lamela, what a charming thing it is to
+be a rogue for a little time! How merry men are when they have cheated
+their brethren! Your innocent milksops never made so jolly a supper
+as did our heroes of the way. Clifford, perhaps acted a part, but
+the hilarity of his comrades was unfeigned. It was a delicious
+contrast,--the boisterous "ha, ha!" of Long Ned, and the secret, dry,
+calculating chuckle of Augustus Tomlinson. It was Rabelais against
+Voltaire. They united only in the objects of their jests, and foremost
+of those objects (wisdom is ever the but of the frivolous!) was the
+great Peter MacGrawler.
+
+The graceless dogs were especially merry upon the subject of the sage's
+former occupation.
+
+"Come, Mac, you carve this ham," said Ned; "you have had practice in
+cutting up."
+
+The learned man whose name was thus disrespectfully abbreviated
+proceeded to perform what he was bid. He was about to sit down for that
+purpose, when Tomlinson slyly subtracted his chair,--the sage fell.
+
+"No jests at MacGrawler," said the malicious Augustus; "whatever be his
+faults as a critic, you see that he is well grounded, and he gets at
+once to the bottom of a subject. Mac, suppose your next work be entitled
+a Tail of Woe!"
+
+Men who have great minds are rarely flexible,--they do not take a jest
+readily; so it was with MacGrawler. He rose in a violent rage; and had
+the robbers been more penetrating than they condescended to be, they
+might have noticed something dangerous in his eye. As it was, Clifford,
+who had often before been the protector of his tutor, interposed in his
+behalf, drew the sage a seat near to himself, and filled his plate for
+him. It was interesting to see this deference from Power to Learning! It
+was Alexander doing homage to Aristotle!
+
+"There is only one thing I regret," cried Ned, with his mouth full,
+"about the old lord,--it was a thousand pities we did not make him
+dance! I remember the day, Captain, when you would have insisted on
+it. What a merry fellow you were once! Do you recollect, one bright
+moonlight night, just like the present, for instance, when we were doing
+duty near Staines, how you swore every person we stopped, above fifty
+years old, should dance a minuet with you?"
+
+"Ay!" added Augustus, "and the first was a bishop in a white wig. Faith,
+how stiffly his lordship jigged it! And how gravely Lovett bowed to him,
+with his hat off, when it was all over, and returned him his watch and
+ten guineas,--it was worth the sacrifice!"
+
+"And the next was an old maid of quality," said Ned, "as lean as a
+lawyer. Don't you remember how she curvetted?"
+
+"To be sure," said Tomlinson; "and you very wittily called her a
+hop-pole!"
+
+"How delighted she was with the captain's suavity! When he gave her back
+her earrings and aigrette, she bade him with a tender sigh keep them for
+her sake,--ha! ha!"
+
+"And the third was a beau!" cried Augustus; "and Lovett surrendered his
+right of partnership to me. Do you recollect how I danced his beauship
+into the ditch? Ah! we were mad fellows then; but we get sated--blases,
+as the French say--as we grow older!"
+
+"We look only to the main chance now," said Ned. "Avarice supersedes
+enterprise," added the sententious Augustus.
+
+"And our captain takes to wine with an h after the w!" continued the
+metaphorical Ned.
+
+"Come, we are melancholy," said Tomlinson, tossing off a bumper.
+"Methinks we are really growing old, we shall repent soon, and the next
+step will be-hanging!"
+
+"'Fore Gad!" said Ned, helping himself, "don't be so croaking. There are
+two classes of maligned gentry, who should always be particular to avoid
+certain colours in dressing; I hate to see a true boy in black, or a
+devil in blue. But here's my last glass to-night! I am confoundedly
+sleepy, and we rise early to-morrow."
+
+"Right, Ned," said Tomlinson; "give us a song before you retire, and let
+it be that one which Lovett composed the last time we were here."
+
+Ned, always pleased with an opportunity of displaying himself, cleared
+his voice and complied.
+
+                    A DITTY FROM SHERWOOD.
+
+                             I.
+          Laugh with us at the prince and the palace,
+          In the wild wood-life there is better cheer;
+          Would you board your mirth from your neighbour's malice,
+          Gather it up in our garners here.
+          Some kings their wealth from their subjects wring,
+          While by their foes they the poorer wax;
+          Free go the men of the wise wood-king,
+          And it is only our foes we tax.
+          Leave the cheats of trade to the shrewd gude-wife
+          Let the old be knaves at ease;
+          Away with the tide of that dashing life
+          Which is stirred by a constant breeze!
+
+                            II.
+          Laugh with us when you hear deceiving
+          And solemn rogues tell you what knaves we be
+          Commerce and law have a method of thieving
+          Worse than a stand at the outlaw's tree.
+          Say, will the maiden we love despise
+          Gallants at least to each other true?
+          I grant that we trample on legal ties,
+          But I have heard that Love scorns them too,
+          Courage, then,--courage, ye jolly boys,
+          Whom the fool with the knavish rates
+          Oh! who that is loved by the world enjoys
+          Half as much as the man it hates?
+
+"Bravissimo, Ned!" cried Tomlinson, rapping the table; "bravissimo! Your
+voice is superb to-night, and your song admirable. Really, Lovett, it
+does your poetical genius great credit; quite philosophical, upon my
+honour."
+
+"Bravissimo!" said MacGrawler, nodding his head awfully. "Mr. Pepper's
+voice is as sweet as a bagpipe! Ah! such a song would have been
+invaluable to 'The Asinaeum,' when I had the honour to--"
+
+"Be Vicar of Bray to that establishment," interrupted Tomlinson. "Pray,
+MacGrawler, why do they call Edinburgh the Modern Athens?"
+
+"Because of the learned and great men it produces," returned MacGrawler,
+with conscious pride.
+
+"Pooh! pooh!--you are thinking of ancient Athens. Your city is called
+the modern Athens because you are all so like the modern Athenians,--the
+greatest scoundrels imaginable, unless travellers belie them."
+
+"Nay," interrupted Ned, who was softened by the applause of the critic,
+"Mac is a good fellow, spare him. Gentlemen, your health. I am going to
+bed, and I suppose you will not tarry long behind me."
+
+"Trust us for that," answered Tomlinson; "the captain and I will consult
+on the business of the morrow, and join you in the twinkling of a
+bedpost, as it has been shrewdly expressed."
+
+Ned yawned his last "good-night," and disappeared within the dormitory.
+MacGrawler, yawning also, but with a graver yawn, as became his wisdom,
+betook himself to the duty of removing the supper paraphernalia: after
+bustling soberly about for some minutes, he let down a press-bed in the
+corner of the cave (for he did not sleep in the robbers' apartment), and
+undressing himself, soon appeared buried in the bosom of Morpheus. But
+the chief and Tomlinson, drawing their seats nearer to the dying embers,
+defied the slothful god, and entered with low tones into a close and
+anxious commune.
+
+"So, then," said Augustus, "now that you have realized sufficient funds
+for your purpose, you will really desert us? Have you well weighed the
+pros and cons? Remember that nothing is so dangerous to our state
+as reform; the moment a man grows honest, the gang forsake him; the
+magistrate misses his fee; the informer peaches; and the recusant
+hangs."
+
+"I have well weighed all this," answered Clifford, "and have decided on
+my course. I have only tarried till my means could assist my will. With
+my share of our present and late booty, I shall betake myself to the
+Continent. Prussia gives easy trust and ready promotion to all who will
+enlist in her service. But this language, my dear friend, seems strange
+from your lips. Surely you will join me in my separation from the corps?
+What! you shake your head! Are you not the same Tomlinson who at Bath
+agreed with me that we were in danger from the envy of our comrades, and
+that retreat had become necessary to our safety? Nay, was not this your
+main argument for our matrimonial expedition?"
+
+"Why, look you, dear Lovett," said Augustus, "we are all blocks of
+matter, formed from the atoms of custom; in other words, we are a
+mechanism, to which habit is the spring. What could I do in an honest
+career? I am many years older than you. I have lived as a rogue till I
+have no other nature than roguery. I doubt if I should not be a coward
+were I to turn soldier. I am sure I should be the most consummate of
+rascals were I to affect to be honest. No: I mistook myself when I
+talked of separation. I must e'en jog on with my old comrades, and in
+my old ways; till I jog into the noose hempen or--melancholy
+alternative!--the noose matrimonial."
+
+"This is mere folly," said Clifford, from whose nervous and masculine
+mind habits were easily shaken. "We have not for so many years discarded
+all the servile laws of others, to be the abject slaves of our own
+weaknesses. Come, my dear fellow, rouse yourself. Heaven knows, were I
+to succumb to the feebleness of my own heart, I should be lost indeed.
+And perhaps, wrestle I ever so stoutly, I do not wrestle away that which
+clings within me, and will kill me, though by inches. But let us not be
+cravens, and suffer fate to drown us rather than swim. In a word, fly
+with me ere it be too late. A smuggler's vessel waits me off the coast
+of Dorset: in three days from this I sail. Be my companion. We can both
+rein a fiery horse, and wield a good sword. As long as men make war one
+against another, those accomplishments will prevent their owner from
+starving, or--"
+
+"If employed in the field, not the road," interrupted Tomlinson, with a
+smile,--"from hanging. But it cannot be! I wish you all joy, all success
+in your career. You are young, bold, and able; and you always had a
+loftier spirit than I have. Knave I am, and knave I must be to the end
+of the chapter!"
+
+"As you will," said Clifford, who was not a man of many words, but he
+spoke with reluctance: "if so, I must seek my fortune alone."
+
+"When do you leave us?" asked Tomlinson.
+
+"To-morrow, before noon. I shall visit London for a few hours, and then
+start at once for the coast."
+
+"London!" exclaimed Tomlinson; "what, the very den of danger? Pooh! you
+do not know what you say: or do you think it filial to caress Mother
+Lobkins before you depart?"
+
+"Not that," answered Clifford. "I have already ascertained that she is
+above the reach of all want; and her days, poor soul! cannot, I fear, be
+many. In all probability she would scarcely recognize me; for her habits
+cannot much have improved her memory. Would I could say as much for her
+neighbours! Were I to be seen in the purlieus of low thievery, you know,
+as well as I do, that some stealer of kerchiefs would turn informer
+against the notorious Captain Lovett."
+
+"What, then, takes you to town? Ah! you turn away your face. I guess!
+Well, Love has ruined many a hero before; may you not be the worse for
+his godship!"
+
+Clifford did not answer, and the conversation made a sudden and long
+pause; Tomlinson broke it.
+
+"Do you know, Lovett," said he, "though I have as little heart as most
+men, yet I feel for you more than I could have thought it possible.
+I would fain join you; there is devilish good tobacco in Germany, I
+believe; and, after all, there is not so much difference between the
+life of a thief and of a soldier."
+
+"Do profit by so sensible a remark," said Clifford. "Reflect! how
+certain of destruction is the path you now tread; the gallows and the
+hulks are the only goals!"
+
+"The prospects are not pleasing, I allow," said Tomlinson; "nor is it
+desirable to be preserved for another century in the immortality of a
+glass case in Surgeons' Hall, grinning from ear to ear, as if one had
+made the merriest finale imaginable. Well! I will sleep on it, and you
+shall have my answer tomorrow; but poor Ned?"
+
+"Would he not join us?"
+
+"Certainly not; his neck is made for a rope, and his mind for the Old
+Bailey. There is no hope for him; yet he is an excellent fellow. We must
+not even tell him of our meditated desertion."
+
+"By no means. I shall leave a letter to our London chief; it will
+explain all. And now to bed. I look to your companionship as settled."
+
+"Humph!" said Augustus Tomlinson.
+
+So ended the conference of the robbers. About an hour after it had
+ceased, and when no sound save the heavy breath of Long Ned broke the
+stillness of the night, the intelligent countenance of Peter MacGrawler
+slowly elevated itself from the lonely pillow on which it had reclined.
+
+By degrees the back of the sage stiffened into perpendicularity, and
+he sat for a few moments erect on his seat of honour, apparently in
+listening deliberation. Satisfied with the deep silence that, save the
+solitary interruption we have specified, reigned around, the learned
+disciple of Vatel rose gently from the bed, hurried on his clothes,
+stole on tiptoe to the door, unbarred it with a noiseless hand, and
+vanished. Sweet reader! while thou art wondering at his absence, suppose
+we account for his appearance.
+
+One evening Clifford and his companion Augustus had been enjoying the
+rational amusement at Ranelagh, and were just leaving that celebrated
+place when they were arrested by a crowd at the entrance. That crowd was
+assembled round a pickpocket; and that pickpocket--O virtue, O wisdom,
+O Asinaeum!--was Peter MacGrawler! We have before said that Clifford was
+possessed of a good mien and an imposing manner, and these advantages
+were at that time especially effectual in preserving our Orbilius from
+the pump. No sooner did Clifford recognize the magisterial face of
+the sapient Scot, than he boldly thrust himself into the middle of
+the crowd, and collaring the enterprising citizen who had collared
+MacGrawler, declared himself ready to vouch for the honesty of the
+very respectable person whose identity had evidently been so grossly
+mistaken. Augustus, probably foreseeing some ingenious ruse, of his
+companion, instantly seconded the defence. The mob, who never descry any
+difference between impudence and truth, gave way; a constable came up,
+took part with the friend of two gentlemen so unexceptionally dressed;
+our friends walked off; the crowd repented of their precipitation, and
+by way of amends ducked the gentleman whose pockets had been picked. It
+was in vain for him to defend himself, for he had an impediment in his
+speech; and Messieurs the mob, having ducked him once for his guilt,
+ducked him a second time for his embarrassment.
+
+In the interim Clifford had withdrawn his quondam Mentor to the asylum
+of a coffee-house; and while MacGrawler's soul expanded itself by wine,
+he narrated the causes of his dilemma. It seems that that incomparable
+journal "The Asinaeum," despite a series of most popular articles upon
+the writings of "Aulus Prudentius," to which were added an exquisite
+string of dialogues, written in a tone of broad humour, namely,
+broad Scotch (with Scotchmen it is all the same thing), despite these
+invaluable miscellanies, to say nothing of some glorious political
+articles, in which it was clearly proved to the satisfaction of
+the rich, that the less poor devils eat the better for their
+constitutions,--despite, we say, these great acquisitions to British
+literature, "The Asinaeum" tottered, fell, buried its bookseller, and
+crushed its author. MacGrawler only,--escaping, like Theodore from the
+enormous helmet of Otranto,--MacGrawler only survived. "Love," says Sir
+Philip Sidney, "makes a man see better than a pair of spectacles."
+Love of life has a very different effect on the optics,--it makes a
+man wofully dim of inspection, and sometimes causes him to see his own
+property in another man's purse! This deceptio visus, did it impose upon
+Peter MacGrawler? He went to Ranelagh. Reader, thou knowest the rest!
+
+Wine and the ingenuity of the robbers having extorted this narrative
+from MacGrawler, the barriers of superfluous delicacy were easily done
+away with.
+
+Our heroes offered to the sage an introduction to their club; the offer
+was accepted; and MacGrawler, having been first made drunk, was next
+made a robber. The gang engaged him in various little matters, in which
+we grieve to relate that though his intentions were excellent, his
+success was so ill as thoroughly to enrage his employers; nay, they were
+about at one time, when they wanted to propitiate justice, to hand him
+over to the secular power, when Clifford interposed in his behalf. From
+a robber the sage dwindled into a drudge; menial offices (the robbers,
+the lying rascals, declared that such offices were best fitted to the
+genius of his country!) succeeded to noble exploits, and the worst of
+robbers became the best of cooks. How vain is all wisdom but that of
+long experience! Though Clifford was a sensible, and keen man, though he
+knew our sage to be a knave, he never dreamed he could be a traitor.
+He thought him too indolent to be malicious, and--short-sighted
+humanity!--too silly to be dangerous. He trusted the sage with the
+secret of the cavern; and Augustus, who was a bit of an epicure,
+submitted, though forebodingly, to the choice, because of the
+Scotchman's skill in broiling.
+
+But MacGrawler, like Brutus, concealed a scheming heart under a stolid
+guise. The apprehension of the noted Lovett had become a matter of
+serious desire; the police was no longer to be bribed, nay, they were
+now eager to bribe. MacGrawler had watched his time, sold his chief, and
+was now on the road to Reading to meet and to guide to the cavern Mr.
+Nabbem of Bow Street and four of his attendants.
+
+Having thus, as rapidly as we were able, traced the causes which brought
+so startlingly before your notice the most incomparable of critics, we
+now, reader, return to our robbers.
+
+"Hist, Lovett!" said Tomlinson, half asleep, "methought I heard
+something in the outer cave."
+
+"It is the Scot, I suppose," answered Clifford: "you saw, of course, to
+the door?"
+
+"To be sure!" muttered Tomlinson, and in two minutes more he was asleep.
+
+Not so Clifford: many and anxious thoughts kept him waking. At one
+while, when he anticipated the opening to a new career, somewhat of
+the stirring and high spirit which still moved amidst the guilty and
+confused habits of his mind made his pulse feverish and his limbs
+restless; at another time, an agonizing remembrance,--the remembrance
+of Lucy in all her charms, her beauty, her love, her tender and innocent
+heart,--Lucy all perfect, and lost to him forever,--banished every other
+reflection, and only left him the sick sensation of despondency and
+despair. "What avails my struggle for a better name?" he thought.
+"Whatever my future lot, she can never share it. My punishment is
+fixed,--it is worse than a death of shame; it is a life without hope!
+Every moment I feel, and shall feel to the last, the pressure of a chain
+that may never be broken or loosened! And yet, fool that I am! I cannot
+leave this country without seeing her again, without telling her that I
+have really looked my last. But have I not twice told her that? Strange
+fatality! But twice have I spoken to her of love, and each time it was
+to tear myself from her at the moment of my confession. And even now
+something that I have no power to resist compels me to the same idle and
+weak indulgence. Does destiny urge me? Ay, perhaps to my destruction!
+Every hour a thousand deaths encompass me. I have now obtained all for
+which I seemed to linger. I have won, by a new crime, enough to bear me
+to another land, and to provide me there a soldier's destiny. I should
+not lose an hour in flight, yet I rush into the nest of my enemies, only
+for one unavailing word with her; and this, too, after I have already
+bade her farewell! Is this fate? If it be so, what matters it? I no
+longer care for a life which, after all, I should reform in vain if I
+could not reform it for her; yet--yet, selfish and lost that I am!
+will it be nothing to think hereafter that I have redeemed her from the
+disgrace of having loved an outcast and a felon? If I can obtain honour,
+will it not, in my own heart at least,--will it not reflect, however
+dimly and distantly, upon her?"
+
+Such, bewildered, unsatisfactory, yet still steeped in the colours
+of that true love which raises even the lowest, were the midnight
+meditations of Clifford; they terminated, towards the morning, in an
+uneasy and fitful slumber. From this he was awakened by a loud yawn from
+the throat of Long Ned, who was always the earliest riser of his set.
+
+"Hullo!" said he, "it is almost daybreak; and if we want to cash our
+notes and to move the old lord's jewels, we should already be on the
+start."
+
+"A plague on you!" said Tomlinson, from under cover of his woollen
+nightcap; "it was but this instant that I was dreaming you were going to
+be hanged, and now you wake me in the pleasantest part of the dream!"
+
+"You be shot!" said Ned, turning one leg out of bed; "by the by, you
+took more than your share last night, for you owed me three guineas
+for our last game at cribbage! You'll please to pay me before we part
+to-day: short accounts make long friends!"
+
+"However true that maxim may be," returned Tomlinson, "I know one much
+truer,--namely, long friends will make short accounts! You must ask Jack
+Ketch this day month if I'm wrong!"
+
+"That's what you call wit, I suppose!" retorted Ned, as he now,
+struggling into his inexpressibles, felt his way into the outer cave.
+
+"What, ho, Mac!" cried he, as he went, "stir those bobbins of thine,
+which thou art pleased to call legs; strike a light, and be d---d to
+you!"
+
+"A light for you," said Tomlinson, profanely, as he reluctantly left his
+couch, "will indeed be a 'light to lighten the Gentiles!'"
+
+"Why, Mac, Mac!" shouted Ned, "why don't you answer? faith, I think the
+Scot's dead!"
+
+"Seize your men!--Yield, sirs!" cried a stern, sudden voice from the
+gloom; and at that instant two dark lanterns were turned, and their
+light streamed full upon the astounded forms of Tomlinson and his gaunt
+comrade! In the dark shade of the background four or five forms were
+also indistinctly visible; and the ray of the lanterns glimmered on
+the blades of cutlasses and the barrels of weapons still less easily
+resisted.
+
+Tomlinson was the first to recover his self-possession. The light
+just gleamed upon the first step of the stairs leading to the stables,
+leaving the rest in shadow. He made one stride to the place beside the
+cart, where, we have said, lay some of the robbers' weapons; he had
+been anticipated,--the weapons were gone. The next moment Tomlinson had
+sprung up the steps.
+
+"Lovett! Lovett! Lovett!" shouted he.
+
+The captain, who had followed his comrades into the cavern, was already
+in the grasp of two men. From few ordinary mortals, however, could any
+two be selected as fearful odds against such a man as Clifford,--a man
+in whom a much larger share of sinews and muscle than is usually the
+lot even of the strong had been hardened, by perpetual exercise, into
+a consistency and iron firmness which linked power and activity into a
+union scarcely less remarkable than that immortalized in the glorious
+beauty of the sculptured gladiator. His right hand is upon the throat of
+one assailant; his left locks, as in a vice, the wrist of the other; you
+have scarcely time to breathe! The former is on the ground, the pistol
+of the latter is wrenched from his grip, Clifford is on the step;
+a ball--another--whizzes by him; he is by the side of the faithful
+Augustus!
+
+"Open the secret door!" whispered Clifford to his friend; "I will draw
+up the steps alone."
+
+Scarcely had he spoken, before the steps were already, but slowly,
+ascending beneath the desperate strength of the robber. Meanwhile Ned
+was struggling, as he best might, with two sturdy officers, who appeared
+loath to use their weapons without an absolute necessity, and who
+endeavoured, by main strength, to capture and detain their antagonist.
+
+"Look well to the door!" cried the voice of the principal officer, "and
+hang out more light!"
+
+Two or three additional lanterns were speedily brought forward; and over
+the whole interior of the cavern a dim but sufficient light now rapidly
+circled, giving to the scene and to the combatants a picturesque and
+wild appearance.
+
+The quick eye of the head-officer descried in an instant the rise of the
+steps, and the advantage the robbers were thereby acquiring. He and two
+of his men threw themselves forward, seized the ladder, if so it may be
+called, dragged it once more to the ground, and ascended. But Clifford,
+grasping with both hands the broken shaft of a cart that lay in reach,
+received the foremost invader with a salute that sent him prostrate and
+senseless back among his companions. The second shared the same fate;
+and the stout leader of the enemy, who, like a true general, had kept
+himself in the rear, paused now in the middle of the steps, dismayed
+alike by the reception of his friends and the athletic form towering
+above, with raised weapons and menacing attitude. Perhaps that moment
+seemed to the judicious Mr. Nabbem more favourable to parley than to
+conflict. He cleared his throat, and thus addressed the foe:
+
+"You, sir, Captain Lovett, alias Howard, alias Jackson, alias Cavendish,
+alias Solomons, alias Devil,--for I knows you well, and could swear to
+you with half an eye, in your clothes or without,--you lay down your
+club there, and let me come alongside of you, and you'll find me as
+gentle as a lamb; for I've been used to gemmen all my life, and I knows
+how to treat 'em when I has 'em!"
+
+"But if I will not let you 'come alongside of me,' what then?"
+
+"Why, I must send one of these here pops through your skull, that's
+all!"
+
+"Nay, Mr. Nabbem, that would be too cruel! You surely would not harm one
+who has such an esteem for you? Don't you remember the manner in which
+I brought you off from Justice Burnflat, when you were accused, you know
+whether justly or--"
+
+"You're a liar, Captain!" cried Nabbem, furiously, fearful that
+something not meet for the ears of his companions should transpire.
+"You knows you are! Come down, or let me mount; otherwise I won't be
+'sponsible for the consequences!"
+
+Clifford cast a look over his shoulder. A gleam of the gray daylight
+already glimmered through a chink in the secret door, which Tomlinson
+had now unbarred and was about to open.
+
+"Listen to me, Mr. Nabbem," said he, "and perhaps I may grant what you
+require! What would you do with me if you had me?"
+
+"You speaks like a sensible man now," answered Nabbem; "and that's after
+my own heart. Why, you sees, Captain, your time is come, and you can't
+shilly-shally any longer. You have had your full swing; your years are
+up, and you must die like a man! But I gives you my honour as a gemman,
+that if you surrenders, I'll take you to the justice folks as tenderly
+as if you were made of cotton."
+
+"Give way one moment," said Clifford, "that I may plant the steps firmer
+for you."
+
+Nabbem retreated to the ground; and Clifford, who had, good-naturedly
+enough, been unwilling unnecessarily to damage so valuable a
+functionary, lost not the opportunity now afforded him. Down thundered
+the steps, clattering heavily among the other officers, and falling like
+an avalanche on the shoulder of one of the arresters of Long Ned.
+
+Meanwhile Clifford sprang after Tomlinson through the aperture, and
+found himself--in the presence of four officers, conducted by the shrewd
+MacGrawler. A blow from a bludgeon on the right cheek and temple of
+Augustus felled that hero. But Clifford bounded over his comrade's
+body, dodged from the stroke aimed at himself, caught the blow aimed
+by another assailant in his open hand, wrested the bludgeon from the
+officer, struck him to the ground with his own weapon, and darting
+onward through the labyrinth of the wood, commenced his escape with a
+step too fleet to allow the hope of a successful pursuit.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+          "In short, Isabella, I offer you myself!"
+          "Heavens!" cried Isabella, "what do I hear?  You, my lord?"
+                                             Castle of Otranto.
+
+A novel is like a weatherglass,--where the man appears out at one time,
+the woman at another. Variable as the atmosphere, the changes of our
+story now re-present Lucy to the reader.
+
+That charming young person--who, it may be remarked, is (her father
+excepted) the only unsophisticated and unsullied character in the pages
+of a story in some measure designed to show, in the depravities of
+character, the depravities of that social state wherein characters are
+formed--was sitting alone in her apartment at the period in which we
+return to her. As time, and that innate and insensible fund of healing,
+which Nature has placed in the bosoms of the young in order that her
+great law, the passing away of the old, may not leave too lasting and
+keen a wound, had softened her first anguish at her father's death, the
+remembrance of Clifford again resumed its ancient sway in her heart. The
+loneliness of her life, the absence of amusement, even the sensitiveness
+and languor which succeed to grief, conspired to invest the image of her
+lover in a tenderer and more impressive guise. She recalled his words,
+his actions, his letters, and employed herself whole hours, whole days
+and nights, in endeavouring to decipher their mystery. Who that has been
+loved will not acknowledge the singular and mighty force with which a
+girl, innocent herself, clings to the belief of innocence in her lover?
+In breasts young and unacquainted with the world, there is so pure a
+credulity in the existence of unmixed good, so firm a reluctance to
+think that where we love there can be that which we would not esteem, or
+where we admire there can be that which we ought to blame, that one may
+almost deem it an argument in favour of our natural power to attain
+a greater eminence in virtue than the habits and arts of the existing
+world will allow us to reach. Perhaps it is not paradoxical to say that
+we could scarcely believe perfection in others, were not the germ of
+perfectibility in our own minds! When a man has lived some years among
+the actual contests of faction without imbibing the prejudice as well
+as the experience, how wonderingly be smiles at his worship of former
+idols, how different a colour does history wear to him, how cautious is
+he now to praise, how slow to admire, how prone to cavil! Human nature
+has become the human nature of art; and he estimates it not from what it
+may be, but from what, in the corruptions of a semi-civilization, it is!
+But in the same manner as the young student clings to the belief that
+the sage or the minstrel, who has enlightened his reason or chained his
+imagination, is in character as in genius elevated above the ordinary
+herd, free from the passions, the frivolities, the little meannesses,
+and the darkening vices which ordinary flesh is heir to, does a woman
+who loves for the first time cling to the imagined excellence of him she
+loves. When Evelina is so shocked at the idea of an occasional fit
+of intoxication in her "noble, her unrivalled" lover, who does not
+acknowledge how natural were her feelings? Had Evelina been married six
+years, and the same lover, then her husband, been really guilty of what
+she suspected, who does not feel that it would have been very unnatural
+to have been shocked in the least at the occurrence? She would not have
+loved him less, nor admired him less, nor would he have been less "the
+noble and the unrivalled,"--he would have taken his glass too much, have
+joked the next morning on the event, and the gentle Evelina would
+have made him a cup of tea; but that which would have been a matter
+of pleasantry in the husband would have been matter of damnation in a
+lover. But to return to Lucy.
+
+If it be so hard, so repellent, to believe a lover guilty even of a
+trivial error, we may readily suppose that Lucy never for a moment
+admitted the supposition that Clifford had been really guilty of gross
+error or wilful crime. True that expressions in his letter were
+more than suspicious; but there is always a charm in the candour of
+self-condemnation. As it is difficult to believe the excellence of those
+who praise themselves, so it is difficult to fancy those criminal who
+condemn. What, too, is the process of a woman's reasoning? Alas! she is
+too credulous a physiognomist. The turn of a throat, with her, is the
+unerring token of nobleness of mind; and no one can be guilty of a sin
+who is blessed with a beautiful forehead! How fondly, how fanatically
+Lucy loved! She had gathered together a precious and secret hoard,--a
+glove, a pen, a book, a withered rose-leaf,--treasures rendered
+inestimable because he had touched them; but more than all, had she
+the series of his letters,--from the first formal note written to her
+father, meant for her, in which he answered an invitation, and requested
+Miss Brandon's acceptance of the music she had wished to have, to the
+last wild and, to her, inexplicable letter in which he had resigned her
+forever. On these relics her eyes fed for hours; and as she pored
+over them, and over thoughts too deep not only for tears but for all
+utterance or conveyance, you might have almost literally watched the
+fading of her rich cheek and the pining away of her rounded and elastic
+form.
+
+It was just in such a mood that she was buried when her uncle knocked at
+her door for admittance. She hurried away her treasures, and hastened to
+admit and greet him.
+
+"I have come," said he, smiling, "to beg the pleasure of your company
+for an old friend who dines with us to-day. But, stay, Lucy, your hair
+is ill-arranged. Do not let me disturb so important an occupation as
+your toilette; dress yourself, my love, and join us."
+
+Lucy turned, with a suppressed sigh, to the glass. The uncle lingered
+for a few moments, surveying her with mingled pride and doubt; he then
+slowly left the chamber.
+
+Lucy soon afterwards descended to the drawing-room, and beheld with a
+little surprise (for she had not had sufficient curiosity to inquire
+the name of the guest), the slender form and comely features of Lord
+Mauleverer. The earl approached with the same grace which had in his
+earlier youth rendered him almost irresistible, but which now, from the
+contrast of years with manner, contained a slight mixture of the comic.
+He paid his compliments, and in paying them declared that he must leave
+it to his friend, Sir William, to explain all the danger he had dared,
+for the sake of satisfying himself that Miss Brandon was no less lovely
+than when he had last beheld her.
+
+"Yes, indeed," said Brandon, with a scarcely perceptible sneer, "Lord
+Mauleverer has literally endured the moving accidents of flood and
+field,--for he was nearly exterminated by a highwayman, and all but
+drowned in a ditch!"
+
+"Commend me to a friend for setting one off to the best advantage,"
+said Mauleverer, gayly. "Instead of attracting your sympathy, you see,
+Brandon would expose me to your ridicule; judge for yourself whether I
+deserve it!" and Mauleverer proceeded to give, with all the animation
+which belonged to his character, the particulars of that adventure with
+which the reader is so well acquainted. He did not, we may be sure,
+feel any scruple in representing himself and his prowess in the most
+favourable colours.
+
+The story was scarcely ended when dinner was announced. During that meal
+Mauleverer exerted himself to be amiable with infinite address. Suiting
+his conversation, more than he had hitherto deigned to do, to the temper
+of Lucy, and more anxious to soften than to dazzle, he certainly never
+before appeared to her so attractive. We are bound to add that the point
+of attraction did not reach beyond the confession that he was a very
+agreeable old man.
+
+Perhaps, if there had not been a certain half-melancholy vein in
+his conversation, possibly less uncongenial to his lordship from the
+remembrance of his lost diamonds, and the impression that Sir William
+Brandon's cook was considerably worse than his own, he might not have
+been so successful in pleasing Lucy. As for himself, all the previous
+impressions she had made on him returned in colours yet more vivid;
+even the delicate and subdued cast of beauty which had succeeded to her
+earlier brilliancy, was far more charming to his fastidious and courtly
+taste than her former glow of spirits and health. He felt himself very
+much in love during dinner; and after it was over, and Lucy had retired,
+he told Brandon, with a passionate air, that he adored his niece to
+distraction!
+
+The wily judge affected to receive the intimation with indifference; but
+knowing that too long an absence is injurious to a grande passion, he
+did not keep Mauleverer very late over his wine.
+
+The earl returned rapturously to the drawing-room, and besought Lucy,
+in a voice in which affectation seemed swooning with delight, to indulge
+him with a song. More and more enchanted by her assent, he drew the
+music-stool to the harpsichord, placed a chair beside her, and presently
+appeared lost in transport. Meanwhile Brandon, with his back to the
+pair, covered his face with his handkerchief, and to all appearance
+yielded to the voluptuousness of an after-dinner repose.
+
+Lucy's song-book opened accidentally at a song which had been praised by
+Clifford; and as she sang, her voice took a richer and more tender tone
+than in Mauleverer's presence it had ever before assumed.
+
+       THE COMPLAINT OF THE VIOLETS WHICH LOSE THEIR SCENT IN MAY.
+
+          In the shadow that falls from the silent hill
+          We slept, in our green retreats
+          And the April showers were wont to fill
+          Our hearts with sweets.
+
+          And though we lay in a lowly bower,
+          Yet all things loved us well,
+          And the waking bee left her fairest flower,
+          With us to dwell.
+
+          But the warm May came in his pride to woo
+          The wealth of our honeyed store;
+          And our hearts just felt his breath, and knew
+          Their sweets no more!
+
+          And the summer reigns on the quiet spot
+          Where we dwell, and its suns and showers
+          Bring balm to our sisters' hearts, but not--
+          Ah! not to ours.
+
+          We live, we bloom, but forever o'er
+          Is the charm of the earth and sky;
+          To our life, ye heavens, that balm restore,
+          Or--bid us die!
+
+As with eyes suffused with many recollections, and a voice which melted
+away in an indescribable and thrilling pathos, Lucy ceased her song,
+Mauleverer, charmed out of himself, gently took her hand, and holding
+the soft treasure in his own, scarcely less soft, he murmured,--
+
+"Angel, sing on! Life would be like your own music, if I could breathe
+it away at your feet!"
+
+There had been a time when Lucy would have laughed outright at this
+declaration; and even as it was, a suppressed and half-arch smile played
+in the dimples of her beautiful mouth, and bewitchingly contrasted the
+swimming softness of her eyes.
+
+Drawing rather an erroneous omen from the smile, Mauleverer rapturously
+continued, still detaining the hand which Lucy endeavoured to
+extricate,--
+
+"Yes, enchanting Miss Brandon! I, who have for so many years boasted
+of my invulnerable heart, am subdued at last. I have long, very long,
+struggled against my attachment to you. Alas! it is in vain; and you
+behold me now utterly at your mercy. Make me the most miserable of men
+or the most enviable. Enchantress, speak!"
+
+"Really, my lord," said Lucy, hesitating, yet rising, and freeing
+herself from his hand, "I feel it difficult to suppose you serious; and
+perhaps this is merely a gallantry to me by way of practice on others."
+
+"Sweet Lucy, if I may so call you," answered Mauleverer, with an ardent
+gaze, "do not, I implore you, even for a moment, affect to mistake me!
+Do not for a moment jest at what, to me, is the bane or bliss of life!
+Dare I hope that my hand and heart, which I now offer you, are not
+deserving of your derision?"
+
+Lucy gazed on her adorer with a look of serious inquiry; Brandon still
+appeared to sleep.
+
+"If you are in earnest, my lord," said Lucy, after a pause, "I am truly
+and deeply sorry. For the friend of my uncle I shall always have esteem;
+believe that I am truly sensible of the honour you render me, when I add
+my regret that I can have no other sentiment than esteem."
+
+A blank and puzzled bewilderment for a moment clouded the expressive
+features of Mauleverer; it passed away. "How sweet is your rebuke!" said
+he. "Yes; I do not yet deserve any other sentiment than esteem. You are
+not to be won precipitately; a long trial, a long course of attentions,
+a long knowledge of my devoted and ardent love, alone will entitle me
+to hope for a warmer feeling in your breast. Fix then your own time of
+courtship, angelic Lucy!---a week, nay, a month! Till then, I will not
+even press you to appoint that day which to me will be the whitest of my
+life!"
+
+"My lord!" said Lucy, smiling now no longer half archly, "you must
+pardon me for believing your proposal can be nothing but a jest; but
+here, I beseech you, let it rest forever. Do not mention this subject to
+me again."
+
+"By heavens!" cried Mauleverer, "this is too cruel. Brandon, intercede
+with me for your niece."
+
+Sir William started, naturally enough, from his slumber, and Mauleverer
+continued,
+
+"Yes, intercede for me; you, my oldest friend, be my greatest
+benefactor! I sue to your niece; she affects to disbelieve. Will you
+convince her of my truth, my devotion, my worship?"
+
+"Disbelieve you!" said the bland judge, with the same secret sneer that
+usually lurked in the corners of his mouth. "I do not wonder that she is
+slow to credit the honour you have done her, and for which the noblest
+damsels in England have sighed in vain. Lucy, will you be cruel to Lord
+Mauleverer? Believe me, he has often confided to me his love for you;
+and if the experience of some years avails, there is not a question of
+his honour and his truth. I leave his fate in your hands."
+
+Brandon turned to the door.
+
+"Stay, dear sir," said Lucy, "and instead of interceding for Lord
+Mauleverer, intercede for me." Her look now settled into a calm and
+decided seriousness of expression. "I feel highly flattered by his
+lordship's proposal, which, as you say, I might well doubt to be gravely
+meant. I wish him all happiness with a lady of higher deserts; but I
+speak from an unalterable determination, when I say that I can never
+accept the dignity with which he would invest me."
+
+So saying, Lucy walked quickly to the door and vanished, leaving the two
+friends to comment as they would upon her conduct.
+
+"You have spoiled all with your precipitation," said the uncle.
+
+"Precipitation! d---n it, what would you have? I have been fifty years
+making up my mind to marry; and now when I have not a day to lose, you
+talk of precipitation!" answered the lover, throwing himself into an
+easy-chair.
+
+"But you have not been fifty years making up your mind to marry my
+niece," said Brandon, dryly.
+
+"To be refused, positively refused, by a country girl!" continued
+Mauleverer, soliloquizing aloud; "and that too at my age and with all
+my experience!--a country girl without rank, ton, accomplishments! By
+heavens! I don't care if all the world heard it,--for not a soul in the
+world will ever believe it."
+
+Brandon sat speechless, eying the mortified face of the courtier with
+a malicious complacency, and there was a pause of several minutes.
+Sir William then, mastering the strange feeling which made him always
+rejoice in whatever threw ridicule on his friend, approached, laid his
+hand kindly on Mauleverer's shoulder, and talked to him of comfort and
+of encouragement. The reader will believe that Mauleverer was not a man
+whom it was impossible to encourage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+     Before he came, everything loved me, and I had more things to love
+     than I could reckon by the hairs of my head.  Now I feel I can love
+     but one, and that one has deserted me....  Well, be it so,--
+     let her perish, let her be anything but mine!--Melmoth.
+
+Early the next morning Sir William Brandon was closeted for a long time
+with his niece, previous to his departure to the duties of his office.
+Anxious and alarmed for the success of one of the darling projects of
+his ambition, he spared no art in his conversation with Lucy, that his
+great ingenuity of eloquence and wonderful insight into human nature
+could suggest, in order to gain at least a foundation for the raising
+of his scheme. Among other resources of his worldly tact, he hinted at
+Lucy's love for Clifford; and (though darkly and subtly, as befitting
+the purity of the one he addressed) this abandoned and wily person did
+not scruple to hint also at the possibility of indulging that love after
+marriage; though he denounced, as the last of indecorums, the crime
+of encouraging it before. This hint, however, fell harmless upon the
+innocent ear of Lucy. She did not in the remotest degree comprehend its
+meaning; she only, with a glowing cheek and a pouting lip, resented
+the allusion to a love which she thought it insolent in any one even to
+suspect.
+
+When Brandon left the apartment, his brow was clouded, and his eye
+absent and thoughtful: it was evident that there had been little in the
+conference with his niece to please or content him. Miss Brandon herself
+was greatly agitated; for there was in her uncle's nature that silent
+and impressive secret of influencing or commanding others which almost
+so invariably and yet so quietly attains the wishes of its owner; and
+Lucy, who loved and admired him sincerely,--not the less, perhaps, for
+a certain modicum of fear,--was greatly grieved at perceiving how
+rooted in him was the desire of that marriage which she felt was a moral
+impossibility. But if Brandon possessed the secret of sway, Lucy was
+scarcely less singularly endowed with the secret of resistance. It may
+be remembered, in describing her character, that we spoke of her as one
+who seemed, to the superficial, as of too yielding and soft a temper.
+But circumstances gave the lie to manner, and proved that she eminently
+possessed a quiet firmness and latent resolution, which gave to her mind
+a nobleness and trustworthy power that never would have been suspected
+by those who met her among the ordinary paths of life.
+
+Brandon had not been long gone, when Lucy's maid came to inform her that
+a gentleman, who expressed himself very desirous of seeing her, waited
+below. The blood rushed from Lucy's cheek at this announcement, simple
+as it seemed. "What gentleman could be desirous of seeing her? Was
+it--was it Clifford?" She remained for some moments motionless, and
+literally unable to move; at length she summoned courage, and smiling
+with self-contempt at a notion which appeared to her after thoughts
+utterly absurd, she descended to the drawing-room. The first glance she
+directed towards the stranger, who stood by the fireplace with folded
+arms, was sufficient,--it was impossible to mistake, though the face was
+averted, the unequalled form of her lover. She advanced eagerly with a
+faint cry, checked herself, and sank upon the sofa.
+
+Clifford turned towards her, and fixed his eyes upon her countenance
+with an intense and melancholy gaze, but he did not utter a syllable;
+and Lucy, after pausing in expectation of his voice, looked up, and
+caught, in alarm, the strange and peculiar aspect of his features. He
+approached her slowly, and still silent; but his gaze seemed to grow
+more earliest and mournful as he advanced.
+
+"Yes," said he at last, in a broken and indistinct voice, "I see you
+once more, after all my promises to quit you forever,--after, my solemn
+farewell, after all that I have cost you; for, Lucy, you love me, you
+love me, and I shudder while I feel it; after all I myself have borne
+and resisted, I once more come wilfully into your presence! How have I
+burned and sickened for this moment! How have I said, 'Let me behold her
+once more, only once more, and Fate may then do her worst!' Lucy! dear,
+dear Lucy! forgive me for my weakness. It is now in bitter and stern
+reality the very last I can be guilty of!"
+
+As he spoke, Clifford sank beside her. He took both her hands in his,
+and holding them, though without pressure, again looked passionately
+upon her innocent yet eloquent face. It seemed as if he were moved
+beyond all the ordinary feelings of reunion and of love. He did not
+attempt to kiss the hands he held; and though the touch thrilled through
+every vein and fibre of his frame, his clasp was as light as that in
+which the first timidity of a boy's love ventures to stamp itself!
+
+"You are pale, Lucy," said he, mournfully, "and your cheek is much
+thinner than it was when I first saw you. When I first saw you! Ah!
+would for your sake that that had never been! Your spirits were light
+then, Lucy; your laugh came from the heart, your step spurned the earth.
+Joy broke from your eyes, everything that breathed around you seemed
+full of happiness and mirth; and now, look upon me, Lucy! lift those
+soft eyes, and teach them to flash upon me indignation and contempt!
+Oh, not thus, not thus! I could leave you happy,--yes, literally
+blessed,--if I could fancy you less forgiving, less gentle, less
+angelic!"
+
+"What have I to forgive?" said Lucy, tenderly.
+
+"What! everything for which one human being can pardon another. Have not
+deceit and injury been my crimes against you? Your peace of mind, your
+serenity of heart, your buoyancy of temper,--have I marred these or
+not?"
+
+"Oh, Clifford!" said Lucy, rising from herself and from all selfish
+thoughts, "why, why will you not trust me? You do not know me, indeed
+you do not,--you are ignorant even of the very nature of a woman, if you
+think me unworthy of your confidence! Do you believe I could betray
+it, or do you think that if you had done that for which all the world
+forsook you, I could forsake?"
+
+Lucy's voice faltered at the last words; but it sank, as a stone sinks
+into deep waters, to the very core of Clifford's heart. Transported from
+all resolution and all forbearance, he wound his arms around her in one
+long and impassioned caress; and Lucy, as her breath mingled with his,
+and her cheek drooped upon his bosom, did indeed feel as if the past
+could contain no secret powerful enough even to weaken the affection
+with which her heart clung to his. She was the first to extricate
+herself from their embrace. She drew back her face from his, and smiling
+on him through her tears, with a brightness that the smiles of her
+earliest youth had never surpassed, she said,--
+
+"Listen to me. Tell me your history or not, as you will. But believe
+me, a woman's wit is often no despicable counsellor. They who accuse
+themselves the most bitterly are not often those whom it is most
+difficult to forgive; and you must pardon me if I doubt the extent of
+the blame you would so lavishly impute to yourself. I am now alone in
+the world" (here the smile withered from Lucy's lips). "My poor father
+is dead. I can injure no one by my conduct; there is no one on earth
+to whom I am bound by duty. I am independent, I am rich. You profess to
+love me. I am foolish and vain, and I believe you. Perhaps, also, I have
+the fond hope which so often makes dupes of women,--the hope that if
+you have erred, I may reclaim you; if you have been unfortunate, I may
+console you! I know, Mr. Clifford, that I am saying that for which many
+would despise me, and for which, perhaps, I ought to despise myself;
+but there are times when we speak only as if some power at our hearts
+constrained us, despite ourselves,--and it is thus that I have now
+spoken to you."
+
+It was with an air very unwonted to herself that Lucy had concluded her
+address, for her usual characteristic was rather softness than dignity;
+but, as if to correct the meaning of her words, which might otherwise
+appear unmaidenly, there was a chaste, a proud, yet not the less a
+tender and sweet propriety and dignified frankness in her look and
+manner; so that it would have been utterly impossible for one who heard
+her not to have done justice to the nobleness of her motives, or not
+to have felt both touched and penetrated, as much by respect as by any
+warmer or more familiar feeling.
+
+Clifford, who had risen while she was speaking, listened with a
+countenance that varied at every word she uttered,--now all hope, now
+all despondency. As she ceased, the expression hardened into a settled
+and compulsive resolution.
+
+"It is well!" said he, mutteringly. "I am worthy of this,--very, very
+worthy! Generous, noble girl! had I been an emperor, I would have bowed
+down to you in worship; but to debase, to degrade you,--no! no!"
+
+"Is there debasement in love?" murmured Lucy.
+
+Clifford gazed upon her with a sort of enthusiastic and self-gratulatory
+pride; perhaps he felt to be thus loved and by such a creature was
+matter of pride, even in the lowest circumstances to which he could ever
+be exposed. He drew his breath hard, set his teeth, and answered,--
+
+"You could love, then, an outcast, without birth, fortune, or character?
+No! you believe this now, but you could not.
+
+"Could you desert your country, your friends, and your home,--all that
+you are born and fitted for? Could you attend one over whom the sword
+hangs, through a life subjected every hour to discovery and disgrace?
+Could you be subjected yourself to the moodiness of an evil memory and
+the gloomy silence of remorse? Could you be the victim of one who has no
+merit but his love for you, and who, if that love destroy you, becomes
+utterly redeemed? Yes, Lucy, I was wrong--I will do you justice; all
+this, nay, more, you could bear, and your generous nature would disdain
+the sacrifice. But am I to be all selfish, and you all devoted? Are you
+to yield everything to me, and I to accept everything and yield none?
+Alas! I have but one good, one blessing to yield, and that is yourself.
+Lucy, I deserve you; I outdo you in generosity. All that you would
+desert for me is nothing--O God!--nothing to the sacrifice I make
+to you! And now, Lucy, I have seen you, and I must once more bid you
+farewell; I am on the eve of quitting this country forever. I shall
+enlist in a foreign service. Perhaps" (and Clifford's dark eyes flashed
+with fire) "you will yet hear of me, and not blush when you hear! But"
+(and his voice faltered, for Lucy, hiding her face with both hands,
+gave way to her tears and agitation),--"but, in one respect, you have
+conquered. I had believed that you could never be mine,--that my past
+life had forever deprived me of that hope! I now begin, with a rapture
+that can bear me through all ordeals, to form a more daring vision. A
+soil maybe effaced,--an evil name maybe redeemed,--the past is not set
+and sealed, without the power of revoking what has been written. If
+I can win the right of meriting your mercy, I will throw myself on it
+without reserve; till then, or till death, you will see me no more!"
+
+He dropped on his knee, left his kiss and his tears upon Lucy's cold
+hand; the next moment she heard his step on the stairs, the door closed
+heavily and jarringly upon him, and Lucy felt one bitter pang, and, for
+some time at least, she felt no more!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+               Many things fall between the cup and the lip!
+                                 Your man does please me
+               With his conceit.
+               ...............
+               Comes Chanon Hugh accoutred as you see
+               Disguised!
+               And thus am I to gull the constable?
+               Now have among you for a man at arms.
+               ...............
+               High-constable was more, though
+               He laid Dick Tator by the heels.
+                                   BEN JONSON--Tale of a Tub.
+
+Meanwhile Clifford strode rapidly through the streets which surrounded
+the judge's house, and turning to an obscurer quartier of the town,
+entered a gloomy lane or alley. Here he was abruptly accosted by a man
+wrapped in a shaggy great-coat, of somewhat a suspicious appearance.
+
+"Aha, Captain!" said he, "you are beyond your time, but all 's well!"
+
+Attempting, with indifferent success, the easy self-possession which
+generally marked his address to his companions, Clifford, repeating the
+stranger's words, replied,--
+
+"All's well! What! are the prisoners released?"
+
+"No, faith!" answered the man, with a rough laugh, "not yet; but all
+in good time. It is a little too much to expect the justices to do our
+work, though, by the Lord Harry, we often do theirs!"
+
+"What then?" asked Clifford, impatiently.
+
+"Why, the poor fellows had been carried to the town of -----, and
+brought before the queer cuffin (Magistrate) ere I arrived, though I
+set off the moment you told me, and did the journey in four hours.
+The examination lasted all yesterday, and they were remanded till
+to-day,--let's see, it is not yet noon; we may be there before it's
+over."
+
+"And this is what you call well!" said Clifford, angrily. "No, Captain,
+don't be glimflashy! You have not heard all yet! It seems that the only
+thing buffed hard against them was by a stout grazier, who was cried
+'Stand!' to, some fifty miles off the town; so the queer coffin thinks
+of sending the poor fellows to the jail of the county where they did the
+business!"
+
+"Ah! that may leave some hopes for them! We must look sharp to their
+journey; if they once get to prison, their only chances are the file
+and the bribe. Unhappily, neither of them is so lucky as myself at that
+trade!"
+
+"No, indeed, there is not a stone-wall in England that the great
+Captain Lovett could not creep through, I'll swear!" said the admiring
+satellite.
+
+"Saddle the horses and load the pistols! I will join you in ten minutes.
+Have my farmer's dress ready, the false hair, etc. Choose your own trim.
+Make haste; the Three Feathers is the house of meeting."
+
+"And in ten minutes only, Captain?"
+
+"Punctually!"
+
+The stranger turned a corner and was out of sight. Clifford, muttering,
+"Yes, I was the cause of their apprehension; it was I who was sought;
+it is but fair that I should strike a blow for their escape before I
+attempt my own," continued his course till he came to the door of a
+public-house. The sign of a seaman swung aloft, portraying the jolly
+tar with a fine pewter pot in his hand, considerably huger than his own
+circumference. An immense pug sat at the door, lolling its tongue out,
+as if, having stuffed itself to the tongue, it was forced to turn that
+useful member out of its proper place. The shutters were half closed,
+but the sounds of coarse merriment issued jovially forth.
+
+Clifford disconcerted the pug; and crossing the threshold, cried in
+aloud tone, "Janseen!"
+
+"Here!" answered a gruff voice; and Clifford, passing on, came to a
+small parlour adjoining the tap. There, seated by a round oak table,
+he found mine host,--a red, fierce, weather-beaten, but bloated-looking
+personage, like Dick Hatteraick in a dropsy.
+
+"How now, Captain!" cried he, in a gutteral accent, and interlarding his
+discourse with certain Dutch graces, which with our reader's leave we
+will omit, as being unable to spell them; "how now!--not gone yet!"
+
+"No! I start for the coast to-morrow; business keeps me to-day. I came
+to ask if Mellon may be fully depended on?"
+
+"Ay, honest to the back-bone."
+
+"And you are sure that in spite of my late delays he will not have left
+the village?"
+
+"Sure! What else can I be? Don't I know Jack Mellon these twenty years!
+He would lie like a log in a calm for ten months together, without
+moving a hair's-breadth, if he was under orders."
+
+"And his vessel is swift and well manned, in case of an officer's
+chase?"
+
+"The 'Black Molly' swift? Ask your grandmother. The 'Black Molly' would
+outstrip a shark."
+
+"Then good-by, Janseen; there is something to keep your pipe alight. We
+shall not meet within the three seas again, I think. England is as much
+too hot for me as Holland for you!"
+
+"You are a capital fellow!" cried mine host, shaking Clifford by the
+hand; "and when the lads come to know their loss, they will know they
+have lost the bravest and truest gill that ever took to the toby; so
+good-by, and be d---d to you!"
+
+With this valedictory benediction mine host released Clifford; and the
+robber hastened to his appointment at the Three Feathers.
+
+He found all prepared. He hastily put on his disguise; and his follower
+led out his horse,--a noble animal of the grand Irish breed, of
+remarkable strength and bone, and save only that it was somewhat sharp
+in the quarters (a fault which they who look for speed as well as grace
+will easily forgive), of most unequalled beauty in its symmetry and
+proportions.
+
+Well did the courser know, and proudly did it render obeisance to, its
+master; snorting impatiently and rearing from the hand of the attendant
+robber, the sagacious animal freed itself of the rein, and as it tossed
+its long mane in the breeze of the fresh air, came trotting to the place
+where Clifford stood.
+
+"So ho, Robin! so ho! What, thou chafest that I have left thy fellow
+behind at the Red Cave! Him we may never see more. But while I have
+life, I will not leave thee, Robin!" With these words the robber fondly
+stroked the shining neck of his favourite steed; and as the animal
+returned the caress by rubbing its head against the hands and the
+athletic breast of its master, Clifford felt at his heart somewhat of
+that old racy stir of the blood which had been once to him the chief
+charm of his criminal profession, and which in the late change of his
+feelings he had almost forgotten.
+
+"Well, Robin, well," he renewed, as he kissed the face of his
+steed,--"well, we will have some days like our old ones yet; thou shalt
+say, Ha! ha! to the trumpet, and bear thy master along on more glorious
+enterprises than he has yet thanked thee for sharing. Thou wilt now be
+my only familiar, my only friend, Robin; we two shall be strangers in a
+foreign land. But thou wilt make thyself welcome easier than thy lord,
+Robin; and thou wilt forget the old days and thine old comrades
+and thine old loves, when--Ha!" and Clifford turned abruptly to his
+attendant, who addressed him; "It is late, you say. True! Look you, it
+will be unwise for us both to quit London together. You know the sixth
+milestone; join me there, and we can proceed in company!"
+
+Not unwilling to linger for a parting cup, the comrade assented to the
+prudence of the plan proposed; and after one or two additional words of
+caution and advice, Clifford mounted and rode from the yard of the
+inn. As he passed through the tall wooden gates into the street, the
+imperfect gleam of the wintry sun falling over himself and his steed, it
+was scarcely possible, even in spite of his disguise and rude garb, to
+conceive a more gallant and striking specimen of the lawless and daring
+tribe to which he belonged; the height, strength, beauty, and exquisite
+grooming visible in the steed; the sparkling eye, the bold profile,
+the sinewy chest, the graceful limbs, and the careless and practised
+horsemanship of the rider.
+
+Looking after his chief with a long and an admiring gaze, the robber
+said to the hostler of the inn, an aged and withered man, who had seen
+nine generations of highwaymen rise and vanish,--
+
+"There, Joe, when did you ever look on a hero like that? The bravest
+heart, the frankest hand, the best judge of a horse, and the handsomest
+man that ever did honour to Hounslow!"
+
+"For all that," returned the hostler, shaking his palsied head, and
+turning back to the tap-room,--"for all that, master, his time be up.
+Mark my whids, Captain Lovett will not be over the year,--no, nor mayhap
+the month!"
+
+"Why, you old rascal, what makes you so wise? You will not peach, I
+suppose!"
+
+"I peach! Devil a bit! But there never was the gemman of the road, great
+or small, knowing or stupid, as outlived his seventh year. And this will
+be the captain's seventh, come the 21st of next month; but he be a fine
+chap, and I'll go to his hanging!"
+
+"Fish!" said the robber, peevishly,--he himself was verging towards the
+end of his sixth year,--"pish!"
+
+"Mind, I tells it you, master; and somehow or other I thinks--and I has
+experience in these things--by the fey, of his eye and the drop of his
+lip, that the captain's time will be up to-day!"
+
+     [Fey--A word difficult to translate; but the closest interpretation
+     of which is, perhaps, "the ill omen."]
+
+Here the robber lost all patience, and pushing the hoary boder of evil
+against the wall, he turned on his heel, and sought some more agreeable
+companion to share his stirrup-cup.
+
+It was in the morning of the day following that in which the above
+conversations occurred, that the sagacious Augustus Tomlinson and the
+valorous Edward Pepper, handcuffed and fettered, were jogging along the
+road in a postchaise, with Mr. Nabbem squeezed in by the side of the
+former, and two other gentlemen in Mr. Nabbem's confidence mounted on
+the box of the chaise, and interfering sadly, as Long Ned growlingly
+remarked, with "the beauty of the prospect."
+
+"Ah, well!" quoth Nabbem, unavoidably thrusting his elbow into
+Tomlinson's side, while he drew out his snuffbox, and helped himself
+largely to the intoxicating dust; "you had best prepare yourself, Mr.
+Pepper, for a change of prospects. I believes as how there is little to
+please you in guod [prison]."
+
+"Nothing makes men so facetious as misfortune to others!" said Augustus,
+moralizing, and turning himself, as well as he was able, in order to
+deliver his body from the pointed elbow of Mr. Nabbem. "When a man
+is down in the world, all the bystanders, very dull fellows before,
+suddenly become wits!"
+
+"You reflects on I," said Mr. Nabbem. "Well, it does not sinnify a
+pin; for directly we does our duty, you chaps become howdaciously
+ungrateful!"
+
+"Ungrateful!" said Pepper; "what a plague have we got to be grateful
+for? I suppose you think we ought to tell you you are the best friend
+we have, because you have scrouged us, neck and crop, into this horrible
+hole, like turkeys fatted for Christmas. 'Sdeath! one's hair is flatted
+down like a pancake; and as for one's legs, you had better cut them off
+at once than tuck them up in a place a foot square,--to say nothing of
+these blackguardly irons!"
+
+"The only irons pardonable in your eyes, Ned," said Tomlinson, "are the
+curling-irons, eh?"
+
+"Now, if this is not too much!" cried Nabbem, crossly; "you objects to
+go in a cart like the rest of your profession; and when I puts myself
+out of the way to obleedgie you with a shay, you slangs I for it!"
+
+"Peace, good Nabbem!" said Augustus, with a sage's dignity; "you must
+allow a little bad humour in men so unhappily situated as we are."
+
+The soft answer turneth away wrath. Tomlinson's answer softened Nabbem;
+and by way of conciliation, he held his snuff-box to the nose of his
+unfortunate prisoner. Shutting his eyes, Tomlinson long and earnestly
+sniffed up the luxury, and as soon as, with his own kerchief of spotted
+yellow, the officer had wiped from the proboscis some lingering grains,
+Tomlinson thus spoke:
+
+"You see us now, Mr. Nabbem, in a state of broken-down opposition; but
+our spirits are not broken too. In our time we have had something to do
+with the administration; and our comfort at present is the comfort of
+fallen ministers!"
+
+"Oho! you were in the Methodist line before you took to the road?" said
+Nabbem.
+
+"Not so!" answered Augustus, gravely. "We were the Methodists of
+politics, not of the church; namely, we lived upon our flock without a
+legal authority to do so, and that which the law withheld from us our
+wits gave. But tell me, Mr. Nabbem, are you addicted to politics?"
+
+"Why, they says I be," said Mr. Nabbem, with a grin; "and for my part, I
+thinks all who sarves the king should stand up for him, and take care of
+their little families!"
+
+"You speak what others think!" answered Tomlinson, smiling also. "And I
+will now, since you like politics, point out to you what I dare say you
+have not observed before."
+
+"What be that?" said Nabbem.
+
+"A wonderful likeness between the life of the gentlemen adorning his
+Majesty's senate and the life of the gentlemen whom you are conducting
+to his Majesty's jail."
+
+              THE LIBELLOUS PARALLEL OF AUGUSTUS TOMLINSON.
+
+     "We enter our career, Mr. Nabbem, as your embryo ministers enter
+     parliament,--by bribery and corruption.  There is this difference,
+     indeed, between the two cases: we are enticed to enter by the
+     bribery and corruptions of others; they enter spontaneously by dint
+     of their own.  At first, deluded by romantic visions, we like the
+     glory of our career better than the profit, and in our youthful
+     generosity we profess to attack the rich solely from consideration
+     for the poor!  By and by, as we grow more hardened, we laugh at
+     these boyish dreams,--peasant or prince fares equally at our
+     impartial hands; we grasp at the bucket, but we scorn not the
+     thimbleful; we use the word 'glory' only as a trap for proselytes
+     and apprentices; our fingers, like an office-door, are open for all
+     that can possibly come into them; we consider the wealthy as our
+     salary, the poor as our perquisites.  What is this, but a picture of
+     your member of parliament ripening into a minister, your patriot
+     mellowing into your placeman?  And mark me, Mr. Nabbem! is not the
+     very language of both as similar as the deeds?  What is the phrase
+     either of us loves to employ?  'To deliver.'  What?  'The Public.'
+     And do not both invariably deliver it of the same thing,--namely,
+     its purse?  Do we want an excuse for sharing the gold of our
+     neighbours, or abusing them if they resist?  Is not our mutual, our
+     pithiest plea, 'Distress'?  True, your patriot calls it 'distress of
+     the country;' but does he ever, a whit more than we do, mean any
+     distress but his own?  When we are brought low, and our coats are
+     shabby, do we not both shake our heads and talk of 'reform'?  And
+     when, oh! when we are up in the world, do we not both kick 'reform'
+     to the devil?  How often your parliament man 'vacates his seat,'
+     only for the purpose of resuming it with a weightier purse!  How
+     often, dear Ned, have our seats been vacated for the same end!
+     Sometimes, indeed, he really finishes his career by accepting the
+     Hundreds,--it is by 'accepting the hundreds' that ours may be
+     finished too!  [Ned drew a long sigh.]  Note us now, Mr. Nabbem, in
+     the zenith of our prosperity,--we have filled our pockets, we have
+     become great in the mouths of our party.  Our pals admire us, and
+     our blowens adore.  What do we in this short-lived summer?  Save and
+     be thrifty?  Ah, no! we must give our dinners, and make light of our
+     lush.  We sport horses on the race-course, and look big at the
+     multitude we have bubbled.  Is not this your minister come into
+     office?  Does not this remind you of his equipage, his palace, his
+     plate?  In both cases lightly won, lavishly wasted; and the public,
+     whose cash we have fingered, may at least have the pleasure of
+     gaping at the figure we make with it!  This, then, is our harvest of
+     happiness; our foes, our friends, are ready to eat us with envy,--
+     yet what is so little enviable as our station?  Have we not both our
+     common vexations and our mutual disquietudes?  Do we not both bribe
+     [Nabbem shook his head and buttoned his waistcoat] our enemies,
+     cajole our partisans, bully our dependants, and quarrel with our
+     only friends,--namely, ourselves?  Is not the secret question with
+     each, 'It is all confoundedly fine; but how long will it last?'
+     Now, Mr. Nabbem, note me,--reverse the portrait: we are fallen, our
+     career is over,--the road is shut to us, and new plunderers are
+     robbing the carriages that once we robbed.  Is not this the lot of--
+     No, no!  I deceive myself!  Your ministers, your jobmen, for the
+     most part milk the popular cow while there's a drop in the udder.
+     Your chancellor declines on a pension; your minister attenuates on a
+     grant; the feet of your great rogues may be gone from the treasury
+     benches, but they have their little fingers in the treasury.  Their
+     past services are remembered by his Majesty; ours only noted by the
+     Recorder.  They save themselves, for they hang by one another; we go
+     to the devil, for we hang by ourselves.  We have our little day of
+     the public, and all is over; but it is never over with them.  We
+     both hunt the same fox; but we are your fair riders, they are your
+     knowing ones,--we take the leap, and our necks are broken; they
+     sneak through the gates, and keep it up to the last!"
+
+As he concluded, Tomlinson's head dropped on his bosom, and it was easy
+to see that painful comparisons, mingled perhaps with secret murmurs at
+the injustice of fortune, were rankling in his breast. Long Ned sat in
+gloomy silence; and even the hard heart of the severe Mr. Nabbem was
+softened by the affecting parallel to which he had listened. They had
+proceeded without speaking for two or three miles, when Long Ned, fixing
+his eyes on Tomlinson, exclaimed,--
+
+"Do you know, Tomlinson, I think it was a burning shame in Lovett to
+suffer us to be carried off like muttons, without attempting to rescue
+us by the way! It is all his fault that we are here; for it was he whom
+Nabbem wanted, not us."
+
+"Very true," said the cunning policeman; "and if I were you, Mr. Pepper,
+hang me if I would not behave like a man of spirit, and show as little
+consarn for him as he shows for you! Why, Lord now, I doesn't want to
+'tice you; but this I does know, the justices are very anxious to catch
+Lovett; and one who gives him up, and says a word or two about his
+c'racter, so as to make conviction sartain, may himself be sartain of a
+free pardon for all little sprees and so forth!"
+
+"Ah!" said Long Ned, with a sigh, "that is all very well, Mr. Nabbem,
+but I'll go to the crap like a gentleman, and not peach of my comrades;
+and now I think of it, Lovett could scarcely have assisted us. One man
+alone, even Lovett, clever as he is, could not have forced us out of the
+clutches of you and your myrmidons, Mr. Nabbem! And when we were once
+at-----, they took excellent care of us. But tell me now, my dear
+Nabbem," and Long Ned's voice wheedled itself into something like
+softness,--"tell me, do you think the grazier will buff it home?"
+
+"No doubt of that," said the unmoved Nabbem. Long Ned's face fell. "And
+what if he does?" said he; "they can but transport us!"
+
+"Don't desave yourself, Master Pepper!" said Nabbem: "you're too old a
+hand for the herring-pond. They're resolved to make gallows apples of
+all such numprels [Nonpareils] as you!"
+
+Ned cast a sullen look at the officer.
+
+"A pretty comforter you are!" said he. "I have been in a post chaise
+with a pleasanter fellow, I'll swear! You may call me an apple if you
+will, but, I take it, I am not an apple you'd like to see peeled."
+
+With this pugilistic and menacing pun, the lengthy hero relapsed into
+meditative silence.
+
+Our travellers were now entering a road skirted on one side by a common
+of some extent, and on the other by a thick hedgerow, which through its
+breaks gave occasional glimpses of woodland and fallow, interspersed
+with cross-roads and tiny brooklets.
+
+"There goes a jolly fellow!" said Nabbem, pointing to an
+athletic-looking man, riding before the carriage, dressed in a farmer's
+garb, and mounted on a large and powerful horse of the Irish breed.
+"I dare say he is well acquainted with your grazier, Mr. Tomlinson; he
+looks mortal like one of the same kidney; and here comes another chap"
+(as the stranger, was joined by a short, stout, ruddy man in a carter's
+frock, riding on a horse less showy than his comrade's, but of the
+lengthy, reedy, lank, yet muscular race, which a knowing jockey would
+like to bet on). "Now that's what I calls a comely lad!" continued
+Nabbem, pointing to the latter horseman; "none of your thin-faced, dark,
+strapping fellows like that Captain Lovett, as the blowens raves about,
+but a nice, tight little body, with a face like a carrot! That's a
+beauty for my money! Honesty's stamped on his face, Mr. Tomlinson! I
+dare says" (and the officer grinned, for he had been a lad of the cross
+in his own day),--"I dare says, poor innocent booby, he knows none
+of the ways of Lunnun town; and if he has not as merry a life as some
+folks, mayhap he may have a longer. But a merry one forever for such
+lads as us, Mr. Pepper! I say, has you heard as how Bill Fang went to
+Scratchland [Scotland] and was stretched for smashing queer screens
+[that is, hung for uttering forged notes]? He died 'nation game; for
+when his father, who was a gray-headed parson, came to see him after the
+sentence, he says to the governor, say he, 'Give us a tip, old 'un,
+to pay the expenses, and die dacently.' The parson forks him out ten
+shiners, preaching all the while like winkey. Bob drops one of the
+guineas between his fingers, and says, 'Holla, dad, you have only tipped
+us nine of the yellow boys! Just now you said as how it was ten!' On
+this the parish-bull, who was as poor as if he had been a mouse of the
+church instead of the curate, lugs out another; and Bob, turning
+round to the jailer, cries, 'Flung the governor out of a guinea, by
+God!--[Fact]--Now, that's what I calls keeping it up to the last!"
+
+Mr. Nabbem had scarcely finished this anecdote, when the farmer-like
+stranger, who had kept up by the side of the chaise, suddenly rode to
+the window, and touching his hat, said in a Norfolk accent,--
+
+"Were the gentlemen we met on the road belonging to your party? They
+were asking after a chaise and pair."
+
+"No!" said Nabbem, "there be no gentlemen as belongs to our party!" So
+saying, he tipped a knowing wink at the farmer, and glanced over his
+shoulder at the prisoners.
+
+"What! you are going all alone?" said the farmer.
+
+"Ay, to be sure," answered Nabbem; "not much danger, I think, in the
+daytime, with the sun out as big as a sixpence, which is as big as ever
+I see'd him in this country!"
+
+At that moment the shorter stranger, whose appearance had attracted the
+praise of Mr. Nabbem (that personage was himself very short and ruddy),
+and who had hitherto been riding close to the post-horses, and talking
+to the officers on the box, suddenly threw himself from his steed, and
+in the same instant that he arrested the horses of the chaise, struck
+the postilion to the ground with a short heavy bludgeon which he drew
+from his frock. A whistle was heard and answered, as if by a signal:
+three fellows, armed with bludgeons, leaped from the hedge; and in the
+interim the pretended farmer, dismounting, flung open the door of the
+chaise, and seizing Mr. Nabbem by the collar, swung him to the ground
+with a celerity that became the circular rotundity of the policeman's
+figure rather than the deliberate gravity of his dignified office.
+
+Rapid and instantaneous as had been this work, it was not without a
+check. Although the policemen had not dreamed of a rescue in the very
+face of the day and on the high-road, their profession was not that
+which suffered them easily to be surprised. The two guardians of the
+dicky leaped nimbly to the ground; but before they had time to use their
+firearms, two of the new aggressors, who had appeared from the hedge,
+closed upon them, and bore them to the ground. While this scuffle took
+place, the farmer had disarmed the prostrate Nabbem, and giving him
+in charge to the remaining confederate, extricated Tomlinson and his
+comrade from the chaise.
+
+"Hist!" said he in a whisper, "beware my name; my disguise hides me at
+present. Lean on me,--only through the hedge; a cart waits there, and
+you are safe!"
+
+With these broken words he assisted the robbers as well as he could, in
+spite of their manacles, through the same part of the hedge from
+which the three allies had sprung. They were already through the
+barrier,--only the long legs of Ned Pepper lingered behind,--when at
+the far end of the road, which was perfectly straight, a gentleman's
+carriage became visible. A strong hand from the interior of the hedge,
+seizing Pepper, dragged him through; and Clifford,--for the reader
+need not be told who was the farmer, perceiving the approaching
+reinforcement, shouted at once for flight. The robber who had guarded
+Nabbem, and who indeed was no other than Old Bags, slow as he habitually
+was, lost not an instant in providing for himself; before you could say
+"Laudamus," he was on the other side of the hedge. The two men engaged
+with the police-officers were not capable of an equal celerity; but
+Clifford, throwing himself into the contest and engaging the policemen,
+gave the robbers the opportunity of escape. They scrambled through the
+fence; the officers, tough fellows and keen, clinging lustily to them,
+till one was felled by Clifford, and the other, catching against a
+stump, was forced to relinquish his hold; he then sprang back into
+the road and prepared for Clifford, who now, however, occupied himself
+rather in fugitive than warlike measures. Meanwhile, the moment the
+other rescuers had passed the Rubicon of the hedge, their flight, and
+that of the gentlemen who had passed before them, commenced. On this
+mystic side of the hedge was a cross-road, striking at once through an
+intricate and wooded part of the country, which allowed speedy and
+ample opportunities of dispersion. Here a light cart, drawn by two swift
+horses in a tandem fashion, awaited the fugitives. Long Ned and Augustus
+were stowed down at the bottom of this vehicle; three fellows filed away
+at their irons, and a fourth, who had hitherto remained inglorious with
+the cart, gave the lash--and he gave it handsomely--to the coursers.
+Away rattled the equipage; and thus was achieved a flight still
+memorable in the annals of the elect, and long quoted as one of
+the boldest and most daring exploits that illicit enterprise ever
+accomplished.
+
+Clifford and his equestrian comrade only remained in the field, or
+rather the road. The former sprang at once on his horse; the latter was
+not long in following the example. But the policeman, who, it has been
+said, baffled in detaining the fugitives of the hedge, had leaped back
+into the road, was not idle in the meanwhile. When he saw Clifford about
+to mount, instead of attempting to seize the enemy, he recurred to his
+pistol, which in the late struggle hand to hand he had been unable to
+use, and taking sure aim at Clifford, whom he judged at once to be the
+leader of the rescue, he lodged a ball in the right side of the robber
+at the very moment he had set spurs in his horse and turned to fly.
+Clifford's head drooped to the saddle-bow. Fiercely the horse sprang on.
+The robber endeavoured, despite his reeling senses, to retain his seat;
+once he raised his head, once he nerved his slackened and listless
+limbs, and then, with a faint groan, he fell to the earth. The horse
+bounded but one step more, and, true to the tutorship it had received,
+stopped abruptly. Clifford raised himself with great difficulty on
+one arm; with the other hand he drew forth a pistol. He pointed it
+deliberately towards the officer that wounded him. The man stood
+motionless, cowering and spellbound, beneath the dilating eye of the
+robber. It was but for a moment that the man had cause for dread; for
+muttering between his ground teeth, "Why waste it on an enemy?" Clifford
+turned the muzzle towards the head of the unconscious steed, which
+seemed sorrowfully and wistfully to incline towards him. "Thou,"
+he said, "whom I have fed and loved, shalt never know hardship from
+another!" and with a merciful cruelty he dragged himself one pace nearer
+to his beloved steed, uttered a well-known word, which brought the
+docile creature to his side, and placing the muzzle of the pistol close
+to his ear, he fired, and fell back senseless at the exertion. The
+animal staggered, and dropped down dead.
+
+Meanwhile Clifford's comrade, profiting by the surprise and sudden panic
+of the officer, was already out of reach, and darting across the common,
+he and his ragged courser speedily vanished.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+                                 Lose I not
+          With him what fortune could in life allot?
+          Lose I not hope, life's cordial?
+            ..............
+          In fact, the lessons he from prudence took
+          Were written in his mind as in a book;
+          There what to do he read, and what to shun,
+          And all commanded was with promptness done.
+          He seemed without a passion to proceed,
+            ..............
+          Yet some believed those passions only slept!
+                                             CRABBE.
+
+          Relics of love, and life's enchanted spring!
+                    A. WATTS: On burning a Packet of Letters.
+
+          Many and sad and deep
+          Were the thoughts folded in thy silent breast!
+          Thou, too, could'st watch and weep!
+                                        MRS. HEMANS.
+
+While Sir William Brandon was pursuing his ambitious schemes, and,
+notwithstanding Lucy's firm and steady refusal of Lord Mauleverer, was
+still determined on that ill-assorted marriage; while Mauleverer himself
+day after day attended at the judge's house, and, though he spoke not of
+love, looked it with all his might,--it became obvious to every one but
+the lover and the guardian, that Lucy herself was rapidly declining in
+appearance and health. Ever since the day she had last seen Clifford,
+her spirits, before greatly shattered, had refused to regain even a
+likeness to their naturally cheerful and happy tone. She became silent
+and abstracted; even her gentleness of temper altered at times into a
+moody and fretful humour. Neither to books nor music, nor any art by
+which time is beguiled, she recurred for a momentary alleviation of the
+bitter feelings at her heart, or for a transient forgetfulness of
+their sting. The whole world of her mind had been shaken. Her pride was
+wounded, her love galled; her faith in Clifford gave way at length to
+gloomy and dark suspicion. Nothing, she now felt, but a name as well
+as fortunes utterly abandoned, could have justified him for the
+stubbornness of heart in which he had fled and deserted her. Her own
+self-acquittal no longer consoled her in affliction. She condemned
+herself for her weakness, from the birth of her ill-starred affection
+to the crisis it had now acquired. "Why did I not wrestle with it at
+first?" she said bitterly. "Why did I allow myself so easily to love
+one unknown to me, and equivocal in station, despite the cautions of my
+uncle and the whispers of the world?" Alas! Lucy did not remember that
+at the time she was guilty of this weakness, she had not learned
+to reason as she since reasoned. Her faculties were but imperfectly
+awakened; her experience of the world was utter ignorance. She scarcely
+knew that she loved, and she knew not at all that the delicious and
+excited sentiment which filled her being could ever become as productive
+of evil and peril as it had done now; and even had her reason been more
+developed, and her resolutions more strong, does the exertion of reason
+and resolution always avail against the master passion? Love, it is
+true, is not unconquerable; but how few have ever, mind and soul,
+coveted the conquest! Disappointment makes a vow, but the heart records
+it not. Or in the noble image of one who has so tenderly and so truly
+portrayed the feelings of her own sex,--
+
+                                       "We make
+               A ladder of our thoughts where angels step,
+               But sleep ourselves at the foot!"
+                             [The History of the Lyre, by L. E. L.]
+
+Before Clifford had last seen her, we have observed that Lucy had (and
+it was a consolation) clung to the belief that, despite of appearances
+and his own confession, his past life had not been such as to place him
+without the pale of her just affections; and there were frequent moments
+when, remembering that the death of her father had removed the only
+being who could assert an unanswerable claim to the dictation of her
+actions, she thought that Clifford, hearing her hand was utterly at her
+own disposal, might again appear, and again urge a suit which he felt so
+few circumstances could induce her to deny. All this half-acknowledged
+yet earnest train of reasoning and hope vanished from the moment he had
+quitted her uncle's house. His words bore no misinterpretation. He had
+not yielded even to her own condescension, and her cheek burned as she
+recalled it. Yet he loved her. She saw, she knew it in his every word
+and look! Bitter, then, and dark must be that remorse which could have
+conquered every argument but that which urged him to leave her, when he
+might have claimed her forever. True, that when his letter formally bade
+her farewell, the same self-accusing language was recurred to, the same
+dark hints and allusions to infamy or guilt; yet never till now had she
+interpreted them rigidly, and never till now had she dreamed how far
+their meaning could extend. Still, what crimes could he have committed?
+The true ones never occurred to Lucy. She shuddered to ask herself, and
+hushed her doubts in a gloomy and torpid silence. But through all her
+accusations against herself, and through all her awakened suspicions
+against Clifford, she could not but acknowledge that something noble
+and not unworthy of her mingled in his conduct, and occasioned his
+resistance to her and to himself; and this belief, perhaps, irritated
+even while it touched her, and kept her feelings in a perpetual struggle
+and conflict which her delicate frame and soft mind were little able to
+endure. When the nerves once break, how breaks the character with them!
+How many ascetics, withered and soured, do we meet in the world, who
+but for one shock to the heart and form might have erred on the side of
+meekness! Whether it come from woe or disease, the stroke which mars
+a single fibre plays strange havoc with the mind. Slaves we are to our
+muscles, and puppets to the spring of the capricious blood; and the
+great soul, with all its capacities, its solemn attributes, and
+sounding claims, is, while on earth, but a jest to this mountebank,--the
+body,--from the dream which toys with it for an hour, to the lunacy
+which shivers it into a driveller, laughing as it plays with its own
+fragments, and reeling benighted and blinded to the grave!
+
+We have before said that Lucy was fond both of her uncle and his
+society; and still, whenever the subject of Lord Mauleverer and his suit
+was left untouched, there was that in the conversation of Sir
+William Brandon which aroused an interest in her mind, engrossed and
+self-consuming as it had become. Sorrow, indeed, and sorrow's companion,
+reflection, made her more and more capable of comprehending a very
+subtle and intricate character. There is no secret for discovering the
+human heart like affliction, especially the affliction which springs
+from passion. Does a writer startle you with his insight into your
+nature, be sure that he has mourned; such lore is the alchemy of tears.
+Hence the insensible and almost universal confusion of idea which
+confounds melancholy with depth, and finds but hollow inanity in the
+symbol of a laugh. Pitiable error! Reflection first leads us to gloom,
+but its next stage is to brightness. The Laughing Philosopher had
+reached the goal of Wisdom; Heraclitus whimpered at the starting-post.
+But enough for Lucy to gain even the vestibule of philosophy.
+
+Notwithstanding the soreness we naturally experience towards all who
+pertinaciously arouse an unpleasant subject, and in spite therefore
+of Brandon's furtherance of Mauleverer's courtship, Lucy felt herself
+inclined strangely, and with something of a daughter's affection,
+towards this enigmatical being; in spite, too, of all the cold and
+measured vice of his character,--the hard and wintry grayness of heart
+with which he regarded the welfare of others, or the substances
+of Truth, Honour, and Virtue,--the callousness of his fossilized
+affections, which no human being softened but for a moment, and no
+warm and healthful impulse struck, save into an evanescent and idle
+flash;--in spite of this consummate obduracy and worldliness of
+temperament, it is not paradoxical to say that there was something
+in the man which Lucy found at times analogous to her own vivid and
+generous self. This was, however, only noticeable when she led him to
+talk over earlier days, and when by degrees the sarcastic lawyer forgot
+the present, and grew eloquent, not over the actions, but the feelings
+of the past. He would speak to her for hours of his youthful dreams, his
+occupations, or his projects, as a boy. Above all, he loved to converse
+with her upon Warlock, its remains of ancient magnificence, the green
+banks of the placid river that enriched its domains, and the summer
+pomp of wood and heath-land, amidst which his noonday visions had been
+nursed.
+
+When he spoke of these scenes and days, his countenance softened, and
+something in its expression, recalling to Lucy the image of one still
+dearer, made her yearn to him the more. An ice seemed broken from his
+mind, and streams of released and gentle feelings, mingled with kindly
+and generous sentiment, flowed forth. Suddenly a thought, a word,
+brought him back to the present,--his features withered abruptly into
+their cold placidity or latent sneer; the seal closed suddenly on the
+broken spell, and, like the victim of a fairy-tale, condemned at a
+stated hour to assume another shape, the very being you had listened to
+seemed vanished, and replaced by one whom you startled to behold. But
+there was one epoch of his life on which he was always silent, and that
+was his first onset into the actual world,--the period of his early
+struggle into wealth and fame. All that space of time seemed as a
+dark gulf, over which he had passed, and become changed at once,--as a
+traveller landing in a strange climate may adopt, the moment he touches
+its shore, its costume and its language.
+
+All men--the most modest--have a common failing; but it is one which
+often assumes the domino and mask,--pride! Brandon was, however, proud
+to a degree very rare in men who have risen and flourished in the world.
+Out of the wrecks of all other feelings this imperial survivor made one
+great palace for its residence, and called the fabric "Disdain."
+Scorn was the real essence of Brandon's nature; even in the blandest
+disguises, the smoothness of his voice, the insinuation of his smile,
+the popular and supple graces of his manners, an oily derision floated,
+rarely discernible, it is true, but proportioning its strength and
+quantum to the calm it produced.
+
+In the interim, while his character thus displayed and contradicted
+itself in private life, his fame was rapidly rising in public
+estimation. Unlike many of his brethren, the brilliant lawyer had
+exceeded expectation, and shone even yet more conspicuously in the less
+adventitiously aided duties of the judge. Envy itself--and Brandon's
+political virulence had, despite his personal affability, made him
+many foes--was driven into acknowledging the profundity of his legal
+knowledge, and in admiring the manner in which the peculiar functions
+of his novel dignity were discharged. No juvenile lawyer browbeat, no
+hackneyed casuist puzzled, him; even his attention never wandered from
+the dullest case subjected to his tribunal. A painter, desirous of
+stamping on his canvas the portrait of an upright judge, could scarcely
+have found a finer realization for his beau-ideal than the austere,
+collected, keen, yet majestic countenance of Sir William Brandon, such
+as it seemed in the trappings of office and from the seat of justice.
+
+The newspapers were not slow in recording the singular capture of the
+notorious Lovett. The boldness with which he had planned and executed
+the rescue of his comrades, joined to the suspense in which his wound
+for some time kept the public, as to his escape from one death by
+the postern gate of another, caused a very considerable ferment
+and excitation in the popular mind; and, to feed the impulse, the
+journalists were little slothful in retailing every anecdote, true or
+false, which they could collect touching the past adventures of the
+daring highwayman. Many a good story then came to light, which partook
+as much of the comic as the tragic,--for not a single one of the
+robber's adventures was noted for cruelty or bloodshed; many of them
+betokened rather an hilarious and jovial spirit of mirthful enterprise.
+It seemed as if he had thought the highway a capital arena for jokes,
+and only robbed for the sake of venting a redundant affection for
+jesting. Persons felt it rather a sin to be severe with a man of so
+merry a disposition; and it was especially observable that not one of
+the ladies who had been despoiled by the robber could be prevailed on
+to prosecute; on the contrary, they always talked of the event as one
+of the most agreeable remembrances in their lives, and seemed to bear a
+provoking gratitude to the comely offender, rather than resentment. All
+the gentlemen were not, however, of so placable a temper; and two sturdy
+farmers, with a grazier to boot, were ready to swear, "through thick and
+thin," to the identity of the prisoner with a horseman who had civilly
+borne each of them company for an hour in their several homeward rides
+from certain fairs, and had carried the pleasure of his society, they
+very gravely asserted, considerably beyond a joke; so that the state of
+the prisoner's affairs took a very sombre aspect, and the counsel--an
+old hand--intrusted with his cause declared confidentially that there
+was not a chance. But a yet more weighty accusation, because it came
+from a much nobler quarter, awaited Clifford. In the robbers' cavern
+were found several articles answering exactly to the description
+of those valuables feloniously abstracted from the person of Lord
+Mauleverer. That nobleman attended to inspect the articles, and to view
+the prisoner. The former he found himself able to swear to, with a very
+tranquillized conscience; the latter he beheld feverish, attenuated, and
+in a moment of delirium, on the sick-bed to which his wound had brought
+him. He was at no loss, however, to recognize in the imprisoned felon
+the gay and conquering Clifford, whom he had once even honoured with his
+envy. Although his former dim and vague suspicions of Clifford were
+thus confirmed, the good-natured peer felt some slight compunction at
+appearing as his prosecutor. This compunction, however, vanished the
+moment he left the sick man's apartment; and after a little patriotic
+conversation with the magistrates about the necessity of public duty,--a
+theme which brought virtuous tears into the eyes of those respectable
+functionaries,--he re-entered his carriage, returned to town, and after
+a lively dinner tete-a-tete with an old chere amie, who, of all her
+charms, had preserved only the attraction of conversation and the
+capacity of relishing a salami, Mauleverer, the very evening of his
+return, betook himself to the house of Sir William Brandon.
+
+When he entered the hall, Barlow, the judge's favourite servant, met
+him, with rather a confused and mysterious air, and arresting him as he
+was sauntering into Brandon's library, informed him that Sir William was
+particularly engaged, but would join his lordship in the drawing-room.
+While Barlow was yet speaking, and Mauleverer was bending his right ear
+(with which he heard the best) towards him, the library door opened, and
+a man in a very coarse and ruffianly garb awkwardly bowed himself out.
+
+"So this is the particular engagement," thought Mauleverer,--"a strange
+Sir Pandarus; but those old fellows have droll tastes."
+
+"I may go in now, my good fellow, I suppose?" said his lordship to
+Barlow; and without waiting an answer, he entered the library. He found
+Brandon alone, and bending earnestly over some letters which strewed
+his table. Mauleverer carelessly approached, and threw himself into an
+opposite chair. Sir William lifted his head, as he heard the movement;
+and Mauleverer, reckless as was that personage, was chilled and almost
+awed by the expression of his friend's countenance. Brandon's face
+was one which, however pliant, nearly always wore one pervading
+character,--calmness; whether in the smoothness of social courtesy,
+or the austerity of his official station, or the bitter sarcasm which
+escaped him at no unfrequent intervals, still a certain hard and
+inflexible dryness stamped both his features and his air. But at this
+time a variety of feelings not ordinarily eloquent in the outward man
+struggled in his dark face, expressive of all the energy and passion
+of his powerful and masculine nature; there seemed to speak from his
+features and eyes something of shame and anger and triumph and regret
+and scorn. All these various emotions, which it appears almost a paradox
+to assert met in the same expression, nevertheless were so individually
+and almost fearfully stamped as to convey at once their signification
+to the mind of Mauleverer. He glanced towards the letters, in which the
+writing seemed faint and discoloured by time or damp; and then once more
+regarding the face of Brandon, said in rather an anxious and subdued
+tone,--
+
+"Heavens, Brandon! are you ill; or has anything happened? You alarm me!"
+
+"Do you recognize these locks?" said Brandon, in a hollow voice; and
+from under the letters he drew some ringlets of an auburn hue, and
+pushed them with an averted face towards Mauleverer.
+
+The earl took them up, regarded them for a few moments, changed colour,
+but shook his head with a negative gesture, as he laid them once more on
+the table.
+
+"This handwriting, then?" renewed the judge, in a yet more impressive
+and painful voice; and he pointed to the letters.
+
+Mauleverer raised one of them, and held it between his face and the
+lamp, so that whatever his features might have betrayed was hidden
+from his companion. At length he dropped the letter with an affected
+nonchalance, and said,--
+
+"Ah, I know the writing even at this distance of time; this letter is
+directed to you!"
+
+"It is; so are all these," said Brandon, with the same voice of
+preternatural and strained composure. "They have come back to me after
+an absence of nearly twenty-five years; they are the letters she
+wrote to me in the days of our courtship" (here Brandon laughed
+scornfully),--"she carried them away with her, you know when; and (a
+pretty clod of consistency is woman!) she kept them, it seems, to her
+dying day."
+
+The subject in discussion, whatever it might be, appeared a sore one to
+Mauleverer; he turned uneasily on his chair, and said at length,--
+
+"Well, poor creature! these are painful remembrances, since it turned
+out so unhappily; but it was not our fault, dear Brandon. We were men
+of the world; we knew the value of--of women, and treated them
+accordingly!"
+
+"Right! right! right!" cried Brandon, vehemently, laughing in a wild and
+loud disdain, the intense force of which it would be in vain to attempt
+expressing. "Right! and, faith, my lord, I repine not, nor repent."
+
+"So, so, that's well!" said Mauleverer, still not at his ease, and
+hastening to change the conversation. "But, my dear Brandon, I have
+strange news for you! You remember that fellow Clifford, who had the
+insolence to address himself to your adorable niece? I told you I
+suspected that long friend of his of having made my acquaintance
+somewhat unpleasantly, and I therefore doubted of Clifford himself.
+Well, my dear friend, this Clifford is--whom do you think?--no other
+than Mr. Lovett of Newgate celebrity!"
+
+"You do not say so!" rejoined Brandon, apathetically, as he slowly
+gathered his papers together and deposited them in a drawer.
+
+"Indeed it is true; and what is more, Brandon, this fellow is one of the
+very identical highwaymen who robbed me on my road from Bath. No doubt
+he did me the same kind office on my road to Mauleverer Park."
+
+"Possibly," said Brandon, who appeared absorbed in a revery.
+
+"Ay!" answered Mauleverer, piqued at this indifference. "But do you not
+see the consequences to your niece?"
+
+"My niece!" repeated Brandon, rousing himself.
+
+"Certainly. I grieve to say it, my dear friend,--but she was young, very
+young, when at Bath. She suffered this fellow to address her too openly.
+Nay,--for I will be frank,--she was suspected of being in love with
+him!"
+
+"She was in love with him," said Brandon, dryly, and fixing the
+malignant coldness of his eye upon the suitor. "And, for aught I know,"
+added he, "she is so at this moment."
+
+"You are cruel!" said Mauleverer, disconcerted. "I trust not, for the
+sake of my continued addresses."
+
+"My dear lord," said Brandon, urbanely taking the courtier's hand, while
+the anguis in herba of his sneer played around his compressed lips,--"my
+dear lord, we are old friends, and need not deceive each other. You wish
+to marry my niece because she is an heiress of great fortune, and you
+suppose that my wealth will in all probability swell her own. Moreover,
+she is more beautiful than any other young lady of your acquaintance,
+and, polished by your example, may do honour to your taste as well as
+your prudence. Under these circumstances, you will, I am quite sure,
+look with lenity on her girlish errors, and not love her the less
+because her foolish fancy persuades her that she is in love with
+another."
+
+"Ahem!" said Mauleverer, "you view the matter with more sense than
+sentiment; but look you, Brandon, we must try, for both our sakes, if
+possible, to keep the identity of Lovett with Clifford from being
+known. I do not see why it should be. No doubt he was on his guard while
+playing the gallant, and committed no atrocity at Bath. The name of
+Clifford is hitherto perfectly unsullied. No fraud, no violence are
+attached to the appellation; and if the rogue will but keep his own
+counsel, we may hang him out of the way without the secret transpiring."
+
+"But if I remember right," said Brandon, "the newspapers say that this
+Lovett will be tried some seventy or eighty miles only from Bath, and
+that gives a chance of recognition."
+
+"Ay, but he will be devilishly altered, I imagine; for his wound has
+already been but a bad beautifier to his face. Moreover, if the dog has
+any delicacy, he will naturally dislike to be known as the gallant of
+that gay city where he shone so successfully, and will disguise
+himself as well as he is able. I hear wonders of his powers of
+self-transformation."
+
+"But he may commit himself on the point between this and his trial,"
+said Brandon.
+
+"I think of ascertaining how far that is likely, by sending my valet
+down to him (you know one treats these gentlemen highwaymen with a
+certain consideration, and hangs them with all due respect to their
+feelings), to hint that it will be doubtless very unpleasant to him,
+under his 'present unfortunate circumstances' (is not that the phrase?),
+to be known as the gentleman who enjoyed so deserved a popularity at
+Bath, and that, though 'the laws of my country compel me' to prosecute
+him, yet, should he desire it, he may be certain that I will preserve
+his secret. Come, Brandon, what say you to that manoeuvre? It will
+answer my purpose, and make the gentleman--for doubtless he is all
+sensibility--shed tears at my generous forbearance!"
+
+"It is no bad idea," said Brandon. "I commend you for it. At all events,
+it is necessary that my niece should not know the situation of her
+lover. She is a girl of a singular turn of mind, and fortune has made
+her independent. Who knows but that she might commit some folly or
+another, write petitions to the king, and beg me to present them, or
+go--for she has a world of romance in her--to prison, to console him;
+or, at all events, she would beg my kind offices on his behalf,--a
+request peculiarly awkward, as in all probability I shall have the
+honour of trying him."
+
+"Ay, by the by, so you will. And I fancy the poor rogue's audacity
+will not cause you to be less severe than you usually are. They say you
+promise to make more human pendulums than any of your brethren."
+
+"They do say that, do they?" said Brandon. "Well, I own I have a bile
+against my species; I loathe their folly and their half vices. 'Ridet et
+odit'--["He laughs and hates"]--is my motto; and I allow that it is not
+the philosophy that makes men merciful!"
+
+"Well, Juvenal's wisdom be yours, mine be Horace's!" rejoined
+Mauleverer, as he picked his teeth; "but I am glad you see the absolute
+necessity of keeping this secret from Lucy's suspicion. She never reads
+the papers, I suppose? Girls never do!"
+
+"No! and I will take care not to have them thrown in her way; and as, in
+consequence of my poor brother's recent death, she sees nobody but us,
+there is little chance, should Lovett's right to the name of Clifford be
+discovered, that it should reach her ears."
+
+"But those confounded servants?"
+
+"True enough! But consider that before they know it, the newspapers
+will; so that, should it be needful, we shall have our own time to
+caution them. I need only say to Lucy's woman, 'A poor gentleman, a
+friend of the late squire, whom your mistress used to dance with, and
+you must have seen,--Captain Clifford,--is to be tried for his life. It
+will shock her, poor thing! in her present state of health, to tell her
+of so sad an event to her father's friend; therefore be silent, as
+you value your place and ten guineas,'--and I may be tolerably sure of
+caution!"
+
+"You ought to be chairman to the Ways and Means Committee!" cried
+Mauleverer. "My mind is now easy; and when once poor Clifford is
+gone,--fallen from a high estate,--we may break the matter gently to
+her; and as I intend thereon to be very respectful, very delicate, etc.,
+she cannot but be sensible of my kindness and real affection!"
+
+"And if a live dog be better than a dead lion," added Brandon, "surely a
+lord in existence will be better than a highwayman hanged!"
+
+"According to ordinary logic," rejoined Mauleverer, "that syllogism is
+clear enough; and though I believe a girl may cling now and then to the
+memory of a departed lover, I do not think she will when the memory is
+allied with shame. Love is nothing more than vanity pleased; wound the
+vanity, and you destroy the love! Lucy will be forced, after having made
+so bad a choice of a lover, to make a good one in a husband, in order to
+recover her self-esteem!"
+
+"And therefore you are certain of her!" said Brandon, ironically.
+
+"Thanks to my star,--my garter,--my ancestor, the first baron, and
+myself, the first earl,--I hope I am," said Mauleverer; and the
+conversation turned. Mauleverer did not stay much longer with the
+judge; and Brandon, left alone, recurred once more to the perusal of his
+letters.
+
+We scarcely know what sensations it would have occasioned in one who had
+known Brandon only in his later years, could he have read those letters
+referring to so much earlier a date. There was in the keen and arid
+character of the man so little that recalled any idea of courtship
+or youthful gallantry that a correspondence of that nature would have
+appeared almost as unnatural as the loves of plants, or the amatory
+softenings of a mineral. The correspondence now before Brandon was
+descriptive of various feelings, but all appertaining to the same class;
+most of them were apparent answers to letters from him. One while they
+replied tenderly to expressions of tenderness, but intimated a doubt
+whether the writer would be able to constitute his future happiness,
+and atone for certain sacrifices of birth and fortune and ambitious
+prospects, to which she alluded: at other times, a vein of latent
+coquetry seemed to pervade the style,--an indescribable air of coolness
+and reserve contrasted former passages in the correspondence, and was
+calculated to convey to the reader an impression that the feelings
+of the lover were not altogether adequately returned. Frequently the
+writer, as if Brandon had expressed himself sensible of this conviction,
+reproached him for unjust jealousy and unworthy suspicion. And the
+tone of the reproach varied in each letter; sometimes it was gay
+and satirizing; at others soft and expostulatory; at others gravely
+reasoning, and often haughtily indignant. Still, throughout the whole
+correspondence, on the part of the mistress, there was a sufficient
+stamp of individuality to give a shrewd examiner some probable guess at
+the writer's character. He would have judged her, perhaps, capable of
+strong and ardent feeling, but ordinarily of a light and capricious
+turn, and seemingly prope to imagine and to resent offence. With these
+letters were mingled others in Brandon's writing,--of how different,
+of how impassioned a description! All that a deep, proud, meditative,
+exacting character could dream of love given, or require of love
+returned, was poured burningly over the pages; yet they were full
+of reproach, of jealousy, of a nice and torturing observation, as
+calculated to wound as the ardour might be fitted to charm; and often
+the bitter tendency to disdain that distinguished his temperament broke
+through the fondest enthusiasm of courtship or the softest outpourings
+of love.
+
+     "You saw me not yesterday," he wrote in one letter, "but I saw you;
+     all day I was by you: you gave not a look which passed me unnoticed;
+     you made not a movement which I did not chronicle in my memory.
+     Julia, do you tremble when I tell you this?  Yes, if you have a
+     heart, I know these words would stab it to the core!  You may affect
+     to answer me indignantly!  Wise dissembler! it is very skilful,
+     very, to assume anger when you have no reply.  I repeat during the
+     whole of that party of pleasure (pleasure! well, your tastes, it
+     must be acknowledged, are exquisite!) which you enjoyed yesterday,
+     and which you so faintly asked me to share, my eye was on you.  You
+     did not know that I was in the wood when you took the grin of the
+     incomparable Digby, with so pretty a semblance of alarm at the
+     moment the snake which my foot disturbed glided across your path.
+     You did not know I was within hearing of the tent where you made so
+     agreeable a repast, and from which your laughter sent peals so many
+     and so numerous.  Laughter!  O Julia, can you tell me that you love,
+     and yet be happy, even to mirth, when I am away!  Love!  O God, how
+     different a sensation is mine!  Mine makes my whole principle of
+     life!  Yours!  I tell you that I think at moments I would rather
+     have your hate than the lukewarm sentiment you bear to me, and
+     honour by the name of affection.'  Pretty phrase!  I have no
+     affection for you!  Give me not that sickly word; but try with me,
+     Julia, to invent some expression that has never filtered a paltry
+     meaning through the lips of another!  Affection!  why, that is a
+     sister's word, a girl's word to her pet squirrel!  Never was it made
+     for that ruby and most ripe mouth!  Shall I come to your house this
+     evening?  Your mother has asked me, and you--you heard her, and said
+     nothing.  Oh! but that was maiden reserve, was it? and maiden
+     reserve caused you to take up a book the moment I left you, as if my
+     company made but an ordinary amusement instantly to be replaced by
+     another!  When I have seen you, society, books, food, all are
+     hateful to me; but you, sweet Julia, you can read, can you?  Why,
+     when I left you, I lingered by the parlour window for hours, till
+     dusk, and you never once lifted your eyes, nor saw me pass and
+     repass.  At least I thought you would have watched my steps when I
+     left the house; but I err, charming moralist!  According to you,
+     that vigilance would have been meanness."
+
+In another part of the correspondence a more grave if not a deeper gush
+of feeling struggled for expression.
+
+     "You say, Julia, that were you to marry one who thinks so much of
+     what he surrenders for you, and who requires from yourself so vast a
+     return of love, you should tremble for the future happiness of both
+     of us.  Julia, the triteness of that fear proves that you love not
+     at all.  I do not tremble for our future happiness; on the contrary,
+     the intensity of my passion for you makes me know that we never can
+     be happy, never beyond the first rapture of our union.  Happiness is
+     a quiet and tranquil feeling.  No feeling that I can possibly bear
+     to you will ever receive those epithets,--I know that I shall be
+     wretched and accursed when I am united to you.  Start not!  I will
+     presently tell you why.  But I do not dream of happiness, neither
+     (could you fathom one drop of the dark and limitless ocean of my
+     emotions) would you name to me that word.  It is not the mercantile
+     and callous calculation of chances for 'future felicity' (what
+     homily supplied you with so choice a term?) that enters into the
+     heart that cherishes an all-pervading love.  Passion looks only to
+     one object, to nothing beyond; I thirst, I consume, not for
+     happiness, but you.  Were your possession inevitably to lead me to a
+     gulf of anguish and shame, think you I should covet it one jot the
+     less!  If you carry one thought, one hope, one dim fancy, beyond the
+     event that makes you mine, you may be more worthy of the esteem of
+     others, but you are utterly undeserving of my love.
+
+          ....................
+
+     "I will tell you now why I know we cannot be happy.  In the first
+     place, when you say that I am proud of birth, that I am morbidly
+     ambitious, that I am anxious to shine in the great world, and that
+     after the first intoxication of love has passed away I shall feel
+     bitterness against one who has so humbled my pride and darkened my
+     prospects, I am not sure that you wholly err.  But I am sure that
+     the instant remedy is in your power.  Have you patience, Julia, to
+     listen to a kind Of history of myself, or rather of my feelings?  If
+     so, perhaps it may be the best method of explaining all that I would
+     convey.  You will see, then, that my family pride and my worldly
+     ambition are not founded altogether on those basements which move my
+     laughter in another; if my feelings thereon are really, however, as
+     you would insinuate, equal matter for derision, behold, my Julia, I
+     can laugh equally at them!  So pleasant a thing to me is scorn, that
+     I would rather despise myself than have no one to despise!  But to
+     my narrative!  You must know that there are but two of us, sons of a
+     country squire, of old family, which once possessed large
+     possessions and something of historical renown.  We lived in an old
+     country-place; my father was a convivial dog, a fox-hunter, a
+     drunkard, yet in his way a fine gentleman,--and a very disreputable
+     member of society.  The first feelings towards him that I can
+     remember were those of shame.  Not much matter of family pride here,
+     you will say!  True, and that is exactly the reason which made me
+     cherish family pride elsewhere.  My father's house was filled with
+     guests,--some high and some low; they all united in ridicule of the
+     host.  I soon detected the laughter, and you may imagine that it did
+     not please me.  Meanwhile the old huntsman, whose family was about
+     as ancient as ours, and whose ancestors had officiated in his
+     capacity for the ancestors of his master time out of mind, told me
+     story after story about the Brandons of yore.  I turned from the
+     stories to more legitimate history, and found the legends were
+     tolerably true.  I learned to glow at this discovery; the pride,
+     humbled when I remembered my sire, revived when I remembered my
+     ancestors.  I became resolved to emulate them, to restore a sunken
+     name, and vowed a world of nonsense on the subject.  The habit of
+     brooding over these ideas grew on me.  I never heard a jest broken
+     on my paternal guardian, I never caught the maudlin look of his
+     reeling eyes, nor listened to some exquisite inanity from his
+     besotted lips, but that my thoughts flew instantly back to the Sir
+     Charleses and the Sir Roberts of my race, and I comforted myself
+     with the hope that the present degeneracy should pass away.  Hence,
+     Julia, my family pride; hence, too, another feeling you dislike in
+     me,--disdain!  I first learned to despise my father, the host, and I
+     then despised my acquaintances, his guests; for I saw, while they
+     laughed at him, that they flattered, and that their merriment was
+     not the only thing suffered to feed at his expense.  Thus contempt
+     grew up with me, and I had nothing to check it; for when I looked
+     around I saw not one living thing that I could respect.  This father
+     of mine had the sense to think I was no idiot.  He was proud (poor
+     man!) of 'my talents,' namely, of prizes won at school, and
+     congratulatory letters from my masters.  He sent me to college.
+     My mind took a leap there; I will tell you, prettiest, what it was!
+     Before I went thither I had some fine vague visions about virtue.
+     I thought to revive my ancestral honours by being good; in short, I
+     was an embryo King Pepin.  I awoke from this dream at the
+     University.  There, for the first time, I perceived the real
+     consequence of rank.
+
+     "At school, you know, Julia, boys care nothing for a lord.  A good
+     cricketer, an excellent fellow, is worth all the earls in the
+     peerage.  But at college all that ceases; bats and balls sink into
+     the nothingness in which corals and bells had sunk before.  One
+     grows manly, and worships coronets and carriages.  I saw it was a
+     fine thing to get a prize, but it was ten times a finer thing to get
+     drunk with a peer.  So, when I had done the first, my resolve to be
+     worthy of my sires made me do the second,--not, indeed, exactly; I
+     never got drunk: my father disgusted me with that vice betimes.  To
+     his gluttony I owe my vegetable diet, and to his inebriety my
+     addiction to water.  No, I did not get drunk with peers; but I was
+     just as agreeable to them as if I had been equally embruted.  I knew
+     intimately all the 'Hats' in the University, and I was henceforth
+     looked up to by the 'Caps,' as if my head had gained the height of
+     every hat that I knew.
+
+          [At Cambridge the sons of noblemen and the eldest sons of
+          baronets are allowed to wear hats instead of the academical
+          cap.]
+
+     But I did not do this immediately.  I must tell you two little
+     anecdotes that first initiated me into the secret of real greatness.
+
+     "The first was this: I was sitting at dinner with some fellows of a
+     college, grave men and clever.  Two of them, not knowing me, were
+     conversing about me; they heard, they said, that I should never be
+     so good a fellow as my father,--have such a cellar or keep such a
+     house.  'I have met six earls there and a marquess,' quoth the other
+     senior.  'And his son,' returned the first don, 'only keeps company
+     with sizars, I believe.'  'So then,' said I to myself, 'to deserve
+     the praise even of clever men, one must have good wines, know plenty
+     of earls, and for swear sizars.'  Nothing could be truer than my
+     conclusion.
+
+     "Anecdote the second is this: On the day I gained a high university
+     prize I invited my friends to dine with me.  Four of them refused
+     because they were engaged (they had been asked since I asked them),
+     --to whom? the richest man at the University.  These occurrences,
+     happening at the same time, threw me into a profound revery.  I
+     awoke, and became a man of the world.  I no longer resolved to be
+     virtuous, and to hunt after the glory of your Romans and your
+     Athenians,--I resolved to become rich, powerful, and of worldly
+     repute.
+
+     "I abjured my honest sizars, and as I said before, I courted some
+     rich 'Hats.'  Behold my first grand step in the world!  I became the
+     parasite and the flatterer.  What! would my pride suffer this?
+     Verily, yes, my pride delighted in it; for it soothed my spirit of
+     contempt to put these fine fellows to my use!  It soothed me to see
+     how easily I could cajole them, and to what a variety of purposes I
+     could apply even the wearisome disgust of their acquaintance.
+     Nothing is so foolish as to say the idle great are of no use; they
+     can be put to any use whatsoever that a wise man is inclined to make
+     of them.  Well, Julia, lo! my character already formed; the family
+     pride, disdain, and worldly ambition,--there it is for you.  After
+     circumstances only strengthened the impression already made.  I
+     desired, on leaving college, to go abroad; my father had no money to
+     give me.  What signified that?  I looked carelessly around for some
+     wealthier convenience than the paternal board; I found it in a Lord
+     Mauleverer.  He had been at college with me, and I endured him
+     easily as a companion,--for he had accomplishments, wit, and good-
+     nature.  I made him wish to go abroad, and I made him think he
+     should die of ennui if I did not accompany him.  To his request to
+     that effect I reluctantly agreed, and saw everything in Europe,
+     which he neglected to see, at his expense.  What amused me the most
+     was the perception that I, the parasite, was respected by him; and
+     he, the patron, was ridiculed by me!  It would not have been so if I
+     had depended on 'my virtue.'  Well, sweetest Julia, the world, as I
+     have said, gave to my college experience a sacred authority.  I
+     returned to England; and my father died, leaving to me not a
+     sixpence, and to my brother an estate so mortgaged that he could not
+     enjoy it, and so restricted that he could not sell it.  It was now
+     the time for me to profit by the experience I boasted of.  I saw
+     that it was necessary I should take some profession.  Professions
+     are the masks to your pauper-rogue; they give respectability to
+     cheating, and a diploma to feed upon others.  I analyzed my talents,
+     and looked to the customs of my country; the result was my
+     resolution to take to the Bar.  I had an inexhaustible power of
+     application; I was keen, shrewd, and audacious.  All these qualities
+     'tell' at the courts of justice.  I kept my legitimate number of
+     terms; I was called; I went the circuit; I obtained not a brief,--
+     not a brief, Julia!  My health, never robust, gave way beneath study
+     and irritation.  I was ordered to betake myself to the country.  I
+     came to this village, as one both salubrious and obscure.  I lodged
+     in the house of your aunt; you came hither daily,--I saw you,--you
+     know the rest.  But where, all this time, were my noble friends?
+     you will say.  'Sdeath, since we had left college, they had learned
+     a little of the wisdom I had then possessed; they were not disposed
+     to give something for nothing; they had younger brothers, and
+     cousins, and mistresses, and, for aught I know, children to provide
+     for.  Besides, they had their own expenses; the richer a man is, the
+     less he has to give.  One of them would have bestowed on me a
+     living, if I had gone into the Church; another, a commission if I
+     had joined his regiment.  But I knew the day was past both for
+     priest and soldier; and it was not merely to live, no, nor to live
+     comfortably, but to enjoy power, that I desired; so I declined these
+     offers.  Others of my friends would have been delighted to have kept
+     me in their house, feasted me, joked with me, rode with me, nothing
+     more!  But I had already the sense to see that if a man dances
+     himself into distinction, it is never by the steps of attendance.
+     One must receive favours and court patronage, but it must be with
+     the air of an independent man.  My old friends thus rendered
+     useless, my legal studies forbade me to make new, nay, they even
+     estranged me from the old; for people may say what they please about
+     a similarity of opinions being necessary to friendship,--a
+     similarity of habits is much more so.  It is the man you dine,
+     breakfast, and lodge with, walk, ride, gamble, or thieve with, that
+     is your friend; not the man who likes Virgil as well as you do, and
+     agrees with you in an admiration of Handel.  Meanwhile my chief
+     prey, Lord Mauleverer, was gone; he had taken another man's
+     Dulcinea, and sought out a bower in Italy.  From that time to this I
+     have never heard of him nor seen him; I know not even his address.
+     With the exception of a few stray gleanings from my brother, who,
+     good easy man!  I could plunder more, were I not resolved not to
+     ruin the family stock, I have been thrown on myself; the result is
+     that, though as clever as my fellows, I have narrowly shunned
+     starvation,--had my wants been less simple, there would have been no
+     shunning in the case; but a man is not easily starved who drinks
+     water, and eats by the ounce.  A more effectual fate might have
+     befallen me.  Disappointment, wrath, baffled hope, mortified pride,
+     all these, which gnawed at my heart, might have consumed it long
+     ago; I might have fretted away as a garment which the moth eateth,
+     had it not been for that fund of obstinate and iron hardness which
+     nature--I beg pardon, there is no nature--circumstance bestowed upon
+     me.  This has borne me up, and will bear me yet through time and
+     shame and bodily weakness and mental fever, until my ambition has
+     won a certain height, and my disdain of human pettiness rioted in
+     the external sources of fortune, as well as an inward fountain of
+     bitter and self-fed consolation.  Yet, oh, Julia!  I know not if
+     even this would have supported me, if at that epoch of life, when I
+     was most wounded, most stricken in body, most soured in mind, my
+     heart had not met and fastened itself to yours.  I saw you, loved
+     you; and life became to me a new object.  Even now, as I write to
+     you, all my bitterness, my pride, vanish; everything I have longed
+     for disappears; my very ambition is gone.  I have no hope but for
+     you, Julia; beautiful, adored Julia! when I love you, I love even my
+     kind.  Oh, you know not the power you possess over me!  Do not
+     betray it; you can yet make me all that my boyhood once dreamed, or
+     you can harden every thought, feeling, sensation, into stone.
+
+               ................
+
+     "I was to tell you why I look not for happiness in our union.  You
+     have now seen my nature.  You have traced the history of my life, by
+     tracing the history of my character.  You see what I surrender in
+     gaining you.  I do not deny the sacrifice.  I surrender the very
+     essentials of my present mind and soul.  I cease to be worldly.  I
+     cannot raise myself, I cannot revive my ancestral name; nay, I shall
+     relinquish it forever.  I shall adopt a disguised appellation.  I
+     shall sink into another grade of life.  In some remote village, by
+     means of some humbler profession than that I now follow, we must
+     earn our subsistence, and smile at ambition.  I tell you frankly,
+     Julia, when I close the eyes of my heart, when I shut you from my
+     gaze, this sacrifice appalls me.  But even then you force yourself
+     before me, and I feel that one glance from your eye is more to me
+     than all.  If you could bear with me,--if you could soothe me,--if
+     when a cloud is on me you could suffer it to pass away unnoticed,
+     and smile on me the moment it is gone,--O Julia! there would be then
+     no extreme of poverty, no abasement of fortune, no abandonment of
+     early dreams which would not seem to me rapture if coupled with the
+     bliss of knowing that you are mine.  Never should my lip, never
+     should my eye tell you that there is that thing on earth for which I
+     repine or which I could desire.  No, Julia, could I flatter my heart
+     with this hope, you would not find me dream of unhappiness and you
+     united.  But I tremble, Julia, when I think of your temper and my
+     own; you will conceive a gloomy look from one never mirthful is an
+     insult, and you will feel every vent of passion on Fortune or on
+     others as a reproach to you.  Then, too, you cannot enter into my
+     nature; you cannot descend into its caverns; you cannot behold, much
+     less can you deign to lull, the exacting and lynx-eyed jealousy that
+     dwells there.  Sweetest Julia! every breath of yours, every touch of
+     yours, every look of yours, I yearn for beyond all a mother's
+     longing for the child that has been torn from her for years.  Your
+     head leaned upon an old tree (do you remember it, near ------?), and
+     I went every day, after seeing you, to kiss it.  Do you wonder that
+     I am jealous?  How can I love you as I do and be otherwise!  My
+     whole being is intoxicated with you!
+
+                ................
+
+     "This then, your pride and mine, your pleasure in the admiration of
+     others, your lightness, Julia, make me foresee an eternal and
+     gushing source of torture to my mind.  I care not; I care for
+     nothing so that you are mine, if but for one hour."
+
+It seems that, despite the strange, sometimes the unloverlike and
+fiercely selfish nature of these letters from Brandon, something of a
+genuine tone of passion,--perhaps their originality,--aided, no doubt,
+by some uttered eloquence of the writer and some treacherous inclination
+on the part of the mistress, ultimately conquered; and that a union so
+little likely to receive the smile of a prosperous star was at length
+concluded. The letter which terminated the correspondence was from
+Brandon: it was written on the evening before the marriage, which, it
+appeared by the same letter, was to be private and concealed. After a
+rapturous burst of hope and joy, it continued thus:--
+
+     "Yes, Julia, I recant my words; I have no belief that you or I shall
+     ever have cause hereafter for unhappiness.  Those eyes that dwelt so
+     tenderly on mine; that hand whose pressure lingers yet in every
+     nerve of my frame; those lips turned so coyly, yet, shall I say,
+     reluctantly from me,--all tell me that you love me; and my fears are
+     banished.  Love, which conquered my nature, will conquer the only
+     thing I would desire to see altered in yours.  Nothing could ever
+     make me adore you less, though you affect to dread it,--nothing but
+     a knowledge that you are unworthy of me, that you have a thought for
+     another; then I should not hate you.  No; the privilege of my past
+     existence would revive; I should revel in a luxury of contempt, I
+     should despise you, I should mock you, and I should be once more
+     what I was before I knew you.  But why do I talk thus?  My bride,
+     my blessing, forgive me!"
+
+In concluding our extracts from this correspondence, we wish the
+reader to note, first, that the love professed by Brandon seems of
+that vehement and corporeal nature which, while it is often the least
+durable, is often the most susceptible of the fiercest extremes of
+hatred or even of disgust; secondly, that the character opened by this
+sarcastic candour evidently required in a mistress either an utter
+devotion or a skilful address; and thirdly, that we have hinted at
+such qualities in the fair correspondent as did not seem sanguinely to
+promise either of these essentials.
+
+While with a curled yet often with a quivering lip the austere and
+sarcastic Brandon slowly compelled himself to the task of proceeding
+through these monuments of former folly and youthful emotion, the
+further elucidation of those events, now rapidly urging on a fatal and
+dread catastrophe, spreads before us a narrative occurring many years
+prior to the time at which we are at present arrived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+          Clem.  Lift the dark veil of years!  Behind, what waits?
+          A human heart.  Vast city, where reside
+          All glories and all vilenesses; while foul,
+          Yet silent, through the roar of passions rolls
+          The river of the Darling Sin, and bears
+          A life and yet a poison on its tide.
+            ..............
+          Clem.  Thy wife?
+
+          Vict.  Avaunt! I've changed that word to "scorn"!
+
+          Clem.  Thy child?
+
+          Vict.  Ay, that strikes home,--my child, my child!
+
+                                         Love and Hatred, by --------
+
+To an obscure town in shire there came to reside a young couple, whose
+appearance and habits drew towards them from the neighbouring gossips
+a more than ordinary attention. They bore the name of Welford. The man
+assumed the profession of a solicitor. He came without introduction
+or recommendation; his manner of life bespoke poverty; his address was
+reserved and even sour; and despite the notice and scrutiny with which
+he was regarded, he gained no clients and made no lawsuits. The want of
+all those decent charlatanisms which men of every profession are almost
+necessitated to employ, and the sudden and unushered nature of his
+coming were, perhaps, the cause of this ill-success. "His house was too
+small," people said, "for respectability." And little good could be got
+from a solicitor the very rails round whose door were so sadly in want
+of repainting! Then, too, Mrs. Welford made a vast number of enemies.
+She was, beyond all expression, beautiful; and there was a certain
+coquetry in her manner which showed she was aware of her attractions.
+All the ladies of ------- hated her. A few people called on the young
+couple. Welford received them coldly; their invitations were unaccepted,
+and, what was worse, they were never returned. The devil himself could
+not have supported an attorney under such circumstances. Reserved,
+shabby, poor, rude, introductionless, a bad house, an unpainted railing,
+and a beautiful wife! Nevertheless, though Welford was not employed,
+he was, as we have said, watched. On their first arrival, which was in
+summer, the young pair were often seen walking together in the fields or
+groves which surrounded their home. Sometimes they walked affectionately
+together, and it was observed with what care Welford adjusted his wife's
+cloak or shawl around her slender shape, as the cool of the evening
+increased. But often his arm was withdrawn; he lingered behind, and
+they continued their walk or returned homeward in silence and apart.
+By degrees whispers circulated throughout the town that the new-married
+couple lived by no means happily. The men laid the fault on the
+stern-looking husband; the women, on the minx of a wife. However, the
+solitary servant whom they kept declared that though Mr. Welford
+did sometimes frown, and Mrs. Welford did sometimes weep, they were
+extremely attached to each other, and only quarrelled through love. The
+maid had had four lovers herself, and was possibly experienced in such
+matters. They received no visitors, near or from a distance; and the
+postman declared he had never seen a letter directed to either. Thus a
+kind of mystery hung over the pair, and made them still more gazed on
+and still more disliked--which is saying a great deal--than they would
+have otherwise been. Poor as Welford was, his air and walk eminently
+bespoke what common persons term gentility. And in this he had greatly
+the advantage of his beautiful wife, who, though there was certainly
+nothing vulgar or plebeian in her aspect, altogether wanted the
+refinement of manner, look, and phrase which characterized Welford.
+For about two years they lived in this manner, and so frugally and
+tranquilly that though Welford had not any visible means of subsistence,
+no one could well wonder in what manner they did subsist. About the
+end of that time Welford suddenly embarked a small sum in a county
+speculation. In the course of this adventure, to the great surprise of
+his neighbours, he evinced an extraordinary turn for calculation, and
+his habits plainly bespoke a man both of business and ability. This
+disposal of capital brought a sufficient return to support the Welfords,
+if they had been so disposed, in rather a better style than heretofore.
+They remained, however, in much the same state; and the only difference
+that the event produced was the retirement of Mr. Welford from the
+profession he had embraced. He was no longer a solicitor! It must be
+allowed that he resigned no great advantages in this retirement. About
+this time some officers were quartered at ------; and one of them, a
+handsome lieutenant, was so struck with the charms of Mrs. Welford,
+whom he saw at church, that he lost no opportunity of testifying his
+admiration. It was maliciously yet not unfoundedly remarked that though
+no absolute impropriety could be detected in the manner of Mrs. Welford,
+she certainly seemed far from displeased with the evident homage of the
+young lieutenant. A blush tinged her cheek when she saw him; and the
+gallant coxcomb asserted that the blush was not always without a smile.
+Emboldened by the interpretations of his vanity, and contrasting, as
+every one else did, his own animated face and glittering garb with the
+ascetic and gloomy countenance, the unstudied dress, and austere gait
+which destroyed in Welford the effect of a really handsome person, our
+lieutenant thought fit to express his passion by a letter, which he
+conveyed to Mrs. Welford's pew. Mrs. Welford went not to church that
+day; the letter was found by a good-natured neighbour, and inclosed
+anonymously to the husband.
+
+Whatever, in the secrecy of domestic intercourse, took place on this
+event was necessarily unknown; but the next Sunday the face of Mr.
+Welford, which had never before appeared at church, was discerned by one
+vigilant neighbour,--probably the anonymous friend,--not in the same
+pew with his wife, but in a remote corner of the sacred house. And once,
+when the lieutenant was watching to read in Mrs. Welford's face some
+answer to his epistle, the same obliging inspector declared that
+Welford's countenance assumed a sardonic and withering sneer that
+made his very blood to creep. However this be, the lieutenant left
+his quarters, and Mrs. Welford's reputation remained dissatisfactorily
+untarnished. Shortly after this the county speculation failed, and it
+was understood that the Welfords were about to leave the town, whither
+none knew,--some said to jail; but then, unhappily, no debts could be
+discovered. Their bills had been "next to nothing;" but, at least, they
+had been regularly paid. However, before the rumoured emigration took
+place, a circumstance equally wonderful to the good people of occurred.
+One bright spring morning a party of pleasure from a great house in the
+vicinity passed through that town. Most conspicuous of these was a
+young horseman, richly dressed, and of a remarkably showy and handsome
+appearance. Not a little sensible of the sensation he created,
+this cavalier lingered behind his companions in order to eye more
+deliberately certain damsels stationed in a window, and who were quite
+ready to return his glances with interest. At this moment the horse,
+which was fretting itself fiercely against the rein that restrained it
+from its fellows, took a fright at a knife-grinder, started violently to
+one side, and the graceful cavalier, who had been thinking, not of the
+attitude best adapted to preserve his equilibrium, but to display his
+figure, was thrown with some force upon a heap of bricks and rubbish
+which had long, to the scandal of the neighbourhood, stood before the
+paintless railings around Mr. Welford's house. Welford himself came
+out at the time, and felt compelled--for he was by no means one whose
+sympathetic emotions flowed easily--to give a glance to the condition
+of a man who lay motionless before his very door. The horseman quickly
+recovered his senses, but found himself unable to rise; one of his legs
+was broken. Supported in the arms of his groom, he looked around, and
+his eye met Welford's. An instant recognition gave life to the face
+of the former, and threw a dark blush over the sullen features of the
+latter.
+
+"Heavens!" said the cavalier, "is that--"
+
+"Hist, my lord!" cried Welford, quickly interrupting him, and glancing
+round. "But you are hurt,--will you enter my house?"
+
+The horseman signified his assent, and, between the groom and Welford,
+was borne within the shabby door of the ex-solicitor. The groom was
+then despatched with an excuse to the party, many of whom were already
+hastening around the house; and though one or two did force themselves
+across the inhospitable threshold, yet so soon as they had uttered a few
+expletives, and felt their stare sink beneath the sullen and chilling
+asperity of the host, they satisfied themselves that though it was d---d
+unlucky for their friend, yet they could do nothing for him at present;
+and promising to send to inquire after him the next day, they remounted
+and rode homeward, with an eye more attentive than usual to the motion
+of their steeds. They did not, however, depart till the surgeon of the
+town had made his appearance, and declared that the patient must not on
+any account be moved. A lord's leg was a windfall that did not happen
+every day to the surgeon of -------. All this while we may imagine the
+state of anxiety experienced in the town, and the agonized endurance of
+those rural nerves which are produced in scanty populations, and have
+so Taliacotian a sympathy with the affairs of other people. One day,
+two days, three days, a week, a fortnight, nay, a month, passed, and the
+lord was still the inmate of Mr. Welford's abode. Leaving the gossips to
+feed on their curiosity,--"cannibals of their own hearts,"--we must
+give a glance towards the interior of the inhospitable mansion of the
+ex-solicitor.
+
+It was towards evening, the sufferer was supported on a sofa, and the
+beautiful Mrs. Welford, who had officiated as his nurse, was placing the
+pillow under the shattered limb. He himself was attempting to seize her
+hand, which she coyly drew back, and uttering things sweeter and more
+polished than she had ever listened to before. At this moment Welford
+softly entered; he was unnoticed by either; and he stood at the door
+contemplating them with a smile of calm and self-hugging derision. The
+face of Mephistopheles regarding Margaret and Faust might suggest some
+idea of the picture we design to paint; but the countenance of Welford
+was more lofty, as well as comelier, in character, though not less
+malignant in expression, than that which the incomparable Retsch has
+given to the mocking fiend. So utter, so congratulatory, so lordly was
+the contempt on Welford's dark and striking features, that though he
+was in that situation in which ridicule usually attaches itself to the
+husband, it was the gallant and the wife that would have appeared to the
+beholder in a humiliating and unenviable light.
+
+After a momentary pause Welford approached with a heavy step. The wife
+started; but with a bland and smooth expression, which since his sojourn
+in the town of had been rarely visible in his aspect, the host joined
+the pair, smiled on the nurse, and congratulated the patient on his
+progress towards recovery. The nobleman, well learned in the usages
+of the world, replied easily and gayly; and the conversation flowed
+on cheerfully enough till the wife, who had sat abstracted and apart,
+stealing ever and anon timid glances towards her husband and looks of a
+softer meaning towards the patient, retired from the room. Welford
+then gave a turn to the conversation; he reminded the nobleman of the
+pleasant days they had passed in Italy,--of the adventures they had
+shared, and the intrigues they had enjoyed. As the conversation warmed,
+it assumed a more free and licentious turn; and not a little, we ween,
+would the good folks of -----have been amazed, could they have listened
+to the gay jests and the libertine maxims which flowed from the thin
+lips of that cold and severe Welford, whose countenance gave the lie to
+mirth. Of women in general they spoke with that lively contempt which is
+the customary tone with men of the world; only in Welford it assumed
+a bitterer, a deeper, and a more philosophical cast than it did in his
+more animated yet less energetic guest.
+
+The nobleman seemed charmed with his friend; the conversation was just
+to his taste; and when Welford had supported him up to bed, he shook
+that person cordially by the hand, and hoped he should soon see him
+in very different circumstances. When the peer's door was closed on
+Welford, he stood motionless for some moments; he then with a soft step
+ascended to his own chamber. His wife slept soundly; beside the bed was
+the infant's cradle. As his eyes fell on the latter, the rigid irony,
+now habitual to his features, relaxed; he bent over the cradle long and
+in deep silence. The mother's face, blended with the sire's, was stamped
+on the sleeping and cherub countenance before him; and as at length,
+rousing from his revery, he kissed it gently, he murmured,--
+
+"When I look on you I will believe that she once loved me. Pah!" he said
+abruptly, and rising, "this fatherly sentiment for a -----'s offering
+is exquisite in me!" So saying, without glancing towards his wife, who,
+disturbed by the loudness of his last words, stirred uneasily, he left
+the room, and descended into that where he had conversed with his
+guest. He shut the door with caution, and striding to and fro the humble
+apartment, gave vent to thoughts marshalled somewhat in the broken array
+in which they now appear to the reader:--
+
+"Ay, ay, she has been my ruin! and if I were one of your weak fools who
+make a gospel of the silliest and most mawkish follies of this social
+state, she would now be my disgrace; but instead of my disgrace, I will
+make her my footstool to honour and wealth. And, then, to the devil with
+the footstool! Yes! two years I have borne what was enough to turn my
+whole blood into gall,--inactivity, hopelessness, a wasted heart
+and life in myself; contumely from the world; coldness, bickering,
+ingratitude from the one for whom (oh, ass that I was!) I gave up the
+most cherished part of my nature,--rather, my nature itself! Two years I
+have borne this, and now will I have my revenge. I will sell her,--sell
+her! God! I will sell her like the commonest beast of a market! And this
+paltry piece of false coin shall buy me--my world! Other men's vengeance
+comes from hatred,--a base, rash, unphilosophical sentiment! mine comes
+from scorn,--the only wise state for the reason to rest in. Other men's
+vengeance ruins themselves; mine shall save me! Ha! how my soul chuckles
+when I look at this pitiful pair, who think I see them not, and know
+that every movement they make is on a mesh of my web! Yet," and Welford
+paused slowly,--"yet I cannot but mock myself when I think of the arch
+gull that this boy's madness, love,--love, indeed! the very word
+turns me sick with loathing,--made of me. Had that woman, silly, weak,
+automatal as she is, really loved me; had she been sensible of the
+unspeakable sacrifice I had made to her (Antony's was nothing to it,--he
+lost a real world only; mine was the world of imagination); had she
+but condescended to learn my nature, to subdue the woman's devil at
+her own,--I could have lived on in this babbling hermitage forever,
+and fancied myself happy and resigned,--I could have become a different
+being. I fancy I could have become what your moralists (quacks!) call
+'good.' But this fretting frivolity of heart, this lust of fool's
+praise, this peevishness of temper, this sullenness in answer to the
+moody thought, which in me she neither fathomed nor forgave, this
+vulgar, daily, hourly pining at the paltry pinches of the body's
+poverty, the domestic whine, the household complaint,--when I--I have
+not a thought for such pitiful trials of affection; and all this while
+my curses, my buried hope and disguised spirit and sunken name not
+thought of; the magnitude of my surrender to her not even comprehended;
+nay, her 'inconveniences'--a dim hearth, I suppose, or a daintiless
+table--compared, ay, absolutely compared, with all which I abandoned for
+her sake! As if it were not enough,--had I been a fool, an ambitionless,
+soulless fool,-the mere thought that I had linked my name to that of a
+tradesman,--I beg pardon, a retired tradesman!--as if that knowledge--a
+knowledge I would strangle my whole race, every one who has ever met,
+seen me, rather than they should penetrate--were not enough, when she
+talks of 'comparing,' to make me gnaw the very flesh from my bones! No,
+no, no! Never was there so bright a turn in my fate as when this titled
+coxcomb, with his smooth voice and gaudy fripperies, came hither! I
+will make her a tool to carve my escape from this cavern wherein she
+has plunged me. I will foment 'my lord's' passion, till 'my lord' thinks
+'the passion' (a butterfly's passion!) worth any price. I will then
+make my own terms, bind 'my lord' to secrecy, and get rid of my wife,
+my shame, and the obscurity of Mr. Welford forever. Bright, bright
+prospects! let me shut my eyes to enjoy you! But softly! my noble friend
+calls himself a man of the world, skilled in human nature, and a derider
+of its prejudices; true enough, in his own little way--thanks not to
+enlarged views, but a vicious experience--so he is! The book of the
+world is a vast miscellany; he is perfectly well acquainted, doubtless,
+with those pages that treat of the fashions,--profoundly versed, I
+warrant, in the 'Magasin des Modes' tacked to the end of the index. But
+shall I, even with all the mastership which my mind must exercise
+over his,--shall I be able utterly to free myself in this 'peer of the
+world's' mind from a degrading remembrance? Cuckold! cuckold! 't is an
+ugly word; a convenient, willing cuckold, humph!--there is no grandeur,
+no philosophical varnish in the phrase. Let me see--yes! I have a
+remedy for all that. I was married privately,--well! under disguised
+names,--well! It was a stolen marriage, far from her town,--well!
+witnesses unknown to her,--well! proofs easily secured to my
+possession,--excellent! The fool shall believe it a forged marriage, an
+ingenious gallantry of mine; I will wash out the stain cuckold with the
+water of another word; I will make market of a mistress, not a wife. I
+will warn him not to acquaint her with this secret; let me consider for
+what reason,--oh! my son's legitimacy may be convenient to me hereafter.
+He will understand that reason, and I will have his 'honour' thereon.
+And by the way, I do care for that legitimacy, and will guard the
+proofs. I love my child,--ambitious men do love their children. I may
+become a lord myself, and may wish for a lord to succeed me; and that
+son is mine, thank Heaven! I am sure on that point,--the only child,
+too, that ever shall arise to me. Never, I swear, will I again put
+myself beyond my own power! All my nature, save one passion, I have
+hitherto mastered; that passion shall henceforth be my slave, my only
+thought be ambition, my only mistress be the world!"
+
+As thus terminated the revery of a man whom the social circumstances
+of the world were calculated, as if by system, to render eminently and
+basely wicked, Welford slowly ascended the stairs, and re-entered his
+chamber. His wife was still sleeping. Her beauty was of the fair and
+girlish and harmonized order, which lovers and poets would express by
+the word "angelic;" and as Welford looked upon her face, hushed and
+almost hallowed by slumber, a certain weakness and irresolution might
+have been discernible in the strong lines of his haughty features. At
+that moment, as if forever to destroy the return of hope or virtue
+to either, her lips moved, they uttered one word,--it was the name of
+Welford's courtly guest.
+
+About three weeks from that evening Mrs. Welford eloped with the young
+nobleman, and on the morning following that event the distracted husband
+with his child disappeared forever from the town of -----. From that day
+no tidings whatsoever respecting him ever reached the titillated ears
+of his anxious neighbours; and doubt, curiosity, discussion, gradually
+settled into the belief that his despair had hurried him into suicide.
+
+Although the unfortunate Mrs. Welford was in reality of a light and
+frivolous turn, and, above all, susceptible to personal vanity, she was
+not without ardent affections and keen sensibilities. Her marriage had
+been one of love,--that is to say, on her part, the ordinary love of
+girls, who love not through actual and natural feeling so much as forced
+predisposition. Her choice had fallen on one superior to herself in
+birth, and far above all, in person and address, whom she had habitually
+met. Thus her vanity had assisted her affection, and something strange
+and eccentric in the temper and mind of Welford had, though at times it
+aroused her fear, greatly contributed to inflame her imagination. Then,
+too, though an uncourtly, he had been a passionate and a romantic lover.
+She was sensible that he gave up for her much that he had previously
+conceived necessary to his existence; and she stopped not to inquire how
+far this devotion was likely to last, or what conduct on her part might
+best perpetuate the feelings from which it sprang. She had eloped with
+him. She had consented to a private marriage. She had passed one happy
+month, and then delusion vanished! Mrs. Welford was not a woman who
+could give to reality, or find in it, the charm equal to delusion. She
+was perfectly unable to comprehend the intricate and dangerous character
+of her husband.
+
+She had not the key to his virtues, nor the spell for his vices. Neither
+was the state to which poverty compelled them one well calculated
+for that tender meditation, heightened by absence and cherished in
+indolence, which so often supplies one who loves with the secret to the
+nature of the one beloved. Though not equal to her husband in birth or
+early prospects, Mrs. Welford had been accustomed to certain comforts,
+often more felt by those who belong to the inferior classes than by
+those appertaining to the more elevated, who in losing one luxury will
+often cheerfully surrender all. A fine lady can submit to more hardships
+than her woman; and every gentleman who travels smiles at the privations
+which agonize his valet. Poverty and its grim comrades made way for a
+whole host of petty irritations and peevish complaints; and as no
+guest or visitor ever relieved the domestic discontent, or broke on the
+domestic bickering, they generally ended in that moody sullenness which
+so often finds love a grave in repentance. Nothing makes people tire of
+each other like a familiarity that admits of carelessness in quarrelling
+and coarseness in complaining. The biting sneer of Welford gave acrimony
+to the murmur of his wife; and when once each conceived the other the
+injurer, or him or herself the wronged, it was vain to hope that one
+would be more wary, or the other more indulgent. They both exacted too
+much, and the wife in especial conceded too little. Mrs. Welford was
+altogether and emphatically what a libertine calls "a woman,"--such as
+a frivolous education makes a woman,--generous in great things, petty
+in small; vain, irritable, full of the littleness of herself and her
+complaints, ready to plunge into an abyss with her lover, but equally
+ready to fret away all love with reproaches when the plunge had been
+made. Of all men, Welford could bear this the least. A woman of a
+larger heart, a more settled experience, and an intellect capable of
+appreciating his character and sounding all his qualities, might have
+made him perhaps a useful and a great man, and, at least, her lover for
+life. Amidst a harvest of evil feelings the mere strength of his nature
+rendered him especially capable of intense feeling and generous emotion.
+One who relied on him was safe; one who rebelled against him trusted
+only to the caprice of his scorn. Still, however, for two years, love,
+though weakening with each hour, fought on in either breast, and could
+scarcely be said to be entirely vanquished in the wife, even when she
+eloped with her handsome seducer. A French writer has said pithily
+enough: "Compare for a moment the apathy of a husband with the
+attention, the gallantry, the adoration of a lover, and can you ask the
+result?" He was a French writer; but Mrs. Welford had in her temper much
+of the Frenchwoman. A suffering patient, young, handsome, well versed
+in the arts of intrigue, contrasted with a gloomy husband whom she
+had never comprehended, long feared, and had lately doubted if she
+disliked,--ah! a much weaker contrast has made many a much better
+woman food for the lawyers! Mrs. Welford eloped; but she felt a revived
+tenderness for her husband on the very morning that she did so. She
+carried away with her his letters of love as well as her own, which
+when they first married she had in an hour of fondness collected
+together,--then an inestimable board!--and never did her new lover
+receive from her beautiful lips half so passionate a kiss as she left on
+the cheek of her infant. For some months she enjoyed with her paramour
+all for which she had sighed in her home. The one for whom she had
+forsaken her legitimate ties was a person so habitually cheerful,
+courteous, and what is ordinarily termed "good-natured" (though he
+had in him as much of the essence of selfishness as any nobleman can
+decently have), that he continued gallant to her without an effort long
+after he had begun to think it possible to tire even of so lovely a
+face. Yet there were moments when the fickle wife recalled her husband
+with regret, and contrasting him with her seducer, did not find all the
+colourings of the contrast flattering to the latter. There is something
+in a powerful and marked character which women and all weak natures feel
+themselves constrained to respect; and Welford's character thus stood in
+bold and therefore advantageous though gloomy relief when opposed to the
+levities and foibles of this guilty woman's present adorer. However this
+be, the die was cast; and it would have been policy for the lady to have
+made the best of her present game. But she who had murmured as a wife
+was not complaisant as a mistress. Reproaches made an interlude to
+caresses, which the noble lover by no means admired. He was not a man
+to retort, he was too indolent; but neither was he one to forbear.
+"My charming friend," said he one day, after a scene, "you weary of
+me,--nothing more natural! Why torment each other? You say I have ruined
+you; my sweet friend, let me make you reparation. Become independent; I
+will settle an annuity upon you; fly me,--seek happiness elsewhere, and
+leave your unfortunate, your despairing lover to his fate."
+
+"Do you taunt me, my lord?" cried the angry fair; "or do you believe
+that money can replace the rights of which you have robbed me? Can you
+make me again a wife,--a happy, a respected wife? Do this, my lord, and
+you atone to me!"
+
+The nobleman smiled, and shrugged his shoulders. The lady yet more
+angrily repeated her question. The lover answered by an innuendo,
+which at once astonished and doubly enraged her. She eagerly demanded
+explanation; and his lordship, who had gone further than he intended,
+left the room. But his words had sunk deep into the breast of this
+unhappy woman, and she resolved to procure an elucidation. Agreeably to
+the policy which stripped the fabled traveller of his cloak, she laid
+aside the storm and preferred the sunshine: she watched a moment of
+tenderness, turned the opportunity to advantage, and by little and
+little she possessed herself of a secret which sickened her with shame,
+disgust, and dismay. Sold! bartered! the object of a contemptuous
+huxtering to the purchaser and the seller, sold, too, with a lie that
+debased her at once into an object for whom even pity was mixed with
+scorn! Robbed already of the name and honour of a wife, and transferred
+as a harlot from the wearied arms of one leman to the capricious
+caresses of another! Such was the image that rose before her; and while
+it roused at one moment all her fiercer passions into madness, humbled,
+with the next, her vanity into the dust. She, who knew the ruling
+passion of Welford, saw at a glance the object of scorn and derision
+which she had become to him. While she imagined herself the betrayer,
+she had been betrayed; she saw vividly before her (and shuddered as she
+saw) her husband's icy smile, his serpent eye, his features steeped in
+sarcasm, and all his mocking soul stamped upon the countenance, whose
+lightest derision was so galling. She turned from this picture, and
+saw the courtly face of the purchaser,--his subdued smile at her
+reproaches,--his latent sneer at her claims to a station which he had
+been taught by the arch plotter to believe she had never possessed.
+She saw his early weariness of her attractions, expressed with respect
+indeed,--an insulting respect,--but felt without a scruple of remorse.
+She saw in either--as around--only a reciprocation of contempt. She was
+in a web of profound abasement. Even that haughty grief of conscience
+for crime committed to another, which if it stings humbles not, was
+swallowed up in a far more agonizing sensation, to one so vain as
+the adulteress,--the burning sense of shame at having herself, while
+sinning, been the duped and deceived. Her very soul was appalled with
+her humiliation. The curse of Welford's vengeance was on her, and it
+was wreaked to the last! Whatever kindly sentiment she might have
+experienced towards her protector, was swallowed up at once by this
+discovery. She could not endure the thought of meeting the eye of one
+who had been the gainer by this ignominious barter; the foibles and
+weaknesses of the lover assumed a despicable as well as hateful dye. And
+in feeling herself degraded, she loathed him. The day after she had made
+the discovery we have referred to, Mrs. Welford left the house of her
+protector, none knew whither. For two years from that date, all trace
+of her history was lost. At the end of that time what was Welford? A man
+rapidly rising in the world, distinguished at the Bar, where his first
+brief had lifted him into notice, commencing a flattering career in
+the senate, holding lucrative and honourable offices, esteemed for the
+austere rectitude of his moral character, gathering the golden opinions
+of all men, as he strode onward to public reputation. He had re-assumed
+his hereditary name; his early history was unknown; and no one in the
+obscure and distant town of ------ had ever guessed that the humble
+Welford was the William Brandon whose praise was echoed in so many
+journals, and whose rising genius was acknowledged by all. That
+asperity, roughness, and gloom which had noted him at ------, and which,
+being natural to him, he deigned not to disguise in a station ungenial
+to his talents and below his hopes, were now glitteringly varnished over
+by an hypocrisy well calculated to aid his ambition. So learnedly could
+this singular man fit himself to others that few among the great met him
+as a companion, nor left him without the temper to become his friend.
+Through his noble rival--that is (to make our reader's "surety doubly
+sure"), through Lord Mauleverer--he had acquired his first lucrative
+office, a certain patronage from government, and his seat in parliament.
+If he had persevered at the Bar rather than given himself entirely to
+State intrigues, it was only because his talents were eminently more
+calculated to advance him in the former path to honour than in the
+latter. So devoted was he become to public life that he had only
+permitted himself to cherish one private source of enjoyment,--his son.
+As no one, not even his brother, knew he had been married (during the
+two years of his disguised name, he had been supposed abroad), the
+appearance of this son made the only piece of scandal whispered against
+the rigid morality of his fair fame; but he himself, waiting his own
+time for avowing a legitimate heir, gave out that it was the orphan
+child of a dear friend whom he had known abroad; and the puritan
+demureness not only of life, but manner, which he assumed, gained a
+pretty large belief to the statement. This son Brandon idolized. As
+we have represented himself to say, ambitious men are commonly fond
+of their children, beyond the fondness of other sires. The perpetual
+reference which the ambitious make to posterity is perhaps the
+main reason. But Brandon was also fond of children generally;
+philoprogenitiveness was a marked trait in his character, and would seem
+to belie the hardness and artifice belonging to that character, were not
+the same love so frequently noticeable in the harsh and the artificial.
+It seems as if a half-conscious but pleasing feeling that they too were
+once gentle and innocent, makes them delight in reviving any sympathy
+with their early state.
+
+Often after the applause and labour of the day, Brandon would repair
+to his son's chamber and watch his slumber for hours; often before his
+morning toil commenced, he would nurse the infant in his arms with all
+a woman's natural tenderness and gushing joy; and often, as a graver
+and more characteristic sentiment stole over him, he would mentally say,
+"You shall build up our broken name on a better foundation than your
+sire. I begin too late in life, and I labour up a painful and stony
+road; but I shall make the journey to Fame smooth and accessible for
+you. Never, too, while you aspire to honour, shall you steel your heart
+to tranquillity. For you, my child, shall be the joys of home and love,
+and a mind that does not sicken at the past, and strain, through mere
+forgetfulness, towards a solitary and barren distinction for the future.
+Not only what your father gains you shall enjoy, but what has cursed him
+his vigilance shall lead you to shun!"
+
+It was thus not only that his softer feelings, but all the better and
+nobler ones, which even in the worst and hardest bosom find some root,
+turned towards his child, and that the hollow and vicious man promised
+to become the affectionate and perhaps the wise parent.
+
+One night Brandon was returning home on foot from a ministerial dinner.
+The night was frosty and clear, the hour was late, and his way lay
+through the longest and best-lighted streets of the metropolis. He
+was, as usual, buried in thought, when he was suddenly aroused from his
+revery by a light touch laid on his arm. He turned, and saw one of the
+unhappy persons who haunt the midnight streets of cities, standing right
+before his path. The gaze of each fell upon the other; and it was thus,
+for the first time since they laid their heads on the same pillow,
+that the husband met the wife. The skies were intensely clear, and the
+lamplight was bright and calm upon the faces of both. There was no
+doubt in the mind of either. Suddenly, and with a startled and ghastly
+consciousuess, they recognized each other. The wife staggered, and clung
+to a post for support; Brandon's look was calm and unmoved. The hour
+that his bitter and malignant spirit had yearned for was come; his
+nerves expanded in a voluptuous calmness, as if to give him a deliberate
+enjoyment of his hope fulfilled. Whatever the words that in that
+unwitnessed and almost awful interview passed between them, we may
+be sure that Brandon spared not one atom of his power. The lost and
+abandoned wife returned home; and all her nature, embruted as it
+had become by guilt and vile habits, hardened into revenge,--that
+preternatural feeling which may be termed the hope of despair.
+
+Three nights from that meeting Brandon's house was broken into. Like
+the houses of many legal men, it lay in a dangerous and thinly populated
+outskirt of the town, and was easily accessible to robbery. He was
+awakened by a noise; he started, and found himself in the grasp of two
+men. At the foot of the bed stood a female, raising a light; and her
+face, haggard with searing passions, and ghastly with the leprous
+whiteness of disease and approaching death, glared full upon him.
+
+"It is now my turn," said the female, with a grin of scorn which Brandon
+himself might have envied; "you have cursed me, and I return the curse!
+You have told me that my child shall never name me but to blush. Fool!
+I triumph over you; you he shall never know to his dying day! You have
+told me that to my child and my child's child (a long transmission of
+execration) my name--the name of the wife you basely sold to ruin and
+to hell--should be left as a legacy of odium and shame! Man, you shall
+teach that child no further lesson whatever: you shall know not whether
+he live or die, or have children to carry on your boasted race; or
+whether, if he have, those children be not outcasts of the earth, the
+accursed of man and God, the fit offspring of the thing you have made
+me. Wretch! I hurl back on you the denunciation with which, when we
+met three nights since, you would have crushed the victim of your
+own perfidy. You shall tread the path of your ambition childless and
+objectless and hopeless. Disease shall set her stamp upon your frame.
+The worm shall batten upon your heart. You shall have honours and enjoy
+them not; you shall gain your ambition, and despair; you shall pine for
+your son, and find him not; or, if you find him, you shall curse the
+hour in which he was born. Mark me, man,--I am dying while I speak,--I
+know that I am a prophet in my curse. From this hour I am avenged, and
+you are my scorn!"
+
+As the hardest natures sink appalled before the stony eye of the maniac,
+so, in the dead of the night, pinioned by ruffians, the wild and solemn
+voice, sharpened by passion and partial madness, of the ghastly figure
+before him curdling through his veins, even the haughty and daring
+character of William Brandon quailed! He uttered not a word. He was
+found the next morning bound by strong cords to his bed. He spoke not
+when he was released, but went in silence to his child's chamber,--the
+child was gone! Several articles of property were also stolen; the
+desperate tools the mother had employed worked not perhaps without their
+own reward.
+
+We need scarcely add that Brandon set every engine and channel of
+justice in motion for the discovery of his son. All the especial
+shrewdness and keenness of his own character, aided by his professional
+experience, he employed for years in the same pursuit. Every research
+was wholly in vain; not the remotest vestige towards discovery could
+be traced until were found (we have recorded when) some of the articles
+that had been stolen. Fate treasured in her gloomy womb, altogether
+undescried by man, the hour and the scene in which the most ardent wish
+of William Brandon was to be realized.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+               O Fortuna, viris invida fortibus
+               Quam non aqua bonis praemia dividis.
+                                             SENECA.
+                  ............
+               And as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue,
+               Pants to the place from whence at first he flew.
+                  ............
+               Here, to the houseless child of want,
+               My door is open still.
+                                           GOLDSMITH.
+
+Slowly for Lucy waned the weeks of a winter which to her was the most
+dreary portion of life she had ever passed. It became the time for the
+judge to attend one of those periodical visitations so fraught with
+dread and dismay to the miserable inmates of the dark abodes which the
+complex laws of this country so bounteously supply,--those times of
+great hilarity and eating to the legal gentry,--
+
+              "Who feed on crimes and fatten on distress,
+               And wring vile mirth from suffering's last excess."
+
+Ah! excellent order of the world, which it is so wicked to disturb! How
+miraculously beautiful must be that system which makes wine out of
+the scorching tears of guilt; and from the suffocating suspense,
+the agonized fear, the compelled and self-mocking bravery, the awful
+sentence, the despairing death-pang of one man, furnishes the smirking
+expectation of fees, the jovial meeting, and the mercenary holiday to
+another! "Of Law, nothing less can be said than that her seat is the
+bosom of God."--[Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity.]--To be sure not;
+Richard Hooker, you are perfectly right. The divinity of a sessions and
+the inspiration of the Old Bailey are undeniable!
+
+The care of Sir William Brandon had effectually kept from Lucy's ear the
+knowledge of her lover's ignominious situation. Indeed, in her delicate
+health even the hard eye of Brandon and the thoughtless glance of
+Mauleverer perceived the danger of such a discovery. The earl, now
+waiting the main attack on Lucy till the curtain had forever dropped on
+Clifford, proceeded with great caution and delicacy in his suit to his
+purposed bride. He waited with the more patience inasmuch as he had
+drawn in advance on his friend Sir William for some portion of the
+heiress's fortune; and he readily allowed that he could not in the mean
+while have a better advocate than he found in Brandon. So persuasive,
+indeed, and so subtle was the eloquence of this able sophist, that
+often in his artful conversations with his niece he left even on the
+unvitiated and strong though simple mind of Lucy an uneasy and restless
+impression, which time might have ripened into an inclination towards
+the worldly advantages of the marriage at her command. Brandon was no
+bungling mediator or violent persecutor. He seemed to acquiesce in her
+rejection of Mauleverer. He scarcely recurred to the event. He rarely
+praised the earl himself, save for the obvious qualities of liveliness
+and good-nature. But he spoke, with all the vivid colours he could
+infuse at will into his words, of the pleasures and the duties of rank
+and wealth. Well could he appeal alike to all the prejudices and all the
+foibles of the human breast, and govern virtue through its weaknesses.
+Lucy had been brought up, like the daughters of most country gentlemen
+of ancient family, in an undue and idle consciousness of superior birth;
+and she was far from inaccessible to the warmth and even feeling (for
+here Brandon was sincere) with which her uncle spoke of the duty of
+raising a gallant name sunk into disrepute, and sacrificing our own
+inclination for the redecorating the mouldered splendour of those who
+have gone before us. If the confusion of idea occasioned by a vague
+pomposity of phrase, or the infant inculcation of a sentiment that is
+mistaken for a virtue, so often makes fools of the wise on the subject
+of ancestry; if it clouded even the sarcastic and keen sense of Brandon
+himself, we may forgive its influence over a girl so little versed in
+the arts of sound reasoning as poor Lucy, who, it may be said, had never
+learned to think until she had learned to love. However, the impression
+made by Brandon, in his happiest moments of persuasion, was as yet only
+transient; it vanished before the first thought of Clifford, and never
+suggested to her even a doubt as to the suit of Mauleverer.
+
+When the day arrived for Sir William Brandon to set out on the circuit,
+he called Barlow, and enjoined on that acute and intelligent servant the
+strictest caution with respect to Lucy. He bade him deny her to every
+one, of whatever rank, and carefully to look into every newspaper that
+was brought to her, as well as to withhold every letter, save such
+as were addressed to her in the judge's own handwriting. Lucy's maid
+Brandon had already won over to silence; and the uncle now pleased
+himself with thinking that he had put an effectual guard to every chance
+of discovery. The identity of Lovett with Clifford had not yet even
+been rumoured; and Mauleverer had rightly judged of Clifford, when he
+believed the prisoner would himself take every precaution against the
+detection of that fact. Clifford answered the earl's note, and promised,
+in a letter couched in so affecting yet so manly a tone of gratitude
+that even Brandon was touched when he read it. And since his confinement
+and partial recovery of health, the prisoner had kept himself closely
+secluded, and refused all visitors. Encouraged by this reflection, and
+the belief in the safety of his precautions, Brandon took leave of Lucy.
+"Farewell!" said he, as he embraced her affectionately. "Be sure that
+you write to me, and forgive me if I do not answer you punctually. Take
+care of yourself, my sweet niece, and let me see a fresher colour on
+that soft cheek when I return!"
+
+"Take care of yourself rather, my dear, dear uncle," said Lucy, clinging
+to him and weeping, as of late her weakened nerves caused her to do at
+the least agitation. "Why may I not go with you? You have seemed to
+me paler than usual the last three or four days, and you complained
+yesterday. Do let me go with you. I will be no trouble, none at all; but
+I am sure you require a nurse."
+
+"You want to frighten me, my pretty Lucy," said Brandon, shaking his
+head with a smile. "I am well, very well. I felt a strange rush of blood
+towards the head yesterday, it is true; but I feel to-day stronger and
+lighter than I have done for years. Once more, God bless you, my child!"
+
+And Brandon tore himself away, and commenced his journey.
+
+The wandering and dramatic course of our story now conducts us to an
+obscure lane in the metropolis, leading to the Thames, and makes us
+spectators of an affecting farewell between two persons, whom the
+injustice of fate and the persecutions of men were about perhaps forever
+to divide.
+
+"Adieu, my friend!" said Augustus Tomlinson, as he stood looking full on
+that segment of the face of Edward Pepper which was left unconcealed by
+a huge hat and a red belcher handkerchief. Tomlinson himself was attired
+in the full costume of a dignified clergyman. "Adieu, my friend, since
+you will remain in England,--adieu! I am, I exult to say, no less
+sincere a patriot than you. Heaven be my witness, how long I looked
+repugnantly on poor Lovett's proposal to quit my beloved country. But
+all hope of life here is now over; and really, during the last ten days
+I have been so hunted from corner to corner, so plagued with polite
+invitations, similar to those given by a farmer's wife to her ducks,
+'Dilly, dilly, dilly, come and be killed!' that my patriotism has
+been prodigiously cooled, and I no longer recoil from thoughts of
+self-banishment. 'The earth,' my dear Ned, as a Greek sage has very well
+observed,--'the earth is the same everywhere!' and if I am asked for my
+home, I can point, like Anaxagoras, to heaven!"
+
+"'Pon my soul, you affect me!" said Ned, speaking thick, either from
+grief or the pressure of the belcher handkerchief on his mouth; "it is
+quite beautiful to hear you talk!"
+
+"Bear up, my dear friend," continued Tomlinson; "bear up against your
+present afflictions. What, to a man who fortifies himself by reason and
+by reflection on the shortness of life, are the little calamities of the
+body? What is imprisonment or persecution or cold or hunger? By the by,
+you did not forget to put the sandwiches into my coat-pocket!"
+
+"Hush!" whispered Ned, and he moved on involuntarily; "I see a man at
+the other end of the street."
+
+"Let us quicken our pace," said Tomlinson; and the pair proceeded
+towards the river.
+
+"And now," began Ned, who thought he might as well say something about
+himself; for hitherto Augustus, in the ardour of his friendship, had
+been only discussing his own plans,--"and now,--that is to say, when I
+leave you,--I shall hasten to dive for shelter, until the storm blows
+over. I don't much like living in a cellar and wearing a smock frock;
+but those concealments have something interesting in them, after all!
+The safest and snuggest place I know of is the Pays Bas, about Thames
+Court; so I think of hiring an apartment underground, and taking my
+meals at poor Lovett's old quarters, the Mug,--the police will never
+dream of looking in these vulgar haunts for a man of my fashion."
+
+"You cannot then tear yourself from England?" said Tomlinson.
+
+"No, hang it! the fellows are so cursed unmanly on the other side of the
+water. I hate their wine and their parley woo. Besides, there is no fun
+there."
+
+Tomlinson, who was absorbed in his own thoughts, made no comment on his
+friend's excellent reasons against travel; and the pair now approached
+the brink of the river. A boat was in waiting to receive and conduct to
+the vessel in which he had taken his place for Calais the illustrious
+emigrant. But as Tomlinson's eye fell suddenly on the rude boatmen and
+the little boat which were to bear him away from his native land; as
+he glanced, too, across the blue waters, which a brisk wind wildly
+agitated, and thought how much rougher it would be at sea, where "his
+soul" invariably "sickened at the heaving wave,"--a whole tide of deep
+and sorrowful emotions rushed upon him.
+
+He turned away. The spot on which he stood was a piece of ground to be
+let (as a board proclaimed) upon a building lease; below, descended the
+steps which were to conduct him to the boat; around, the desolate space
+allowed him to see in far and broad extent the spires and domes and
+chimneys of the great city whose inhabitants he might never plunder
+more. As he looked and looked, the tears started to his eyes, and with
+a gust of enthusiasm, little consonant with his temperate and
+philosophical character, he lifted his right hand from his black
+breeches-pocket, and burst into the following farewell to the metropolis
+of his native shores:--
+
+"Farewell, my beloved London, farewell! Where shall I ever find a city
+like you? Never, till now, did I feel how inexpressibly dear you were to
+me. You have been my father and my brother and my mistress and my tailor
+and my shoemaker and my hatter and my cook and my wine-merchant! You and
+I never misunderstood each other. I did not grumble when I saw what fine
+houses and good strong boxes you gave to other men. No! I rejoiced at
+their prosperity. I delighted to see a rich man,--my only disappointment
+was in stumbling on a poor one. You gave riches to my neighbours; but,
+O generous London, you gave those neighbours to me! Magnificent streets,
+all Christian virtues abide within you! Charity is as common as smoke!
+Where, in what corner of the habitable world, shall I find human
+beings with so many superfluities? Where shall I so easily decoy, from
+benevolent credulity, those superfluities to myself? Heaven only knows,
+my dear, dear, darling London, what I lose in you! O public charities!
+O public institutions! O banks that belie mathematical axioms and make
+lots out of nothing! O ancient constitution always to be questioned! O
+modern improvements that never answer! O speculations! O companies! O
+usury laws which guard against usurers, by making as many as possible!
+O churches in which no one profits, save the parson, and the old women
+that let pews of an evening! O superb theatres, too small for parks,
+too enormous for houses, which exclude comedy and comfort, and have
+a monopoly for performing nonsense gigantically! O houses of plaster,
+built in a day! O palaces four yards high, with a dome in the middle,
+meant to be invisible!
+
+     [We must not suppose this apostrophe to be an anachronism.
+     Tomlinson, Of course, refers to some palace of his day; one of the
+     boxes--Christmas boxes--given to the king by his economical nation
+     of shopkeepers.  We suppose it is either pulled down or blown down
+     long ago; it is doubtless forgotten by this time, except by
+     antiquaries.  Nothing is so ephemeral as great houses built by the
+     people.  Your kings play the deuce with their playthings!]
+
+"O shops worth thousands, and O shopkeepers not worth a shilling! O
+system of credit by which beggars are princes, and princes are beggars!
+O imprisonment for debt, which lets the mare be stolen, and then locks
+up the bridle! O sharpers, bubbles, senators, beaux, taverns, brothels,
+clubs, houses private and public!---O LONDON, in a word, receive my last
+adieu! Long may you flourish in peace and plenteousness! May your knaves
+be witty, and your fools be rich! May you alter only two things,--your
+damnable tricks of transportation and hanging! Those are your sole
+faults; but for those I would never desert you. Adieu!"
+
+Here Tomlinson averted his head, and then hastily shaking the hand of
+Long Ned with a tremulous and warm grasp, he hurried down the stairs and
+entered the boat. Ned remained motionless for some moments, following
+him with his eyes as he sat at the end of the boat, waving a white
+pocket-handkerchief. At length a line of barges snatched him from the
+sight of the lingerer; and Ned, slowly turning away, muttered,--"Yes,
+I have always heard that Dame Lobkins's was the safest asylum for
+misfortune like mine. I will go forthwith in search of a lodging, and
+to-morrow I will make my breakfast at the Mug!"
+
+Be it our pleasing task, dear reader, to forestall the good robber,
+and return, at the hour of sunrise on the day following Tomlinson's
+departure, to the scene at which our story commenced. We are now once
+more at the house of Mrs. Margery Lobkins.
+
+The room which served so many purposes was still the same as when Paul
+turned it into the arena of his mischievous pranks. The dresser,
+with its shelves of mingled delf and pewter, occupied its ancient and
+important station. Only it might be noticed that the pewter was more
+dull than of yore, and that sundry cracks made their erratic wanderings
+over the yellow surface of the delf. The eye of the mistress had
+become less keen than heretofore, and the care of the hand maid had, of
+necessity, relaxed. The tall clock still ticked in monotonous warning;
+the blanket-screen, haply innocent of soap since we last described it,
+many-storied and polyballaded, still unfolded its ample leaves "rich
+with the spoils of time;" the spit and the musket yet hung from the wall
+in amicable proximation. And the long, smooth form, "with many a holy
+text thereon bestrewn," still afforded rest to the weary traveller, and
+an object to the vacant stare of Mrs. Margery Lobkins, as she lolled in
+her opposite seat and forgot the world. But poor Piggy Lob!---there
+was the alteration! The soul of the woman was gone; the spirit had
+evaporated from the human bottle! She sat, with open mouth and glassy
+eye, in her chair, sidling herself to and fro, with the low, peevish
+sound of fretful age and bodily pain; sometimes this querulous
+murmur sharpened into a shrill but unmeaning scold: "There now, you
+gallows-bird! you has taken the swipes without chalking; you wants to
+cheat the poor widow; but I sees you, I does! Providence protects the
+aged and the innocent--Oh, oh! these twinges will be the death o' me.
+Where's Martha? You jade, you! you wiperous hussy, bring the tape; does
+n't you see how I suffers? Has you no bowels, to let a poor Christian
+cretur perish for want o' help! That's with 'em, that's the way! No one
+cares for I now,--no one has respect for the gray 'airs of the old!" And
+then the voice dwindled into the whimpering "tenor of its way."
+
+Martha, a strapping wench with red hair streaming over her "hills of
+snow," was not, however, inattentive to the wants of her mistress. "Who
+knows," said she to a man who sat by the hearth, drinking tea out of a
+blue mug, and toasting with great care two or three huge rounds of bread
+for his own private and especial nutriment,--"who knows," said she,
+"what we may come to ourselves?" And, so saying, she placed a glowing
+tumbler by her mistress's elbow.
+
+But in the sunken prostration of her intellect, the old woman was
+insensible even to her consolation. She sipped and drank, it is true;
+but as if the stream warmed not the benumbed region through which it
+passed, she continued muttering in a crazed and groaning key,--
+
+"Is this your gratitude, you sarpent! Why does not you bring the tape,
+I tells you? Am I of a age to drink water like a 'oss, you nasty thing!
+Oh, to think as ever I should live to be desarted!"
+
+Inattentive to these murmurs, which she felt unreasonable, the
+bouncing Martha now quitted the room to repair to her "upper household"
+avocations. The man at the hearth was the only companion left to the
+widow. Gazing at her for a moment, as she sat whining, with a rude
+compassion in his eye, and slowly munching his toast, which he had
+now buttered and placed in a delf plate on the hob, this person thus
+soothingly began:--
+
+"Ah, Dame Lobkins, if so be as 'ow little Paul vas a vith you, it would
+be a gallows comfort to you in your latter hend!"
+
+The name of Paul made the good woman incline her bead towards the
+speaker; a ray of consciousness shot through her bedulled brain.
+
+"Little Paul,--eh, sirs! where is Paul? Paul, I say, my ben cull. Alack!
+he's gone,--left his poor old nurse to die like a cat in a cellar. Oh,
+Dummie, never live to be old, man! They leaves us to oursel's, and then
+takes away all the lush with 'em! I has not a drop o' comfort in the
+'varsal world!"
+
+Dummie, who at this moment had his own reasons for soothing the dame,
+and was anxious to make the most of the opportunity of a conversation as
+unwitnessed as the present, replied tenderly, and with a cunning likely
+to promote his end, reproached Paul bitterly for never having informed
+the dame of his whereabout and his proceedings. "But come, dame," he
+wound up, "come, I guess as how he is better nor all that, and that you
+need not beat your hold brains to think where he lies, or vot he's a
+doing. Blow me tight, Mother Lob,--I ax pardon, Mrs. Margery, I should
+say,--if I vould not give five bob, ay, and five to the tail o' that, to
+know what the poor lad is about; I takes a mortal hinterest in that 'ere
+chap!"
+
+"Oh! oh!" groaned the old woman, on whose palsied sense the astute
+inquiries of Dummie Dunnaker fell harmless; "my poor sinful carcass!
+what a way it be in!"
+
+Artfully again did Dummie Dunnaker, nothing defeated, renew his attack;
+but fortune does not always favour the wise, and it failed Dummie now,
+for a twofold reason,--first, because it was not possible for the
+dame to comprehend him; secondly, because even if it had been, she had
+nothing to reveal. Some of Clifford's pecuniary gifts had been conveyed
+anonymously, all without direction or date; and for the most part they
+had been appropriated by the sage Martha, into whose hands they fell,
+to her own private uses. Nor did the dame require Clifford's grateful
+charity; for she was a woman tolerably well off in this world,
+considering how near she was waxing to another. Longer, however, might
+Dummie have tried his unavailing way, had not the door of the inn
+creaked on its hinges, and the bulky form of a tall man in a smockfrock,
+but with a remarkably fine head of hair, darkened the threshold. He
+honoured the dame, who cast on him a lacklustre eye, with a sulky yet
+ambrosial nod, seized a bottle of spirits and a tumbler, lighted a
+candle, drew a small German pipe and a tobacco-box from his pouch,
+placed these several luxuries on a small table, wheeled it to a far
+corner of the room, and throwing himself into one chair, and his
+legs into another, he enjoyed the result of his pains in a moody and
+supercilious silence. Long and earnestly did the meek Dummie gaze on the
+face of the gentleman before him. It had been some years since he had
+last beheld it; but it was one which did not easily escape the memory;
+and although its proprietor was a man who had risen in the world,
+and had gained the height of his profession (a station far beyond
+the diurnal sphere of Dummie Dunnaker), and the humble purloiner was
+therefore astonished to encounter him in these lower regions, yet
+Dummie's recollection carried him back to a day when they had gone
+shares together without respect of persons, and been right jolly
+partners in the practical game of beggar my neighbour. While, however,
+Dummie Dunnaker, who was a little inclined to be shy, deliberated as
+to the propriety of claiming acquaintanceship, a dirty boy, with a face
+which betokened the frost, as Dummie himself said, like a plum dying of
+the scarlet fever, entered the room, with a newspaper in his dexter paw.
+
+"Great news! great news!" cried the urchin, imitating his vociferous
+originals in the street; "all about the famous Captain Lovett, as large
+as life!"
+
+"'Old your blarney, you blattergowl!" said Dummie, rebukingly, and
+seizing the journal.
+
+"Master says as how he must have it to send to Clapham, and can't spare
+it for more than a 'our!" said the boy, as he withdrew.
+
+"I 'members the day," said Dummie, with the zeal of a clansman, "when
+the Mug took a paper all to itsel' instead o' 'iring it by the job
+like!"
+
+Thereon he opened the paper with a fillip, and gave himself tip to the
+lecture. But the tall stranger, half rising with a start, exclaimed,--
+
+"Can't you have the manners to be communicative? Do you think nobody
+cares about Captain Lovett but yourself?" On this, Dummie turned round
+on his chair, and, with a "Blow me tight, you're velcome, I'm sure,"
+began as follows (we copy the paper, not the diction of the reader):--
+
+     "The trial of the notorious Lovett commences this day.  Great
+     exertions have been made by people of all classes to procure seats
+     in the Town Hall, which will be full to a degree never before known
+     in this peaceful province.  No less than seven indictments are said
+     to await the prisoner; it has been agreed that the robbery of Lord
+     Mauleverer should be the first to come on.  The principal witness in
+     this case against the prisoner is understood to be the king's
+     evidence, MacGrawler.  No news as yet have been circulated
+     concerning the suspected accomplices, Augustus Tomlinson and Edward
+     Pepper.  It is believed that the former has left the country, and
+     that the latter is lurking among the low refuges of guilt with which
+     the heart of the metropolis abounds.  Report speaks highly of the
+     person and manners of Lovett.  He is also supposed to be a man of
+     some talent, and was formerly engaged in an obscure periodical
+     edited by MacGrawler, and termed the 'Althenaeum,' Or 'Asinaeum.'
+     Nevertheless, we apprehend that his origin is remarkably low, and
+     suitable to the nature of his pursuits.  The prisoner will be most
+     fortunate in a judge.  Never did any one holding the same high
+     office as Sir William Brandon earn an equal reputation in so short a
+     time.  The Whigs are accustomed to sneer at us, when we insist on
+     the private virtues of our public men.  Let them look to Sir William
+     Brandon, and confess that the austerest morals maybe linked with the
+     soundest knowledge and the most brilliant genius.  The opening
+     address of the learned judge to the jury at-------is perhaps the
+     most impressive and solemn piece of eloquence in the English
+     language!"
+
+A cause for this eulogium might haply be found in another part of the
+paper, in which it was said,--
+
+     "Among the higher circles, we understand, the rumour has gone forth
+     that Sir William Brandon is to be recalled to his old parliamentary
+     career in a more elevated scene.  So highly are this gentleman's
+     talents respected by his Majesty and the ministers, that they are,
+     it is reported, anxious to secure his assistance in the House of
+     Lords!"
+
+When Dummie had spelt his "toilsome march" through the first of the
+above extracts he turned round to the tall stranger, and, eying him with
+a sort of winking significance, said,--
+
+"So MacGrawler peaches,--blows the gaff on his pals, eh! Vel, now, I
+always suspected that 'ere son of a gun! Do you know, he used to be at
+the Mug many 's a day, a teaching our little Paul, and says I to Piggy
+Lob, says I, 'Blow me tight, but that cove is a queer one! and if he
+does not come to be scragged,' says I, 'it vill only be because he'll
+turn a rusty, and scrag one of his pals!' So you sees" (here Dummie
+looked round, and his voice sank into a whisper),--"so you sees, Meester
+Pepper, I vas no fool there!"
+
+Long Ned dropped his pipe, and said sourly and with a suspicious frown,
+"What! you know me?"
+
+"To be sure and sartin I does," answered little Dummie, walking to the
+table where the robber sat. "Does not you know I?"
+
+Ned regarded the interrogator with a sullen glance, which gradually
+brightened into knowledge. "Ah!" said he, with the air of a Brummel,
+"Mr. Bummie, or Dummie, I think, eh! Shake a paw,--I'm glad to see you.
+Recollect the last time I saw you, you rather affronted me. Never mind.
+I dare say you did not mean it."
+
+Encouraged by this affable reception from the highwayman, though a
+little embarrassed by Ned's allusion to former conduct on his part,
+which he felt was just, Dummie grinned, pushed a stool near Ned, sat
+himself down, and carefully avoiding any immediate answer to Ned's
+complaints, rejoined,--
+
+"Do you know, Meester Pepper, you struck I all of a heap? I could not
+have s'posed as how you'd condescend nowadays to come to the Mug, vhere
+I never seed you but once afore. Lord love ye, they says as 'ow you go
+to all the fine places in ruffles, with a pair of silver pops in your
+vaistcoat pocket! Vy, the boys hereabout say that you and Meester
+Tomlinson, and this 'ere poor devil in quod, vere the finest gemmen in
+town; and, Lord, for to think of your ciwility to a pitiful ragmerchant,
+like I!"
+
+"Ah!" said Ned, gravely, "there are sad principles afloat now. They want
+to do away with all distinctions in ranks,--to make a duke no better
+than his valet, and a gentleman highwayman class with a filcher of
+fogles.' But, damme, if I don't think misfortune levels us all quite
+enough; and misfortune brings me here, little Dummie."
+
+"Ah! you vants to keep out of the vay of the bulkies!"
+
+"Right. Since poor Lovett was laid by the heels, which I must say was
+the fault of his own deuced gentlemanlike behaviour to me and Augustus
+(you've heard of Guz, you say), the knot of us seems quite broken.
+One's own friends look inclined to play one false; and really, the queer
+cuffins hover so sharply upon us that I thought it safe to duck for a
+time. So I have taken a lodging in a cellar, and I intend for the next
+three months to board at the Mug. I have heard that I may be sure of
+lying snug here. Dummie, your health! Give us the baccy."
+
+"I say, Meester Pepper," said Dummie, clearing his throat, when he
+had obeyed the request, "can you tell I, if so be you 'as met in your
+travels our little Paul? Poor chap! You knows as 'ow and vy he was sent
+to quod by Justice Burnflat. Vel, ven he got out, he vent to the devil,
+or summut like it, and ve have not 'card a vord of him since. You
+'members the lad,--a 'nation fine cull, tall and straight as a harrow!"
+
+"Why, you fool," said Ned, "don't you know"--then checking himself
+suddenly, "Ah! by the by, that rigmarole oath! I was not to tell; though
+now it's past caring for, I fear! It is no use looking after the seal
+when the letter's burned."
+
+"Blow me," cried Dunnaker, with unaffected vehemence, "I sees as how you
+know vot's come of he! Many's the good turn I'll do you, if you vill but
+tell I."
+
+"Why, does he owe you a dozen bobs; or what, Dummie?" said Ned.
+
+"Not he,--not he," cried Dummie.
+
+"What then, you want to do him a mischief of some sort?"
+
+"Do little Paul a mischief!" ejaculated Dummie; "vy, I've known the cull
+ever since he was that high! No, but I vants to do him a great sarvice,
+Meester Pepper, and myself too,--and you to boot, for aught that I know,
+Meester Pepper."
+
+"Humph!" said Ned,--"humph! what do you mean? I do, it is true,
+know where Paul is; but you must tell me first why you wish to know,
+otherwise you may ask your grandfather for me."
+
+A long, sharp, wistful survey did Mr. Dummie Dunnaker cast around him
+before he rejoined. All seemed safe and convenient for confidential
+communication. The supine features of Mrs. Lobkins were hushed in a
+drowsy stupor; even the gray cat that lay by the fire was curled in the
+embrace of Morpheus. Nevertheless, it was in a close whisper that Dummie
+spoke.
+
+"I dares be bound, Meester Pepper, that you 'members vell ven Harry
+Cook, the great highvayman,--poor fellow! he's gone vhere ve must all
+go,--brought you, then quite a gossoon,' for the first time to the
+little back parlour at the Cock and Hen, Dewereux Court?"
+
+Ned nodded assent.
+
+"And you 'members as how I met Harry and you there, and I vas all afeard
+at you,--'cause vy? I had never seen you afore, and ve vas a going to
+crack a swell's crib. And Harry spoke up for you, and said as 'ow though
+you had just gone on the town, you was already prime up to gammon. You
+'members, eh?"
+
+"Ay, I remember all," said Ned; "it was the first and only house I ever
+had a hand in breaking into. Harry was a fellow of low habits; so I
+dropped his acquaintance, and took solely to the road, or a chance
+ingenuity now and then. I have no idea of a gentleman turning
+cracksman."
+
+"Vel, so you vent vith us, and ve slipped you through a pane in the
+kitchen-vindow. You vas the least of us, big as you be now; and you vent
+round and opened the door for us; and ven you had opened the door,
+you saw a voman had joined us, and you were a funked then, and stayed
+vithout the crib, to keep vatch vhile ve vent in."
+
+"Well, well," cried Ned, "what the devil has all this rigmarole got to
+do with Paul?"
+
+"Now don't be glimflashy, but let me go on smack right about. Vell, ven
+ve came out, you minds as 'ow the voman had a bundle in her arms, and
+you spake to her; and she answered you roughly, and left us all, and
+vent straight home; and ve vent and fenced the swag' that wery night
+and afterwards napped the regulars. And sure you made us laugh 'artily,
+Meester Pepper, when you said, says you, 'That 'ere voman is a rum blo"
+en.' So she vas, Meester Pepper!"
+
+     [The reader has probably observed the use made by Dummie and Mrs.
+     Lobkins of Irish phraseology or pronunciation, This is a remarkable
+     trait in the dialect of the lowest orders in London, owing, we
+     suppose, to their constant association with emigrants from "the
+     first flower of the earth."  Perhaps it is a modish affectation
+     among the gentry of St.  Giles's, just as we eke out our mother-
+     tongue with French at Mayfair.]
+
+"Oh, spare me," said Ned, affectedly, "and make haste; you keep me all
+in the dark. By the way, I remember that you joked me about the bundle;
+and when I asked what the woman had wrapped in it, you swore it was a
+child. Rather more likely that the girl, whoever she was, would have
+left a child behind her than carried one off!" The face of Dummie waxed
+big with conscious importance.
+
+"Vell, now, you would not believe us; but it vas all true. That 'ere
+bundle vas the voman's child,--I s'pose an unnatural von by the gemman;
+she let us into the 'ouse on condition we helped her off vith it. And,
+blow me tight, but ve paid ourselves vel for our trouble. That 'ere
+voman vas a strange cretur; they say she had been a lord's blowen; but
+howsomever, she was as 'ot-'eaded and hodd as if she had been. There
+vas old Nick's hown row made on the matter, and the revard for our
+[de]tection vas so great, that as you vas not much tried yet, Harry
+thought it best for to take you vith 'im down to the country, and told
+you as 'ow it vas all a flam about the child in the bundle!"
+
+"Faith," said Ned, "I believed him readily enough; and poor Harry was
+twisted shortly after, and I went into Ireland for safety, where I
+stayed two years,--and deuced good claret I got there!"
+
+"So, vhiles you vas there," continued Dummie, "poor Judy, the voman,
+died,--she died in this very 'ouse, and left the horphan to the
+[af]fection of Piggy Lob, who was 'nation fond of it surely! Oh! but I
+'members vot a night it vas ven poor Judy died; the vind vistled like
+mad, and the rain tumbled about as if it had got a holiday; and there
+the poor creature lay raving just over 'ed of this room we sits in!
+Laus-a-me, vat a sight it vas!"
+
+Here Dummie paused, and seemed to recall in imagination the scene he had
+witnessed; but over the mind of Long Ned a ray of light broke slowly.
+
+"Whew!" said he, lifting up his forefinger, "whew! I smell a rat; this
+stolen child, then, was no other than Paul. But, pray, to whom did the
+house belong? For that fact Harry never communicated to me. I only heard
+the owner was a lawyer, or parson, or some such thing."
+
+"Vy now, I'll tell you, but don't be glimflashy. So, you see, ven Judy
+died, and Harry was scragged, I vas the only von living who vas up to
+the secret; and vhen Mother Lob vas a taking a drop to comfort her vhen
+Judy vent off, I hopens a great box in which poor Judy kept her duds and
+rattletraps, and surely I finds at the bottom of the box hever so many
+letters and sick like,--for I knew as 'ow they vas there; so I vhips
+these off and carries 'em 'ome with me, and soon arter, Mother Lob sold
+me the box o' duds for two quids--'cause vy? I vas a rag-merchant. So
+now I 'solved, since the secret vas all in my hown keeping, to keep it
+as tight as vinkey; for first, you sees as 'ow I vas afeard I should
+be hanged if I vent for to tell,--'cause vy? I stole a vatch, and lots
+more, as vell as the hurchin; and next I vas afeard as 'ow the mother
+might come back and haunt me the same as Sall haunted Villy, for it vas
+a 'orrid night ven her soul took ving. And hover and above this, Meester
+Pepper, I thought summut might turn hup by and by, in vhich it vould be
+best for I to keep my hown counsel and nab the revard, if I hever durst
+make myself known."
+
+Here Dummie proceeded to narrate how frightened he had been lest Ned
+should discover all, when (as it may be remembered, Pepper informed Paul
+at the beginning of this history) he encountered that worthy at Dame
+Lobkins's house; how this fear had induced him to testify to Pepper that
+coldness and rudeness which had so enraged the haughty highwayman; and
+how great had been his relief and delight at finding that Ned returned
+to the Mug no more. He next proceeded to inform his new confidant of his
+meeting with the father (the sagacious reader knows where and when), and
+of what took place at that event. He said how, in his first negotiation
+with the father, prudently resolving to communicate drop by drop such
+information as he possessed, he merely, besides confessing to a share
+in the robbery, stated that he thought he knew the house, etc., to which
+the infant had been consigned,--and that, if so, it was still alive; but
+that he would inquire. He then related how the sanguine father, who saw
+that hanging Dummie for the robbery of his house might not be half so
+likely a method to recover his son as bribery and conciliation, not only
+forgave him his former outrage, but whetted his appetite to the search
+by rewarding him for his disclosure. He then proceeded to state how,
+unable anywhere to find Paul, or any trace of him, he amused the sire
+from time to time with forged excuses; how, at first, the sums he
+received made him by no means desirous to expedite a discovery that
+would terminate such satisfactory receipts; how at length the magnitude
+of the proffered reward, joined to the threats of the sire, had made him
+become seriously anxious to learn the real fate and present "whereabout"
+of Paul; how, the last time he had seen the father, he had, by way of
+propitiation and first fruit, taken to him all the papers left by the
+unhappy mother and secreted by himself; and how he was now delighted to
+find that Ned was acquainted with Paul's address. Since he despaired of
+finding Paul by his own exertions alone, he became less tenacious of his
+secret; and he now proffered Ned, on discovery of Paul, a third of that
+reward the whole of which he had once hoped to engross.
+
+Ned's eyes and mouth opened at this proposition. "But the name,--the
+name of the father? You have not told me that yet!" cried he,
+impatiently.
+
+"Noa, noa!" said Dummie, archly, "I does n't tell you all, till you
+tells I summut. Vhere's little Paul, I say; and vhere be us to get at
+him?"
+
+Ned heaved a sigh.
+
+"As for the oath," said he, musingly, "it would be a sin to keep it, now
+that to break it can do him no harm, and may do him good, especially as,
+in case of imprisonment or death, the oath is not held to be binding;
+yet I fear it is too late for the reward. The father will scarcely thank
+you for finding his son!---Know, Dummie, that Paul is in jail, and that
+he is one and the same person as Captain Lovett!" Astonishment never
+wrote in more legible characters than she now displayed on the
+rough features of Dummie Dunnaker. So strong are the sympathies of
+a profession compared with all others, that Dummie's first confused
+thought was that of pride. "The great Captain Lovett!" he faltered.
+
+"Little Paul at the top of the profession! Lord, Lord! I always said as
+how he'd the hambition to rise!"
+
+"Well, well, but the father's name?"
+
+At this question the expression of Dummie's face fell; a sudden horror
+struggled to his eyes--
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+     Why is it that at moments there creeps over us an awe, a terror,
+     overpowering but undefined?  Why is it that we shudder without a
+     cause, and feel the warm life-blood stand still in its courses?
+     Are the dead too near?
+                                                   FALKLAND
+
+          Ha! sayest thou!  Hideous thought, I feel it twine
+          O'er my iced heart, as curls around his prey
+          The sure and deadly serpent!
+           ............
+          What!  in the hush and in the solitude
+          Passed that dread soul away?
+                                               Love and Hatred.
+
+The evening prior to that morning in which the above conversation
+occurred, Brandon passed alone in his lodging at --------. He had
+felt himself too unwell to attend the customary wassail, and he sat
+indolently musing in the solitude of the old-fashioned chamber to which
+he was consigned. There, two wax-candles on the smooth, quaint table
+dimly struggled against the gloom of heavy panels, which were relieved
+at unfrequent intervals by portraits in oaken frames, dingy, harsh,
+and important with the pomp of laced garments and flowing wigs. The
+predilection of the landlady for modern tastes had, indeed, on each
+side of the huge fireplace suspended more novel masterpieces of the fine
+arts. In emblematic gorgeousness hung the pictures of the four Seasons,
+buxom wenches all, save Winter, who was deformedly bodied forth in the
+likeness of an aged carle. These were interspersed by an engraving of
+Lord Mauleverer, the lieutenant of the neighbouring county, looking
+extremely majestical in his peer's robes; and by three typifications of
+Faith, Hope, and Charity,--ladies with whom it may be doubted if the
+gay earl ever before cultivated so close an intimacy. Curtains, of that
+antique chintz in which fasces of stripes are alternated by rows of
+flowers, filled the interstices of three windows; a heavy sideboard
+occupied the greater portion of one side of the room; and on the
+opposite side, in the rear of Brandon, a vast screen stretched its
+slow length along, and relieved the unpopulated and as it were desolate
+comfort of the apartment.
+
+Pale and imperfectly streamed the light upon Brandon's face, as he sat
+in his large chair, leaning his cheek on one hand, and gazing with the
+unconscious earnestness of abstraction on the clear fire. At that moment
+a whole phalanx of gloomy thought was sweeping in successive array
+across his mind. His early ambition, his ill-omened marriage, the causes
+of his after-rise in the wrong-judging world, the first dawn of his
+reputation, his rapid and flattering successes, his present elevation,
+his aspiring hope of far higher office, and more patrician honours,--all
+these phantoms passed before him in checkered shadow and light; but ever
+with each stalked one disquieting and dark remembrance,--the loss of his
+only son.
+
+Weaving his ambition with the wish to revive the pride of his hereditary
+name, every acquisition of fortune or of fame rendered him yet
+more anxious to find the only one who could perpetuate these hollow
+distinctions to his race.
+
+"I shall recover him yet!" he broke out suddenly and aloud. As he spoke,
+a quick, darting, spasmodic pain ran shivering through his whole frame,
+and then fixed for one instant on his heart with a gripe like the
+talons of a bird; it passed away, and was followed by a deadly sickness.
+Brandon rose, and filling himself a large tumbler of water, drank
+with avidity. The sickness passed off like the preceding pain; but the
+sensation had of late been often felt by Brandon, and disregarded,--for
+few persons were less afflicted with the self-torture of hypochondria;
+but now, that night, whether it was more keen than usual, or whether
+his thought had touched on the string that jars naturally on the most
+startling of human anticipations, we know not, but, as he resumed his
+seat, the idea of his approaching dissolution shot like an ice-bolt
+through his breast.
+
+So intent was this scheming man upon the living objects of the world,
+and so little were his thoughts accustomed to turn toward the ultimate
+goal of all things, that this idea obtruding itself abruptly upon him,
+startled him with a ghastly awe. He felt the colour rush from his cheek,
+and a tingling and involuntary pain ran wandering through the channels
+of his blood, even from the roots of the hair to the soles of his feet.
+But the stern soul of Brandon was not one which shadows could long
+affright. He nerved himself to meet the grim thought thus forced upon
+his mental eye, and he gazed on it with a steady and enduring look.
+
+"Well," thought he, "is my hour coming, or have I yet the ordinary term
+of mortal nature to expect? It is true, I have lately suffered these
+strange revulsions of the frame with somewhat of an alarming frequency;
+perhaps this medicine, which healed the anguish of one infirmity, has
+produced another more immediately deadly. Yet why should I think this?
+My sleep is sound and calm, my habits temperate, my mind active and
+clear as in its best days. In my youth I never played the traitor with
+my constitution; why should it desert me at the very threshold of my
+age? Nay, nay, these are but passing twitches, chills of the blood
+that begins to wax thin. Shall I learn to be less rigorous in my diet?
+Perhaps wine may reward my abstinence in avoiding it for my luxuries,
+by becoming a cordial to my necessities! Ay, I will consult,--I will
+consult, I must not die yet. I have--let me see, three--four grades
+to gain before the ladder is scaled. And, above all, I must regain my
+child! Lucy married to Mauleverer, myself a peer, my son wedded to-whom?
+Pray God he be not married already! My nephews and my children nobles!
+the house of Brandon restored, my power high in the upward gaze of
+men, my fame set on a more lasting basis than a skill in the quirks of
+law,--these are yet to come; these I will not die till I have enjoyed!
+Men die not till their destinies are fulfilled. The spirit that swells
+and soars within me says that the destiny of William Brandon is but half
+begun!"
+
+With this conclusion, Brandon sought his pillow. What were the
+reflections of the prisoner whom he was to judge? Need we ask? Let
+us picture to ourselves his shattered health, the languor of sickness
+heightening the gloom which makes the very air of a jail; his certainty
+of the doom to be passed against him; his knowledge that the uncle of
+Lucy Brandon was to be his judge, that Mauleverer was to be his accuser,
+and that in all human probability the only woman he had ever loved must
+sooner or later learn the criminality of his life and the ignominy of
+his death; let us but glance at the above blackness of circumstances
+that surrounded him, and it would seem that there is but little doubt
+as to the complexion of his thoughts! Perhaps, indeed, even in that
+terrible and desolate hour one sweet face shone on him, "and dashed the
+darkness all away." Perhaps, too, whatever might be the stings of his
+conscience, one thought, one remembrance of a temptation mastered and
+a sin escaped, brought to his eyes tears that were sweet and healing in
+their source. But the heart of a man in Clifford's awful situation is
+dark and inscrutable; and often when the wildest and gloomiest external
+circumstances surround us, their reflection sleeps like a shadow, calm
+and still upon the mind.
+
+The next morning, the whole town of (a town in which, we regret to say,
+an accident once detained ourself for three wretched days, and which
+we can, speaking therefore from profound experience, assert to be in
+ordinary times the most melancholy and peopleless-looking congregation
+of houses that a sober imagination can conceive) exhibited a scene of
+such bustle, animation, and jovial anxiety as the trial for life or
+death to a fellow-creature can alone excite in the phlegmatic breasts
+of the English. Around the court the crowd thickened with every moment,
+until the whole marketplace in which the townhall was situated became
+one living mass. The windows of the houses were filled with women, some
+of whom had taken that opportunity to make parties to breakfast; and
+little round tables, with tea and toast on them, caught the eyes of the
+grinning mobists as they gaped impatiently upwards.
+
+"Ben," said a stout yeoman, tossing up a halfpenny, and catching the
+said coin in his right hand, which he immediately covered with the
+left,--"Ben, heads or tails that Lovett is hanged; heads hanged, tails
+not, for a crown."
+
+"Petticoats, to be sure," quoth Ben, eating an apple; and it was heads!
+
+"Damme, you've lost!" cried the yeoman, rubbing his rough hands with
+glee.
+
+It would have been a fine sight for Asmodeus, could he have perched on
+one of the house tops of the market-place of --------, and looked on the
+murmuring and heaving sea of mortality below. Oh! the sight of a crowd
+round a court of law or a gibbet ought to make the devil split himself
+with laughter.
+
+While the mob was fretting, and pushing, and swearing, and grinning, and
+betting, and picking pockets, and trampling feet, and tearing gowns,
+and scrambling nearer and nearer to the doors and windows of the court,
+Brandon was slowly concluding his abstemious repast, preparatory to
+attendance on his judicial duties. His footman entered with a letter.
+Sir William glanced rapidly over the seal (one of those immense
+sacrifices of wax used at that day), adorned with a huge coat-of-arms,
+surmounted with an earl's coronet, and decorated on either side with
+those supporters so dear to heraldic taste. He then tore open the
+letter, and read as follows:--
+
+     MY DEAR SIR WILLIAM,--You know that in the last conversation I had
+     the Honour to hold with you I alluded, though perhaps somewhat
+     distantly, to the esteem which his Majesty had personally expressed
+     for your principles and talents, and his wish to testify it at the
+     earliest opportunity.  There will be, as you are doubtless aware, an
+     immediate creation of four peerages.  Your name stands second on the
+     list.  The choice of title his Majesty graciously leaves to you; but
+     he has hinted that the respectable antiquity of your family would
+     make him best pleased were you to select the name of your own
+     family-seat, which, if I mistake not, is Warlock.  You will instruct
+     me at your leisure as to the manner in which the patent should be
+     made out, touching the succession, etc.  Perhaps (excuse the license
+     of an old friend) this event may induce you to forsake your long-
+     cherished celibacy.  I need not add that this accession of rank will
+     be accompanied by professional elevation.  You will see by the
+     papers that the death of --------leaves vacant the dignity of Chief
+     Baron; and I am at length empowered to offer you a station
+     proportioned to your character and talents.
+
+     With great consideration, believe me, my dear Sir, Very truly yours,
+
+     Private and Confidential.
+
+Brandon's dark eye glanced quickly from the signature of the premier,
+affixed to this communication, towards the mirror opposite him. He
+strode to it, and examined his own countenance with a long and wistful
+gaze. Never, we think, did youthful gallant about to repair to the
+trysting-spot, in which fair looks make the greatest of earthly
+advantages, gaze more anxiously on the impartial glass than now did the
+ascetic and scornful judge; and never, we ween, did the eye of the said
+gallant retire with a more satisfied and triumphant expression.
+
+"Yes, yes!" muttered the judge, "no sign of infirmity is yet written
+here; the blood flows clear and warm enough; the cheek looks firm too,
+and passing full, for one who was always of the lean kine. Aha! this
+letter is a cordial, an elixir vitro. I feel as if a new lease were
+granted to the reluctant tenant. Lord Warlock, the first Baron of
+Warlock, Lord Chief Baron,--what next?"
+
+As he spoke, he strode unconsciously away, folding his arms with that
+sort of joyous and complacent gesture which implies the idea of a man
+hugging himself in a silent delight. Assuredly had the most skilful
+physician then looked upon the ardent and all-lighted face, the firm
+step, the elastic and muscular frame, the vigorous air of Brandon, as
+he mentally continued his soliloquy, he would have predicted for him as
+fair a grasp on longevity as the chances of mortal life will allow. He
+was interrupted by the servant entering.
+
+"It is twenty-five minutes after nine, sir," said he, respectfully.
+
+"Sir,--sir!" repeated Brandon. "Ah, well! so late!"
+
+"Yes, sir, and the sheriff's carriage is almost at the door."
+
+"Humph! Minister,--Peer,--Warlock,--succession. My son, my son! would to
+God that I could find thee!"
+
+Such were Brandon's last thoughts as he left the room. It was with
+great difficulty, so dense was the crowd, that the judge drove up to
+the court. As the carriage slowly passed, the spectators pressed to
+the windows of the vehicle, and stood on tiptoe to catch a view of
+the celebrated lawyer. Brandon's face, never long indicative of his
+feelings, had now settled into its usual gravity; and the severe
+loftiness of his look chilled, while it satisfied, the curiosity of the
+vulgar. It had been ordered that no person should be admitted until the
+judge had taken his seat on the bench; and this order occasioned so much
+delay, owing to the accumulated pressure of the vast and miscellaneous
+group, that it was more than half an hour before the court was able to
+obtain that decent order suiting the solemnity of the occasion. At five
+minutes before ten a universal and indescribable movement announced that
+the prisoner was put to the bar. We read in one of the journals of that
+day, that "on being put to the bar, the prisoner looked round with a
+long and anxious gaze, which at length settled on the judge, and then
+dropped, while the prisoner was observed to change countenance slightly.
+Lovett was dressed in a plain dark suit; he seemed to be about six feet
+high; and though thin and worn, probably from the effect of his wound
+and imprisonment, he is remarkably well made, and exhibits the outward
+appearance of that great personal strength which he is said to possess,
+and which is not unfrequently the characteristic of daring criminals.
+His face is handsome and prepossessing, his eyes and hair dark, and his
+complexion pale, possibly from the effects of his confinement; there was
+a certain sternness in his countenance during the greater part of the
+trial. His behaviour was remarkably collected and composed. The prisoner
+listened with the greatest attention to the indictment, which the reader
+will find in another part of our paper, charging him with the highway
+robbery of Lord Mauleverer, on the night of the of last. He occasionally
+inclined his body forward, and turned his ear towards the court; and he
+was observed, as the jury were sworn, to look steadily in the face
+of each. He breathed thick and hard when the various aliases he had
+assumed--Howard, Cavendish, Jackson, etc.,--were read; but smiled with
+an unaccountable expression when the list was completed, as if exulting
+at the varieties of his ingenuity. At twenty-five minutes past ten Mr.
+Dyebright, the counsel for the crown, stated the case to the jury."
+
+Mr. Dyebright was a lawyer of great eminence; he had been a Whig all
+his life, but had latterly become remarkable for his insincerity,
+and subservience to the wishes of the higher powers. His talents were
+peculiar and effective. If he had little eloquence, he had much power;
+and his legal knowledge, was sound and extensive. Many of his brethren
+excelled him in display; but no one, like him, possessed the secret of
+addressing a jury. Winningly familiar; seemingly candid to a degree that
+scarcely did justice to his cause, as if he were in an agony lest he
+should persuade you to lean a hair-breadth more on his side of the
+case than justice would allow; apparently all made up of good, homely,
+virtuous feeling, a disinterested regard for truth, a blunt yet tender
+honesty, seasoned with a few amiable fireside prejudices, which always
+come home to the hearts of your fathers of families and thorough-bred
+Britons; versed in all the niceties of language, and the magic of
+names; if he were defending crime, carefully calling it misfortune; if
+attacking misfortune, constantly calling it crime,--Mr. Dyebright was
+exactly the man born to pervert justice, to tickle jurors, to cozen
+truth with a friendly smile, and to obtain a vast reputation as an
+excellent advocate. He began with a long preliminary flourish on the
+importance of the case. He said that he should with the most scrupulous
+delicacy avoid every remark calculated to raise unnecessary prejudice
+against the prisoner. He should not allude to his unhappy notoriety, his
+associations with the lowest dregs. (Here up jumped the counsel for the
+prisoner, and Mr. Dyebright was called to order.) "God knows," resumed
+the learned gentleman, looking wistfully at the jury, "that my learned
+friend might have spared himself this warning. God knows that I would
+rather fifty of the wretched inmates of this county jail were to escape
+unharmed than that a hair of the prisoner you behold at the bar should
+be unjustly touched. The life of a human being is at stake; we should be
+guilty ourselves of a crime which on our deathbeds we should tremble to
+recall, were we to suffer any consideration, whether of interest or of
+prejudice, or of undue fear for our own properties and lives, to bias
+us even to the turning of a straw against the unfortunate prisoner.
+Gentlemen, if you find me travelling a single inch from my case,--if
+you find me saying a single word calculated to harm the prisoner in your
+eyes, and unsupported by the evidence I shall call,--then I implore you
+not to depend upon the vigilance of my learned friend, but to treasure
+these my errors in your recollection, and to consider them as so many
+arguments in favour of the prisoner. If, gentlemen, I could by any
+possibility imagine that your verdict would be favourable to the
+prisoner, I can, unaffectedly and from the bottom of my heart,
+declare to you that I should rejoice; a case might be lost, but a
+fellow-creature would be saved! Callous as we of the legal profession
+are believed, we have feelings like you; and I ask any one of you,
+gentlemen of the jury, any one who has ever felt the pleasures of social
+intercourse, the joy of charity, the heart's reward of benevolence,--I
+ask any one of you, whether, if he were placed in the arduous situation
+I now hold, all the persuasions of vanity would not vanish at once from
+his mind, and whether his defeat as an advocate would not be rendered
+dear to him by the common and fleshly sympathies of a man. But,
+gentlemen" (Mr. Dyebright's voice at once deepened and faltered), "there
+is a duty, a painful duty, we owe to our country; and never, in the long
+course of my professional experience, do I remember an instance in which
+it was more called forth than in the present. Mercy, gentlemen, is dear,
+very dear to us all; but it is the deadliest injury we can inflict on
+mankind when it is bought at the expense of justice."
+
+The learned gentleman then, after a few further prefatory observations,
+proceeded to state how, on the night of ------- last, Lord Mauleverer
+was stopped and robbed by three men masked, of a sum of money amounting
+to above L350, a diamond snuff-box, rings, watch, and a case of most
+valuable jewels,--how Lord Mauleverer, in endeavouring to defend
+himself, had passed a bullet through the clothes of one of the
+robbers,--how it would be proved that the garments of the prisoner,
+found in a cave in Oxfordshire, and positively sworn to by a witness he
+should produce, exhibited a rent similar to such a one as a bullet would
+produce,--how, moreover, it would be positively sworn to by the same
+witness, that the prisoner Lovett had come to the cavern with two
+accomplices not since taken up, since their rescue by the prisoner, and
+boasted of the robbery he had just committed; that in the clothes
+and sleeping apartment of the robber the articles stolen from Lord
+Mauleverer were found; and that the purse containing the notes for L300,
+the only thing the prisoner could probably have obtained time to carry
+off with him, on the morning on which the cave was entered by the
+policemen, was found on his person on the day on which he had attempted
+the rescue of his comrades, and had been apprehended in that attempt.
+He stated, moreover, that the dress found in the cavern, and sworn to
+by one witness he should produce as belonging to the prisoner, answered
+exactly to the description of the clothes worn by the principal robber,
+and sworn to by Lord Mauleverer, his servant, and the postilions.
+In like manner the colour of one of the horses found in the cavern
+corresponded with that rode by the highwayman. On these circumstantial
+proofs, aided by the immediate testimony of the king's evidence (that
+witness whom he should produce) he rested a case which could, he
+averred, leave no doubt on the minds of an impartial jury. Such, briefly
+and plainly alleged, made the substance of the details entered into
+by the learned counsel, who then proceeded to call his witnesses. The
+evidence of Lord Mauleverer (who was staying at Mauleverer Park, which
+was within a few miles of--) was short and clear (it was noticed as
+a singular circumstance, that at the end of the evidence the prisoner
+bowed respectfully to his lordship). The witness of the postilions
+and of the valet was no less concise; nor could all the ingenuity
+of Clifford's counsel shake any part of their evidence in his
+cross-examination. The main witness depended on by the crown was now
+summoned, and the solemn countenance of Peter MacGrawler rose on the
+eyes of the jury. One look of cold and blighting contempt fell on him
+from the eye of the prisoner, who did not again deign to regard him
+during the whole of his examination.
+
+The witness of MacGrawler was delivered with a pomposity worthy of
+the ex-editor of the "Asinaeum." Nevertheless, by the skill of Mr.
+Dyebright, it was rendered sufficiently clear a story to leave an
+impression on the jury damnatory to the interests of the prisoner.
+The counsel on the opposite side was not slow in perceiving the ground
+acquired by the adverse party; so, clearing his throat, he rose with a
+sneering air to the cross-examination.
+
+"So, so," began Mr. Botheram, putting on a pair of remarkably large
+spectacles, wherewith he truculently regarded the witness,--"so, so,
+Mr. MacGrawler,--is that your name, eh, eh? Ah, it is, is it? A very
+respectable name it is too, I warrant. Well, sir, look at me. Now,
+on your oath, remember, were you ever the editor of a certain
+thing published every Wednesday, and called the 'Athenaeum,' or the
+'Asinaeum,' or some such name?"
+
+Commencing with this insidious and self-damnatory question, the learned
+counsel then proceeded, as artfully as he was able, through a series
+of interrogatories calculated to injure the character, the respectable
+character, of MacGrawler, and weaken his testimony in the eyes of the
+jury. He succeeded in exciting in the audience that feeling of merriment
+wherewith the vulgar are always so delighted to intersperse the dull
+seriousness of hanging a human being. But though the jury themselves
+grinned, they were not convinced. The Scotsman retired from the
+witness-box "scotched," perhaps, in reputation, but not "killed" as
+to testimony. It was just before this witness concluded, that Lord
+Mauleverer caused to be handed to the judge a small slip of paper,
+containing merely these words in pencil:--
+
+     DEAR BRANDON,--A dinner waits you at Mauleverer Park, only three
+     miles hence.  Lord--and the Bishop of--meet you.  Plenty of news
+     from London, and a letter about you, which I will show to no one
+     till we meet.  Make haste and hang this poor fellow, that I may see
+     you the sooner; and it is bad for both of us to wait long for a
+     regular meal like dinner.  I can't stay longer, it is so hot, and my
+     nerves were always susceptible.
+
+                                        Yours,  MAULEVERER.
+
+     If you will come, give me a nod.  You know my hour,--it is always
+     the same.
+
+The judge, glancing over the note, inclined his head gravely to the
+earl, who withdrew; and in one minute afterwards, a heavy and breathless
+silence fell over the whole court. The prisoner was called upon for his
+defence: it was singular what a different sensation to that existing in
+their breasts the moment before crept thrillingly through the audience.
+Hushed was every whisper, vanished was every smile that the late
+cross-examination had excited; a sudden and chilling sense of the dread
+importance of the tribunal made itself abruptly felt in the minds of
+every one present.
+
+Perhaps, as in the gloomy satire of Hogarth (the moral Mephistopheles of
+painters), the close neighbourhood of pain to mirth made the former
+come with the homelier shock to the heart; be that as it may, a freezing
+anxiety, numbing the pulse and stirring through the air, made every
+man in that various crowd feel a sympathy of awe with his neighbour,
+excepting only the hardened judge and the hackneyed lawyers, and one
+spectator,--an idiot who had thrust himself in with the general press,
+and stood, within a few paces of the prisoner, grinning unconsciously,
+and every now and then winking with a glassy eye at some one at a
+distance, whose vigilance he had probably eluded.
+
+The face and aspect, even the attitude, of the prisoner were well fitted
+to heighten the effect which would naturally have been created by any
+man under the same fearful doom. He stood at the very front of the bar,
+and his tall and noble figure was drawn up to its full height; a glow of
+excitement spread itself gradually over features at all times striking,
+and lighted an eye naturally eloquent, and to which various emotions at
+that time gave a more than commonly deep and impressive expression. He
+began thus:--
+
+"My lord, I have little to say, and I may at once relieve the anxiety
+of my counsel, who now looks wistfully upon me, and add that that little
+will scarcely embrace the object of defence. Why should I defend myself?
+Why should I endeavour to protract a life that a few days, more or less,
+will terminate, according to the ordinary calculations of chance? Such
+as it is and has been, my life is vowed to the law, and the law will
+have the offering. Could I escape from this indictment, I know that
+seven others await me, and that by one or the other of these my
+conviction and my sentence must come. Life may be sweet to all of us, my
+lord; and were it possible that mine could be spared yet a while, that
+continued life might make a better atonement for past actions than a
+death which, abrupt and premature, calls for repentance while it forbids
+redress.
+
+"But when the dark side of things is our only choice, it is useless
+to regard the bright; idle to fix our eyes upon life, when death is at
+hand; useless to speak of contrition, when we are denied its proof. It
+is the usual policy of prisoners in my situation to address the feelings
+and flatter the prejudices of the jury; to descant on the excellence of
+our laws, while they endeavour to disarm them; to praise justice, yet
+demand mercy; to talk of expecting acquittal, yet boast of submitting
+without a murmur to condemnation. For me, to whom all earthly interests
+are dead, this policy is idle and superfluous. I hesitate not to tell
+you, my lord judge,--to proclaim to you, gentlemen of the jury,--that
+the laws which I have broken through my life I despise in death! Your
+laws are but of two classes; the one makes criminals, the other punishes
+them. I have suffered by the one; I am about to perish by the other.
+
+"My lord, it was the turn of a straw which made me what I am. Seven
+years ago I was sent to the house of correction for an offence which I
+did not commit. I went thither, a boy who had never infringed a single
+law; I came forth, in a few weeks, a man who was prepared to break all
+laws! Whence was this change? Was it my fault, or that of my condemners?
+You had first wronged me by a punishment which I did not deserve; you
+wronged me yet more deeply when (even had I been guilty of the first
+offence) I was sentenced to herd with hardened offenders, and graduates
+in vice and vice's methods of support. The laws themselves caused me
+to break the laws: first, by implanting within me the goading sense
+of injustice; secondly, by submitting me to the corruption of example.
+Thus, I repeat,--and I trust my words will sink solemnly into the hearts
+of all present,--your legislation made me what I am; and it now destroys
+me, as it has destroyed thousands, for being what it made me! But for
+this, the first aggression on me, I might have been what the world terms
+honest,--I might have advanced to old age and a peaceful grave through
+the harmless cheateries of trade or the honoured falsehoods of a
+profession. Nay, I might have supported the laws which I have now
+braved; like the counsel opposed to me, I might have grown sleek on the
+vices of others, and advanced to honour by my ingenuity in hanging
+my fellow-creatures! The canting and prejudging part of the Press has
+affected to set before you the merits of 'honest ability,' or 'laborious
+trade,' in opposition to my offences. What, I beseech you, are the props
+of your 'honest' exertion,--the profits of 'trade'? Are there no bribes
+to menials? Is there no adulteration of goods? Are the rich never duped
+in the price they pay? Are the poor never wronged in the quality they
+receive? Is there honesty in the bread you eat, in a single necessity
+which clothes or feeds or warms you? Let those whom the law protects
+consider it a protector: when did it ever protect me? When did it ever
+protect the poor man? The government of a State, the institutions
+of law, profess to provide for all those who 'obey.' Mark! a man
+hungers,--do you feed him? He is naked,--do you clothe him? If not, you
+break your covenant, you drive him back to the first law of nature, and
+you hang him, not because he is guilty, but because you have left him
+naked and starving! [A murmur among the mob below, with great difficulty
+silenced.] One thing only I will add, and that not to move your
+mercy,--no, nor to invest my fate with an idle and momentary
+interest,--but because there are some persons in this world who have not
+known me as the criminal who stands before you, and whom the tidings of
+my fate may hereafter reach; and I would not have those persons view
+me in blacker colours than I deserve. Among all the rumours, gentlemen,
+that have reached you, through all the tales and fables kindled from my
+unhappy notoriety and my approaching doom, I put it to you, if you have
+heard that I have committed one sanguinary action or one ruinous and
+deliberate fraud. You have heard that I have lived by the plunder of
+the rich,--I do not deny the charge. From the grinding of the poor, the
+habitual overreaching, or the systematic pilfering of my neighbours, my
+conscience is as free as it is from the charge of cruelty and bloodshed.
+Those errors I leave to honest mediocrity or virtuous exertion! You
+may perhaps find, too, that my life has not passed through a career of
+outrage without scattering some few benefits on the road. In destroying
+me, it is true that you will have the consolation to think that
+among the benefits you derive from my sentence will be the salutary
+encouragement you give to other offenders to offend to the last, degree,
+and to divest outrage of no single aggravation! But if this does not
+seem to you any very powerful inducement, you may pause before you
+cut off from all amendment a man who seems neither wholly hardened
+nor utterly beyond atonement. My lord, my counsel would have wished to
+summon witnesses,--some to bear testimony to redeeming points in my own
+character, others to invalidate the oath of the witness against me,--a
+man whom I saved from destruction in order that he might destroy me. I
+do not think either necessary. The public Press has already said of
+me what little good does not shock the truth; and had I not possessed
+something of those qualities which society does not disesteem, you would
+not have beheld me here at this hour! If I had saved myself as well as
+my companions, I should have left this country, perhaps forever, and
+commenced a very different career abroad. I committed offences; I eluded
+you; I committed what, in my case, was an act of duty: I am seized, and
+I perish. But the weakness of my body destroys me, not the strength of
+your malice. Had I" (and as the prisoner spake, the haughty and rapid
+motion, the enlarging of the form, produced by the passion of the
+moment, made impressively conspicuous to all the remarkable power of his
+frame),--"had I but my wonted health, my wonted command over these limbs
+and these veins, I would have asked no friend, no ally, to favour my
+escape. I tell you, engines and guardians of the law, that I would have
+mocked your chains and defied your walls, as ye know that I have mocked
+and defied them before. But my blood creeps now only in drops through
+its courses; and the heart that I had of old stirs feebly and heavily
+within me." The prisoner paused a moment, and resumed in an altered
+tone: "Leaving, then, my own character to the ordeal of report, I cannot
+perhaps do better than leave to the same criterion that of the witness
+against me. I will candidly own that under other circumstances it might
+have been otherwise. I will candidly avow that I might have then used
+such means as your law awards me to procure an acquittal and to prolong
+my existence,--though in a new scene; as it is, what matters the cause
+in which I receive my sentence? Nay, it is even better to suffer by the
+first than to linger to the last. It is some consolation not again to
+stand where I now stand; to go through the humbling solemnities which I
+have this day endured; to see the smile of some, and retort the frown of
+others; to wrestle with the anxiety of the heart, and to depend on the
+caprice of the excited nerves. It is something to feel one part of the
+drama of disgrace is over, and that I may wait unmolested in my den
+until, for one time only, I am again the butt of the unthinking and the
+monster of the crowd. My lord, I have now done! To you, whom the law
+deems the prisoner's counsel,--to you, gentlemen of the jury, to whom it
+has delegated his fate,--I leave the chances of my life."
+
+The prisoner ceased; but the same heavy silence which, save when broken
+by one solitary murmur, had lain over the court during his speech, still
+continued even for several moments after that deep and firm voice had
+died on the ear. So different had been the defence of the prisoner from
+that which had been expected; so assuredly did the more hackneyed part
+of the audience, even as he had proceeded, imagine that by some artful
+turn he would at length wind into the usual courses of defence,--that
+when his unfaltering and almost stern accents paused, men were
+not prepared to feel that his speech was finished, and the pause
+involuntarily jarred on them as untimeous and abrupt. At length, when
+each of the audience slowly awoke to the conviction that the prisoner
+had indeed concluded his harangue, a movement, eloquent of feelings
+released from a suspense, which had been perhaps the more earnest and
+the more blended with awe, from the boldness and novelty of the words on
+which it hung, circled round the court. The jurors looked confusedly
+at each other, but not one of them spoke, even by a whisper; their
+feelings, which had been aroused by the speech of the prisoner, had not
+from its shortness, its singularity, and the haughty impolicy of its
+tone, been so far guided by its course as to settle into any state of
+mind clearly favourable to him, or the reverse; so that each man waited
+for his neighbour to speak first, in order that he might find, as it
+were, in another, a kind of clew to the indistinct and excited feelings
+which wanted utterance in himself.
+
+The judge, who had been from the first attracted by the air and aspect
+of the prisoner, had perhaps, notwithstanding the hardness of his mind,
+more approvingly than any one present listened to the defence; for in
+the scorn of the hollow institutions and the mock honesty of social
+life, so defyingly manifested by the prisoner, Brandon recognized
+elements of mind remarkably congenial to his own; and this sympathy
+was heightened by the hardihood of physical nerve and moral intrepidity
+displayed by the prisoner,--qualities which among men of a similar mould
+often form the strongest motive of esteem, and sometimes (as we read of
+in the Imperial Corsican and his chiefs) the only point of attraction!
+Brandon was, however, soon recalled to his cold self by a murmur of
+vague applause circling throughout the common crowd, among whom the
+general impulse always manifests itself first, and to whom the
+opinions of the prisoner, though but imperfectly understood, came more
+immediately home than they did to the better and richer classes of the
+audience. Ever alive to the decorums of form, Brandon instantly ordered
+silence in the court; and when it was again restored, and it was fully
+understood that the prisoner's defence had closed, the judge proceeded
+to sum up.
+
+It is worthy of remark that many of the qualities of mind which seem
+most unamiable in private life often conduce with a singular felicity
+to the ends of public; and thus the stony firmness characteristic of
+Brandon was a main cause which made him admirable as a judge,--for men
+in office err no less from their feelings than their interests.
+
+Glancing over his notes, the judge inclined himself to the jury, and
+began with that silver ringing voice which particularly distinguished
+Brandon's eloquence, and carried with it in high stations so majestic
+and candid a tone of persuasion. He pointed out, with a clear brevity,
+the various points of the evidence; he dwelt for a moment on the attempt
+to cast disrepute upon the testimony of MacGrawler, but called a proper
+attention to the fact that the attempt had been unsupported by witnesses
+or proof. As he proceeded, the impression made by the prisoner on the
+minds of the jury slowly melted away; and perhaps, so much do men soften
+when they behold clearly the face of a fellow-man dependent on them
+for life, it acted disadvantageously on the interests of Clifford, that
+during the summing up he leaned back in the dock, and prevented his
+countenance from being seen. When the evidence had been gone through,
+the judge concluded thus:--
+
+"The prisoner, who in his defence (on the principles and opinions of
+which I now forbear to comment) certainly exhibited the signs of a
+superior education, and a high though perverted ability, has alluded
+to the reports circulated by the public Press, and leaned some little
+stress on the various anecdotes tending to his advantage, which he
+supposes have reached your ears. I am by no means willing that the
+prisoner should be deprived of whatever benefit may be derivable from
+such a source; but it is not in this place, nor at this moment, that it
+can avail him. All you have to consider is the evidence before you. All
+on which you have to decide is, whether the prisoner be or be not guilty
+of the robbery of which he is charged. You must not waste a thought on
+what redeems or heightens a supposed crime,--you must only decide on
+the crime itself. Put away from your minds, I beseech you, all that
+interferes with the main case. Put away also from your motives of
+decision all forethought of other possible indictments to which the
+prisoner has alluded, but with which you are necessarily unacquainted.
+If you doubt the evidence, whether of one witness or of all, the
+prisoner must receive from you the benefit of that doubt. If not,
+you are sworn to a solemn oath, which ordains you to forego all minor
+considerations,--which compels you to watch narrowly that you be not
+influenced by the infirmities natural to us all, but criminal in you, to
+lean towards the side of a mercy that would be rendered by your oath a
+perjury to God, and by your duty as impartial citizens a treason to your
+country. I dismiss you to the grave consideration of the important case
+you have heard; and I trust that He to whom all hearts are open and all
+secrets are known, will grant you the temper and the judgment to form a
+right decision!"
+
+There was in the majestic aspect and thrilling voice of Brandon
+something which made the commonest form of words solemn and impressive;
+and the hypocrite, aware of this felicity of manner, generally, as
+now, added weight to his concluding words by a religious allusion or a
+Scriptural phraseology. He ceased; and the jury, recovering the effect
+of his adjuration, consulted for a moment among themselves. The foreman
+then, addressing the court on behalf of his fellow-jurors, requested
+leave to retire for deliberation. An attendant bailiff being sworn in,
+we read in the journals of the day, which noted the divisions of time
+with that customary scrupulosity rendered terrible by the reflection how
+soon all time and seasons may perish for the hero of the scene, that "it
+was at twenty-five minutes to two that the jury withdrew."
+
+Perhaps in the whole course of a criminal trial there is no period more
+awful than that occupied by the deliberation of the jury. In the present
+case the prisoner, as if acutely sensible of his situation, remained in
+the rear of the dock, and buried his face in his hands. They who stood
+near him observed, however, that his breast did not seem to swell with
+the convulsive emotion customary to persons in his state, and that not
+even a sigh or agitated movement escaped him. The jury had been absent
+about twenty minutes, when a confused noise was heard in the court.
+The face of the judge turned in commanding severity towards the quarter
+whence it proceeded. He perceived a man of a coarse garb and mean
+appearance endeavouring rudely and violently to push his way through
+the crowd towards the bench, and at the same instant he saw one of the
+officers of the court approaching the disturber of its tranquillity
+with no friendly intent. The man, aware of the purpose of the constable,
+exclaimed with great vehemence, "I vill give this to my lord the judge,
+blow me if I von't!" and as he spoke he raised high above his head a
+soiled scrap of paper folded awkwardly in the shape of a letter. The
+instant Brandon's eye caught the rugged features of the intrusive
+stranger, he motioned with rather less than his usual slowness of
+gesture to one of his official satellites. "Bring me that paper
+instantly!" he whispered.
+
+The officer bowed and obeyed. The man, who seemed a little intoxicated,
+gave it with a look of ludicrous triumph and self-importance.
+
+"Stand avay, man!" he added to the constable, who now laid hand on his
+collar. "You'll see vot the judge says to that 'ere bit of paper; and so
+vill the prisoner, poor fellow!"
+
+This scene, so unworthy the dignity of the court, attracted the notice
+and (immediately around the intruder) the merriment of the crowd; and
+many an eye was directed towards Brandon, as with calm gravity he opened
+the note and glanced over the contents. In a large school-boy hand-it
+was the hand of Long Ned--were written these few words:
+
+     MY LORD JUDGE,--I make bold to beg you will do all you can for the
+     prisoner at the barre, as he is no other than the "Paul" I spoke to
+     your Worship about.  You know what I mean.
+
+                                        DUMMIE DUNNAKER.
+
+As he read this note, the judge's head was observed to droop suddenly,
+as if by a sickness or a spasm; but he recovered himself instantly, and
+whispering the officer who brought him the note, said, "See that that
+madman be immediately removed from the court, and lock him up alone. He
+is so deranged as to be dangerous!"
+
+The officer lost not a moment in seeing the order executed. Three stout
+constables dragged the astounded Dummie from the court in an instant,
+yet the more ruthlessly for his ejaculating,--
+
+"Eh, sirs, what's this? I tells you I have saved the judge's hown
+flesh and blood! Vy, now, gently, there; you'll smart for this, my fine
+fellow! Never you mind, Paul, my 'arty; I 'se done you a pure good--"
+
+"Silence!" proclaimed the voice of the judge; and that voice came forth
+with so commanding a tone of power that it awed Dummie, despite his
+intoxication. In a moment more, and ere he had time to recover, he
+was without the court. During this strange hubbub, which nevertheless
+scarcely lasted above two or three minutes, the prisoner had not once
+lifted his head, nor appeared aroused in any manner from his revery; and
+scarcely had the intruder been withdrawn before the jury returned.
+
+The verdict was, as all had foreseen, "Guilty;" but it was coupled with
+a strong recommendation to mercy.
+
+The prisoner was then asked, in the usual form, whether he had to say
+anything why sentence of death should not be passed against him.
+
+As these dread words struck upon his ear, slowly the prisoner rose. He
+directed first towards the jury a brief and keen glance, and his eyes
+then rested full, and with a stern significance, on the face of his
+judge.
+
+"My lord," he began, "I have but one reason to advance against the
+sentence of the law. If you have interest to prevent or mitigate it,
+that reason will, I think, suffice to enlist you on my behalf. I said
+that the first cause of those offences against the law which brings me
+to this bar was the committing me to prison on a charge of which I was
+wholly innocent! My lord judge, you were the man who accused me of that
+charge, and subjected me to that imprisonment! Look at me well, my lord,
+and you may trace in the countenance of the hardened felon you are about
+to adjudge to death the features of a boy whom, some seven years ago,
+you accused before a London magistrate of the theft of your watch.
+On the oath of a man who has one step on the threshold of death, the
+accusation was unjust. And, fit minister of the laws you represent! you,
+who will now pass my doom,--You were the cause of my crimes! My lord,
+I have done. I am ready to add another to the long and dark list of
+victims who are first polluted and then sacrificed by the blindness and
+the injustice of human codes!"
+
+While Clifford spoke, every eye turned from him to the judge, and every
+one was appalled by the ghastly and fearful change which had fallen over
+Brandon's face. Men said, afterwards, that they saw written there, in
+terrible distinctness, the characters of death; and there certainly
+seemed something awful and preternatural in the bloodless and haggard
+calmness of his proud features. Yet his eye did not quail, nor the
+muscles of his lip quiver; and with even more than his wonted loftiness,
+he met the regard of the prisoner. But, as alone conspicuous throughout
+the motionless and breathless crowd the judge and criminal gazed upon
+each other, and as the eyes of the spectators wandered on each, a
+thrilling and electric impression of a powerful likeness between the
+doomed and the doomer, for the first time in the trial, struck upon the
+audience, and increased, though they scarcely knew why, the sensation of
+pain and dread which the prisoner's last words excited. Perhaps it might
+have chiefly arisen from a common expression of fierce emotion conquered
+by an iron and stern character of mind; or perhaps, now that the ashy
+paleness of exhaustion had succeeded the excited flush on the prisoner's
+face, the similarity of complexion thus obtained made the likeness more
+obvious than before; or perhaps the spectators had not hitherto fixed so
+searching, or, if we may so speak, so alternating a gaze upon the two.
+However that be, the resemblance between the men, placed as they were in
+such widely different circumstances,--that resemblance which, as we have
+hinted, had at certain moments occurred startlingly to Lucy,--was plain
+and unavoidably striking: the same the dark hue of their complexions;
+the same the haughty and Roman outline of their faces; the same the
+height of the forehead; the same even a displeasing and sarcastic
+rigidity of mouth, which made the most conspicuous feature in Brandon,
+and which was the only point that deteriorated from the singular beauty
+of Clifford. But, above all, the same inflexible, defying, stubborn
+spirit, though in Brandon it assumed the stately cast of majesty, and in
+Clifford it seemed the desperate sternness of the bravo, stamped itself
+in both. Though Clifford ceased, he did not resume his seat, but stood
+in the same attitude as that in which he had reversed the order of
+things, and merged the petitioner in the accuser; and Brandon himself,
+without speaking or moving, continued still to survey him; so, with
+erect fronts and marble countenances, in which what was defying and
+resolute did not altogether quell the mortal leaven of pain and dread,
+they looked as might have looked the two men in the Eastern story who
+had the power of gazing each other unto death.
+
+What at that moment was raging in Brandon's heart, it is in vain to
+guess. He doubted not for a moment that he beheld before him his long
+lost, his anxiously demanded son! Every fibre, every corner of his
+complex and gloomy soul, that certainly reached, and blasted with a
+hideous and irresistible glare. The earliest, perhaps the strongest,
+though often the least acknowledged principle of his mind was the desire
+to rebuild the fallen honours of his house; its last scion he now beheld
+before him, covered with the darkest ignominies of the law! He had
+coveted worldly honours; he beheld their legitimate successor in a
+convicted felon! He had garnered the few affections he had spared from
+the objects of pride and ambition, in his son. That son he was about
+to adjudge to the gibbet and the hangman! Of late he had increased the
+hopes of regaining his lost treasure, even to an exultant certainty. Lo!
+the hopes were accomplished! How? With these thoughts warring, in what
+manner we dare not even by an epithet express, within him, we may cast
+one hasty glance on the horror of aggravation they endured, when he
+heard the prisoner accuse Him as the cause of his present doom, and felt
+himself at once the murderer and the judge of his son!
+
+Minutes had elapsed since the voice of the prisoner ceased; and Brandon
+now drew forth the black cap. As he placed it slowly over his brows, the
+increasing and corpse-like whiteness of his face became more glaringly
+visible, by the contrast which this dread head-gear presented. Twice as
+he essayed to speak his voice failed him, and an indistinct murmur came
+forth from his hueless lips, and died away like a fitful and feeble
+wind. But with the third effort the resolution and long self-tyranny of
+the man conquered, and his voice went clear and unfaltering through the
+crowd, although the severe sweetness of its wonted tones was gone, and
+it sounded strange and hollow on the ears that drank it.
+
+"Prisoner at the bar! it has become my duty to announce to you the close
+of your mortal career. You have been accused of a daring robbery, and
+after an impartial trial a jury of your countrymen and the laws of your
+country have decided against you. The recommendation to mercy" (here,
+only throughout his speech, Brandon gasped convulsively for breath) "so
+humanely added by the jury, shall be forwarded to the supreme power; but
+I cannot flatter you with much hope of its success." (The lawyers
+looked with some surprise at each other; they had expected a far more
+unqualified mandate, to abjure all hope from the jury's recommendation.)
+"Prisoner, for the opinions you have expressed, you are now only
+answerable to your God; I forbear to arraign them. For the charge you
+have made against me, whether true or false, and for the anguish it has
+given me, may you find pardon at another tribunal! It remains for me
+only--under a reserve too slight, as I have said, to afford you a fair
+promise of hope--only to--to" (all eyes were on Brandon; he felt it,
+exerted himself for a last effort, and proceeded)--"to pronounce on
+you the sharp sentence of the law! It is, that you be taken back to the
+prison whence you came, and thence (when the supreme authority shall
+appoint) to the place of execution, to be there hanged by the neck till
+you are dead; and the Lord God Almighty have mercy on your soul!"
+
+With this address concluded that eventful trial; and while the crowd, in
+rushing and noisy tumult, bore towards the door, Brandon, concealing
+to the last with a Spartan bravery the anguish which was gnawing at his
+entrails, retired from the awful pageant. For the next half-hour he was
+locked up with the strange intruder on the proceedings of the court. At
+the end of that time the stranger was dismissed; and in about double the
+same period Brandon's servant re-admitted him, accompanied by another
+man, with a slouched hat and in a carman's frock. The reader need not be
+told that the new comer was the friendly Ned, whose testimony was indeed
+a valuable corroborative to Dummie's, and whose regard for Clifford,
+aided by an appetite for rewards, had induced him to venture to the
+town of -----, although he tarried concealed in a safe suburb, until
+reassured by a written promise from Brandon of safety to his person,
+and a sum for which we might almost doubt whether he would not have
+consented (so long had he been mistaking means for an end) to be hanged
+himself. Brandon listened to the details of these confederates; and when
+they had finished, he addressed them thus: "I have heard you, and am
+convinced you are liars and impostors. There is the money I promised
+you" (throwing down a pocket-book),--"take it; and, hark you, if ever
+you dare whisper, ay, but a breath of the atrocious lie you have now
+forged, be sure I will have you dragged from the recess or nook of
+infamy in which you may hide your heads, and hanged for the crimes you
+have already committed. I am not the man to break my word. Begone! quit
+this town instantly! If in two hours hence you are found here, your
+blood be on your own heads! Begone, I say!"
+
+These words, aided by a countenance well adapted at all times to
+expressions of a menacing and ruthless character, at once astounded and
+appalled the accomplices. They left the room in hasty confusion; and
+Brandon, now alone, walked with uneven steps (the alarming weakness and
+vacillation of which he did not himself feel) to and fro the apartment.
+The hell of his breast was stamped upon his features, but he uttered
+only one thought aloud,--
+
+"I may,--yes, yes,--I may yet conceal this disgrace to my name!"
+
+His servant tapped at the door to say that the carriage was ready,
+and that Lord Mauleverer had bid him remind his master that they dined
+punctually at the hour appointed.
+
+"I am coming!" said Brandon, with a slow and startling emphasis on each
+word. But he first sat down and wrote a letter to the official quarter,
+strongly aiding the recommendation of the Jury; and we may conceive how
+pride clung to him to the last, when he urged the substitution for death
+of transportation for life! As soon as he had sealed this letter,
+he summoned an express, gave his orders coolly and distinctly, and
+attempted with his usual stateliness of step to walk through a long
+passage which led to the outer door. He found himself fail. "Come
+hither," he said to his servant, "give me your arm!"
+
+All Brandon's domestics, save the one left with Lucy, stood in awe
+of him; and it was with some hesitation that his servant ventured to
+inquire if his master felt well.
+
+Brandon looked at him, but made no reply. He entered his carriage
+with slight difficulty, and telling the coachman to drive as fast as
+possible, pulled down (a general custom with him) all the blinds of the
+windows.
+
+Meanwhile Lord Mauleverer, with six friends, was impatiently awaiting
+the arrival of the seventh guest.
+
+"Our August friend tarries!" quoth the Bishop of -------, with his hands
+folded across his capacious stomach. "I fear the turbot your lordship
+spoke of may not be the better for the length of the trial."
+
+"Poor fellow!" said the Earl of --------, slightly yawning.
+
+"Whom do you mean?" asked Lord Mauleverer, with a smile,--"the bishop,
+the judge, or the turbot?"
+
+"Not one of the three, Mauleverer,--I spoke of the prisoner."
+
+"Ah, the fine dog! I forgot him," said Mauleverer. "Really, now you
+mention him, I must confess that he inspires me with great compassion;
+but, indeed, it is very wrong in him to keep the judge so long!"
+
+"Those hardened wretches have such a great deal to say," mumbled the
+bishop, sourly.
+
+"True!" said Mauleverer; "a religious rogue would have had some bowels
+for the state of the church esurient."
+
+"Is it really true, Mauleverer," asked the Earl of ------, "that Brandon
+is to succeed?"
+
+"So I hear," said Mauleverer. "Heavens, how hungry I am!"
+
+A groan from the bishop echoed the complaint.
+
+"I suppose it would be against all decorum to sit down to dinner without
+him?" said Lord --------.
+
+"Why, really, I fear so," returned Mauleverer. "But our health--our
+health is at stake; we will only wait five minutes more. By Jove,
+there's the carriage! I beg your pardon for my heathen oath, my lord
+bishop."
+
+"I forgive you!" said the good bishop, smiling.
+
+The party thus engaged in colloquy were stationed at a window opening on
+the gravel road, along which the judge's carriage was now seen rapidly
+approaching; this window was but a few yards from the porch, and had
+been partially opened for the better reconnoitring the approach of the
+expected guest.
+
+"He keeps the blinds down still! Absence of mind, or shame at
+unpunctuality,--which is the cause, Mauleverer?" said one of the party.
+
+"Not shame, I fear!" answered Mauleverer. "Even the indecent immorality
+of delaying our dinner could scarcely bring a blush to the parchment
+skin of my learned friend."
+
+Here the carriage stopped at the porch; the carriage door was opened.
+
+"There seems a strange delay," said Mauleverer, peevishly. "Why does not
+he get out?"
+
+As he spoke, a murmur among the attendants, who appeared somewhat
+strangely to crowd around the carriage, smote the ears of the party.
+
+"What do they say,--what?" said Mauleverer, putting his hand to his ear.
+
+The bishop answered hastily; and Mauleverer, as he heard the reply,
+forgot for once his susceptibility to cold, and hurried out to the
+carriage door. His guests followed.
+
+They found Brandon leaning against the farther corner of the
+carriage,--a corpse. One hand held the check-string, as if he had
+endeavoured involuntarily but ineffectually to pull it. The right side
+of his face was partially distorted, as by convulsion or paralysis; but
+not sufficiently so to destroy that remarkable expression of loftiness
+and severity which had characterized the features in life. At the same
+time the distortion which had drawn up on one side the muscles of the
+mouth had deepened into a startling broadness the half sneer of derision
+that usually lurked around the lower part of his face. Thus unwitnessed
+and abrupt had been the disunion of the clay and spirit of a man who, if
+he passed through life a bold, scheming, stubborn, unwavering
+hypocrite, was not without something high even amidst his baseness, his
+selfishness, and his vices; who seemed less to have loved sin than by
+some strange perversion of reason to have disdained virtue, and who, by
+a solemn and awful suddenness of fate (for who shall venture to indicate
+the judgment of the arch and unseen Providence, even when it appears
+to mortal eye the least obscured?), won the dreams, the objects, the
+triumphs of hope, to be blasted by them at the moment of acquisition!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+AND LAST.
+
+                    Subtle, Surly,--Mammon, Dol,
+                    Hot Ananias, Dapper, Dragger,--all
+                    With whom I traded.
+                                           The Alchemist.
+
+As when some rural citizen-retired for a fleeting holiday, far from the
+cares of the world strepitumque Romae,--["And the roar of
+Rome."]--to the sweet shades of Pentonville or the remoter plains of
+Clapham--conducts some delighted visitor over the intricacies of that
+Daedalian masterpiece which he is pleased to call his labyrinth or
+maze,--now smiling furtively at his guest's perplexity, now listening
+with calm superiority to his futile and erring conjectures, now
+maliciously accompanying him through a flattering path in which the
+baffled adventurer is suddenly checked by the blank features of a
+thoroughfareless hedge, now trembling as he sees the guest stumbling
+unawares into the right track, and now relieved as he beholds him
+after a pause of deliberation wind into the wrong,--even so, O pleasant
+reader! doth the sage novelist conduct thee through the labyrinth of
+his tale, amusing himself with thy self-deceits, and spinning forth,
+in prolix pleasure, the quiet yarn of his entertainment from the
+involutions which occasion thy fretting eagerness and perplexity. But as
+when, thanks to the host's good-nature or fatigue, the mystery is once
+unravelled, and the guest permitted to penetrate even into the concealed
+end of the leafy maze, the honest cit, satisfied with the pleasant pains
+he has already bestowed upon his visitor, puts him not to the labour of
+retracing the steps he hath so erratically trod, but leads him in three
+strides, and through a simpler path, at once to the mouth of the maze,
+and dismisseth him elsewhere for entertainment; even so will the prudent
+narrator, when the intricacies of his plot are once unfolded, occasion
+no stale and profitless delays to his wearied reader, but conduct him,
+with as much brevity as convenient, without the labyrinth which has
+ceased to retain the interest of a secret.
+
+We shall therefore, in pursuance of the tit's policy, relate as rapidly
+as possible that part of our narrative which yet remains untold. On
+Brandon's person was found the paper which had contained so fatal an
+intelligence of his son; and when brought to Lord Mauleverer, the words
+struck that person (who knew Brandon had been in search of his lost
+son, whom we have seen that he had been taught however to suppose
+illegitimate, though it is probable that many doubts whether he had
+not been deceived must have occurred to his natural sagacity) as
+sufficiently important to be worth an inquiry after the writer. Dummie
+was easily found, for he had not yet turned his back on the town when
+the news of the judge's sudden death was brought back to it; and
+taking advantage of that circumstance, the friendly Dunnaker remained
+altogether in the town (albeit his long companion deserted it as hastily
+as might be), and whiled the time by presenting himself at the jail,
+and after some ineffectual efforts winning his way to Clifford. Easily
+tracked by the name he had given to the governor of the jail, he was
+conducted the same day to Lord Mauleverer; and his narrative, confused
+as it was, and proceeding even from so suspicious a quarter, thrilled
+those digestive organs, which in Mauleverer stood proxy for a heart,
+with feelings as much resembling awe and horror as our good peer was
+capable of experiencing. Already shocked from his worldly philosophy
+of indifference by the death of Brandon, he was more susceptible to a
+remorseful and salutary impression at this moment than he might have
+been at any other; and he could not, without some twinges of conscience,
+think of the ruin he had brought on the mother of the being he had but
+just prosecuted to the death. He dismissed Dummie, and after a
+little consideration he ordered his carriage, and leaving the funeral
+preparations for his friend to the care of his man of business, he set
+off for London, and the house, in particular, of the Secretary of the
+Home Department. We would not willingly wrong the noble penitent; but
+we venture a suspicion that he might not have preferred a personal
+application for mercy to the prisoner to a written one, had he not felt
+certain unpleasant qualms in remaining in a country-house overshadowed
+by ceremonies so gloomy as those of death. The letter of Brandon and
+the application of Mauleverer obtained for Clifford a relaxation of his
+sentence. He was left for perpetual transportation. A ship was already
+about to sail; and Mauleverer, content with having saved his life,
+was by no means anxious that his departure from the country should be
+saddled with any superfluous delay.
+
+Meanwhile the first rumour that reached London respecting Brandon's fate
+was that he had been found in a fit, and was lying dangerously ill
+at Mauleverer's; and before the second and more fatally sure report
+arrived, Lucy had gathered from the visible dismay of Barlow, whom
+she anxiously cross-questioned, and who, really loving his master,
+was easily affected into communication, the first and more flattering
+intelligence. To Barlow's secret delight, she insisted instantly on
+setting off to the supposed sick man; and accompanied by Barlow and
+her woman, the affectionate girl hastened to Mauleverer's house on
+the evening after the day the earl left it. Lucy had not proceeded far
+before Barlow learned, from the gossip of the road, the real state
+of the case. Indeed, it was at the first stage that with a mournful
+countenance he approached the door of the carriage, and announcing the
+inutility of proceeding farther, begged of Lucy to turn back. So soon as
+Miss Brandon had overcome the first shock which this intelligence gave
+her, she said with calmness,--
+
+"Well, Barlow, if it be so, we have still a duty to perform. Tell the
+postboys to drive on!"
+
+"Indeed, madam, I cannot see what use it can be fretting yourself,--and
+you so poorly. If you will let me go, I will see every attention paid to
+the remains of my poor master."
+
+"When my father lay dead," said Lucy, with a grave and sad sternness
+in her manner, "he who is now no more sent no proxy to perform the last
+duties of a brother; neither will I send one to discharge those of a
+niece, and prove that I have forgotten the gratitude of a daughter.
+Drive on!"
+
+We have said that there were times when a spirit was stricken from Lucy
+little common to her in general; and now the command of her uncle sat
+upon her brow. On sped the horses, and for several minutes Lucy remained
+silent. Her woman did not dare to speak. At length Miss Brandon turned,
+and, covering her face with her hands, burst into tears so violent that
+they alarmed her attendant even more than her previous stillness. "My
+poor, poor uncle!" she sobbed; and those were all her words.
+
+We must pass over Lucy's arrival at Lord Mauleverer's house; we must
+pass over the weary days which elapsed till that unconscious body was
+consigned to dust with which, could it have retained yet one spark of
+its haughty spirit, it would have refused to blend its atoms. She had
+loved the deceased incomparably beyond his merits, and resisting all
+remonstrance to the contrary and all the forms of ordinary custom, she
+witnessed herself the dreary ceremony which bequeathed the human remains
+of William Brandon to repose and to the worm. On that same day Clifford
+received the mitigation of his sentence, and on that day another trial
+awaited Lucy. We think briefly to convey to the reader what that scene
+was; we need only observe that Dummie Dunnaker, decoyed by his great
+love for little Paul, whom he delightedly said he found not the least
+"stuck up by his great fame and helewation," still lingered in the
+town, and was not only aware of the relationship of the cousins, but had
+gleaned from Long Ned, as they journeyed down to ------, the
+affection entertained by Clifford for Lucy. Of the manner in which the
+communication reached Lucy, we need not speak; suffice it to say, that
+on the day in which she had performed the last duty to her uncle, she
+learned for the first time her lover's situation.
+
+On that evening, in the convict's cell, the cousins met.
+
+Their conference was low, for the jailer stood within hearing; and it
+was broken by Lucy's convulsive sobs. But the voice of one whose iron
+nerves were not unworthy of the offspring of William Brandon, was clear
+and audible to her ear, even though uttered in a whisper that scarcely
+stirred his lips. It seemed as if Lucy, smitten to the inmost heart by
+the generosity with which her lover had torn himself from her at the
+time that her wealth might have raised him in any other country far
+above the perils and the crimes of his career in this; perceiving now,
+for the first time, and in all their force, the causes of his mysterious
+conduct; melted by their relationship, and forgetting herself utterly in
+the desolation and dark situation in which she beheld one who, whatever
+his crimes, had not been criminal towards her;--it seemed as if, carried
+away by these emotions, she had yielded altogether to the fondness and
+devotion of her nature,--that she had wished to leave home and friends
+and fortune, and share with him his punishment and his shame.
+
+"Why," she faltered,--"why--why not? We are all that is left to each
+other in the world! Your father and mine were brothers; let me be to you
+as a sister. What is there left for me here? Not one being whom I love,
+or who cares for me,--not one!"
+
+It was then that Clifford summoned all his courage, as he answered.
+Perhaps, now that he felt (though here his knowledge was necessarily
+confused and imperfect) his birth was not unequal to hers; now that he
+read, or believed he read, in her wan cheek and attenuated frame that
+desertion to her was death, and that generosity and self-sacrifice had
+become too late,--perhaps these thoughts, concurring with a love in
+himself beyond all words, and a love in her which it was above humanity
+to resist, altogether conquered and subdued him. Yet, as we have said,
+his voice breathed calmly in her ear; and his eye only, which brightened
+with a steady and resolute hope, betrayed his mind. "Live, then!" said
+he, as he concluded. "My sister, my mistress, my bride, live! In one
+year from this day--I repeat--I promise it thee!"
+
+The interview was over, and Lucy returned home with a firm step. She was
+on foot. The rain fell in torrents, yet even in her precarious state her
+health suffered not; and when within a week from that time she read that
+Clifford had departed to the bourne of his punishment, she read the news
+with a steady eye and a lip that, if it grew paler, did not quiver.
+
+Shortly after that time Miss Brandon departed to an obscure town by the
+seaside; and there, refusing all society, she continued to reside.
+As the birth of Clifford was known but to few, and his legitimacy was
+unsuspected by all except, perhaps, by Mauleverer, Lucy succeeded to the
+great wealth of her uncle; and this circumstance made her more than ever
+an object of attraction in the eyes of her noble adorer. Finding himself
+unable to see her, he wrote to her more than one moving epistle; but as
+Lucy continued inflexible, he at length, disgusted by her want of taste,
+ceased his pursuit, and resigned himself to the continued sterility of
+unwedded life. As the months waned, Miss Brandon seemed to grow weary
+of her retreat; and immediately on attaining her majority, which she did
+about eight months after Brandon's death, she transferred the bulk of
+her wealth to France, where it was understood (for it was impossible
+that rumour should sleep upon an heiress and a beauty) that she intended
+in future to reside. Even Warlock (that spell to the proud heart of her
+uncle) she ceased to retain. It was offered to the nearest relation of
+the family at a sum which he did not hesitate to close with; and by the
+common vicissitudes of Fortune, the estate of the ancient Brandons has
+now, we perceive by a weekly journal, just passed into the hands of a
+wealthy alderman.
+
+It was nearly a year since Brandon's death when a letter bearing a
+foreign postmark came to Lucy. From that time her spirits--which before,
+though subject to fits of abstraction, had been even and subdued, not
+sad--rose into all the cheerfulness and vivacity of her earliest youth.
+She busied herself actively in preparations for her departure from this
+country; and at length the day was fixed, and the vessel was engaged.
+Every day till that one, did Lucy walk to the seaside, and ascending the
+highest cliff, spend hours, till the evening closed, in watching, with
+seemingly idle gaze, the vessels that interspersed the sea; and with
+every day her health seemed to strengthen, and the soft and lucid colour
+she had once worn, to rebloom upon her cheek.
+
+Previous to her departure Miss Brandon dismissed her servants, and only
+engaged one female, a foreigner, to accompany her. A certain tone of
+quiet command, formerly unknown to her, characterized these measures,
+so daringly independent for one of her sex and age. The day arrived,--it
+was the anniversary of her last interview with Clifford. On entering the
+vessel it was observed that she trembled violently, and that her face
+was as pale as death. A stranger, who had stood aloof wrapped in
+his cloak, darted forward to assist her; that was the last which her
+discarded and weeping servants beheld of her from the pier where they
+stood to gaze.
+
+Nothing more in this country was ever known of the fate of Lucy Brandon;
+and as her circle of acquaintances was narrow, and interest in her fate
+existed vividly in none save a few humble breasts, conjecture was never
+keenly awakened, and soon cooled into forgetfulness. If it favoured,
+after the lapse of years, any one notion more than another, it was that
+she had perished among the victims of the French Revolution.
+
+Meanwhile let us glance over the destinies of our more subordinate
+acquaintances.
+
+Augustus Tomlinson, on parting from Long Ned, had succeeded in reaching
+Calais; and after a rapid tour through the Continent, he ultimately
+betook himself to a certain literary city in Germany, where he became
+distinguished for his metaphysical acumen, and opened a school of morals
+on the Grecian model, taught in the French tongue. He managed, by the
+patronage he received and the pupils he enlightened, to obtain a very
+decent income; and as he wrote a folio against Locke, proved that men
+had innate feelings, and affirmed that we should refer everything not to
+reason, but to the sentiments of the soul, he became greatly respected
+for his extraordinary virtue. Some little discoveries were made after
+his death, which perhaps would have somewhat diminished the general
+odour of his sanctity, had not the admirers of his school carefully
+hushed up the matter, probably out of respect for the "sentiments of the
+soul!"
+
+Pepper, whom the police did not so anxiously desire to destroy as they
+did his two companions, might have managed, perhaps many years longer,
+to graze upon the public commons, had not a letter, written somewhat
+imprudently, fallen into wrong hands. This, though after creating a
+certain stir it apparently died away, lived in the memory of the
+police, and finally conspired, with various peccadilloes, to produce
+his downfall. He was seized, tried, and sentenced to seven years'
+transportation. He so advantageously employed his time at Botany
+Bay, and arranged things there so comfortably to himself, that at
+the expiration of his sentence he refused to return home. He made an
+excellent match, built himself an excellent house, and remained in "the
+land of the blest" to the end of his days, noted to the last for the
+redundance of his hair and a certain ferocious coxcombry of aspect.
+
+As for Fighting Attie and Gentleman George, for Scarlet Jem and for Old
+Bags, we confess ourselves destitute of any certain information of their
+latter ends. We can only add, with regard to Fighting Attie, "Good luck
+be with him wherever he goes!" and for mine host of the Jolly Angler,
+that, though we have not the physical constitution to quaff "a bumper
+of blue ruin," we shall be very happy, over any tolerable wine and
+in company with any agreeable convivialist, to bear our part in the
+polished chorus of--
+
+               "Here's to Gentleman George, God bless him!"
+
+Mrs. Lobkins departed this life like a lamb; and Dummie Dunnaker
+obtained a license to carry on the business at Thames Court. He boasted,
+to the last, of his acquaintance with the great Captain Lovett, and
+of the affability with which that distinguished personage treated him.
+Stories he had, too, about Judge Brandon, but no one believed a syllable
+of them; and Dummie, indignant at the disbelief, increased, out of
+vehemence, the marvel of the stories, so that, at length, what was added
+almost swallowed up what was original, and Dummie himself might have
+been puzzled to satisfy his own conscience as to what was false and what
+was true.
+
+The erudite Peter MacGrawler, returning to Scotland, disappeared by
+the road. A person singularly resembling the sage was afterward seen at
+Carlisle, where he discharged the useful and praiseworthy duties of Jack
+Ketch. But whether or not this respectable functionary was our identical
+Simon Pure, our ex-editor of "The Asinaeum," we will not take upon
+ourselves to assert.
+
+Lord Mauleverer, finally resolving on a single life, passed the
+remainder of his years in indolent tranquillity. When he died, the
+newspapers asserted that his Majesty was deeply affected by the loss
+of so old and valued a friend. His furniture and wines sold remarkably
+high; and a Great Man, his particular intimate, who purchased his books,
+startled to find, by pencil marks, that the noble deceased had read some
+of them, exclaimed, not altogether without truth,
+
+"Ah! Mauleverer might have been a deuced clever fellow--if he had liked
+it!"
+
+The earl was accustomed to show as a curiosity a ring of great value,
+which he had received in rather a singular manner. One morning a packet
+was brought him which he found to contain a sum of money, the ring
+mentioned, and a letter from the notorious Lovett, in which that
+person in begging to return his lordship the sums of which he had
+twice assisted to rob him, thanked him, with earnest warmth, for the
+consideration testified towards him in not revealing his identity with
+Captain Clifford; and ventured, as a slight testimony of respect, to
+inclose the aforesaid ring with the sum returned.
+
+About the time Mauleverer received this curious packet, several
+anecdotes of a similar nature appeared in the public journals; and
+it seemed that Lovett had acted upon a general principle of
+restitution,--not always, it must be allowed, the offspring of a
+robber's repentance. While the idle were marvelling at these anecdotes,
+came the tardy news that Lovett, after a single month's sojourn at his
+place of condemnation, had, in the most daring and singular manner,
+effected his escape. Whether, in his progress up the country, he had
+been starved or slain by the natives, or whether, more fortunate, he had
+ultimately found the means of crossing seas, was as yet unknown. There
+ended the adventures of the gallant robber; and thus, by a strange
+coincidence, the same mystery which wrapped the fate of Lucy involved
+also that of her lover. And here, kind reader, might we drop the curtain
+on our closing scene, did we not think it might please thee to hold it
+up yet one moment, and give thee another view of the world behind.
+
+In a certain town of that Great Country where shoes are imperfectly
+polished--[See Captain Hall's late work on America]--and opinions are
+not prosecuted, there resided, twenty years after the date of Lucy
+Brandon's departure from England, a man held in high and universal
+respect, not only for the rectitude of his conduct, but for the energies
+of his mind, and the purposes to which they were directed. If you asked
+who cultivated that waste, the answer was, "Clifford!" who procured the
+establishment of that hospital, "Clifford!" who obtained the redress of
+such a public grievance, "Clifford!" who struggled for and won such a
+popular benefit, "Clifford!" In the gentler part of his projects and his
+undertakings--in that part, above all, which concerned the sick or the
+necessitous--this useful citizen was seconded, or rather excelled, by a
+being over whose surpassing loveliness Time seemed to have flown with a
+gentle and charming wing. There was something remarkable and touching
+in the love which this couple (for the woman we refer to was Clifford's
+wife) bore to each other; like the plant on the plains of Hebron, the
+time which brought to that love an additional strength brought to it
+also a softer and a fresher verdure. Although their present neighbours
+were unacquainted with the events of their earlier life previous to
+their settlement at ----------, it was known that they had been wealthy
+at the time they first came to reside there, and that, by a series
+of fatalities, they had lost all. But Clifford had borne up manfully
+against fortune; and in a new country, where men who prefer labour to
+dependence cannot easily starve, he had been enabled to toil upward
+through the severe stages of poverty and hardship with an honesty and
+vigour of character which won him, perhaps, a more hearty esteem for
+every successive effort than the display of his lost riches might ever
+have acquired him. His labours and his abilities obtained gradual but
+sure success; and he now enjoyed the blessings of a competence earned
+with the most scrupulous integrity, and spent with the most kindly
+benevolence. A trace of the trials they had passed through was
+discernible in each; those trials had stolen the rose from the wife's
+cheek, and had sown untimely wrinkles in the broad brow of Clifford.
+There were moments, too, but they were only moments, when the latter
+sank from his wonted elastic and healthful cheerfulness of mind into a
+gloomy and abstracted revery; but these moments the wife watched with a
+jealous and fond anxiety, and one sound of her sweet voice had the
+power to dispel their influence; and when Clifford raised his eyes,
+and glanced from her tender smile around his happy home and his growing
+children, or beheld through the very windows of his room the public
+benefits he had created, something of pride and gladness glowed on his
+countenance, and he said, though with glistening eyes and subdued voice,
+as his looks returned once more to his wife, "I owe these to thee!"
+
+One trait of mind especially characterized Clifford,--indulgence to the
+faults of others. "Circumstances make guilt," he was wont to say; "let
+us endeavour to correct the circumstances, before we rail against the
+guilt!" His children promised to tread in the same useful and honourable
+path that he trod himself. Happy was considered that family which had
+the hope to ally itself with his.
+
+Such was the after-fate of Clifford and Lucy. Who will condemn us for
+preferring the moral of that fate to the moral which is extorted
+from the gibbet and the hulks,--which makes scarecrows, not beacons;
+terrifies our weakness, not warms our reason. Who does not allow that
+it is better to repair than to perish,--better, too, to atone as the
+citizen than to repent as the hermit? Oh, John Wilkes, Alderman of
+London, and Drawcansir of Liberty, your life was not an iota too
+perfect,--your patriotism might have been infinitely purer, your morals
+would have admitted indefinite amendment, you are no great favourite
+with us or with the rest of the world,--but you said one excellent
+thing, for which we look on you with benevolence, nay, almost with
+respect. We scarcely know whether to smile at its wit or to sigh at its
+wisdom. Mark this truth, all ye gentlemen of England who would make
+law as the Romans made fasces,--a bundle of rods with an axe in the
+middle,--mark it, and remember! long may it live, allied with hope in
+ourselves, but with gratitude in our children,--long after the book
+which it now "adorns" and "points" has gone to its dusty slumber,--long,
+long after the feverish hand which now writes it down can defend or
+enforce it no more: "THE VERY WORST USE TO WHICH YOU CAN PUT A MAN IS TO
+HANG HIM!"
+
+                                  NOTE.
+
+In the second edition of this novel there were here inserted two
+"characters" of "Fighting Attie" and "Gentleman George," omitted in the
+subsequent edition published by Mr. Bentley in the "Standard Novels." At
+the request of some admirers of those eminent personages, who considered
+the biographical sketches referred to impartial in themselves, and
+contributing to the completeness of the design for which men so
+illustrious were introduced, they are here retained, though in the more
+honourable form of a separate and supplementary notice.
+
+                             FIGHTING ATTIE.
+
+When he dies, the road will have lost a great man, whose foot was rarely
+out of his stirrup, and whose clear head guided a bold hand. He carried
+common-sense to its perfection, and he made the straight path the
+sublimest. His words were few, his actions were many. He was the
+Spartan of Tobymen, and laconism was the short soul of his professional
+legislation!
+
+Whatever way you view him, you see those properties of mind which
+command fortune; few thoughts not confusing each other,--simple
+elements, and bold. His character in action maybe summed in two
+phrases,--"a fact seized, and a stroke made." Had his intellect been
+more luxurious, his resolution might have been less hardy; and his
+hardiness made his greatness. He was one of those who shine but in
+action,--chimneys (to adapt the simile of Sir Thomas More) that seem
+useless till you light your fire. So in calm moments you dreamed not
+of his utility, and only on the road you were struck dumb with the
+outbreaking of his genius. Whatever situation he was called to, you
+found in hire what you looked for in vain in others; for his strong
+sense gave to Attie what long experience ought, but often fails, to
+give to its possessors. His energy triumphed over the sense of novel
+circumstance, and he broke in a moment through the cobwebs which
+entangled lesser natures for years. His eye saw a final result, and
+disregarded the detail. He robbed his man without chicanery; and took
+his purse by applying for it rather than scheming. If his enemies
+wish to detract from his merit,--a merit great, dazzling, and yet
+solid,--they may, perhaps, say that his genius fitted him better to
+continue exploits than to devise them; and thus that, besides the renown
+which he may justly claim, he often wholly engrossed that fame which
+should have been shared by others: he took up the enterprise where it
+ceased at Labour, and carried it onwards, where it was rewarded with
+Glory. Even this charge proves a new merit of address, and lessens not
+the merit less complicated the have allowed him before. The fame he
+has acquired may excite our emulation; the envy he has not appeased may
+console us for obscurity.
+
+A stanza of Greek poetry--Thus, not too vigorously, translated by Mr.
+West,--
+
+"But wrapped in error is the human mind, And human bliss is ever
+insecure--Know we what fortune shall remain behind? Know we how long the
+present shall endure?"
+
+                            GENTLEMAN GEORGE.
+
+For thee, Gentleman George, for thee, what conclusive valediction
+remains? Alas! since we began the strange and mumming scene wherein
+first thou went introduced, the grim foe hath knocked thrice at thy
+gates; and now, as we write,--[In 1830]--thou art departed thence,--thou
+art no more! A new lord presides to thine easy-chair, a new voice rings
+from thy merry board,--thou art forgotten! thou art already, like these
+pages, a tale that is told to a memory that retaineth not! Where are
+thy quips and cranks; where thy stately coxcombries and thy regal
+gauds? Thine house and thy pagoda, thy Gothic chimney and thy Chinese
+sign-post,--these yet ask the concluding hand. Thy hand is cold; their
+completion, and the enjoyment the completion yields, are for another!
+Thou sowest, and thy follower reaps; thou buildest, thy successor holds;
+thou plantest, and thine heir sits beneath the shadow of thy trees,--
+
+                    "Neque harum, quas colis, arborum
+                    Te, praeter invisas cupressos,
+                    Ulla brevem dominum sequetur!"
+
+     ["Nor will any of these trees thou didst cultivate follow thee,
+     the shortlived lord, save the hateful Cyprus."]
+
+At this moment thy life,--for thou veert a Great Man to thine order,
+and they have added thy biography to that of Abershaw and Sheppard,--thy
+life is before us. What a homily in its events! Gayly didst thou laugh
+into thy youth, and run through the courses of thy manhood. Wit sat
+at thy table, and Genius was thy comrade. Beauty was thy handmaid; and
+Frivolity played around thee,--a buffoon that thou didst ridicule, and
+ridiculing enjoy! Who among us can look back to thy brilliant era, and
+not sigh to think that the wonderful men who surrounded thee, and amidst
+whom thou wert a centre and a nucleus, are for him but the things of
+history, and the phantoms of a bodiless tradition? Those brilliant.
+suppers, glittering with beauty, the memory of which makes one spot
+(yet inherited by Bachelor Bill) a haunted and a fairy ground; all who
+gathered to that Armida's circle,--the Grammonts and the Beauvilliers
+and the Rochefoucaulds of England and the Road,--who does not feel that
+to have seen these, though but as Gil Blas saw the festivities of his
+actors, from the sideboard and behind the chair, would have been a
+triumph for the earthlier feelings of his old age to recall? What,
+then, must it have been to have seen them as thou didst see,--thou, the
+deceased and the forgotten!---seen them from the height of thy youth and
+power and rank (for early wert thou keeper to a public), and reckless
+spirits, and lusty capacities of joy? What pleasures where sense
+lavished its uncounted varieties? What revellings where wine was the
+least excitement?
+
+Let the scene shift. How stirring is the change! Triumph and glitter
+and conquest! For thy public was a public of renown; thither came the
+Warriors of the Ring,--the Heroes of the Cross,--and thou, their patron,
+wert elevated on their fame! "Principes pro victoria pugnant, comites
+pro Principe."--[Chiefs for the victory fight,--for chiefs the
+soldiers]--What visions sweep across us! What glories didst thou
+witness! Over what conquests didst thou preside! The mightiest epoch,
+the most wonderful events which the world, thy world, ever knew,--of
+these was it not indeed, and dazzlingly thine,--
+
+          "To share the triumph and partake the gale"?
+
+Let the scene shift. Manhood is touched by age; but Lust is "heeled" by
+Luxury, and Pomp is the heir of Pleasure; gewgaws and gaud, instead of
+glory, surround, rejoice, and flatter thee to the last. There rise thy
+buildings; there lie, secret but gorgeous, the tabernacles of thine
+ease; and the earnings of thy friends, and the riches of the people whom
+they plunder, are waters to thine imperial whirlpool. Thou art lapped
+in ease, as is a silkworm; and profusion flows from thy high and unseen
+asylum as the rain poureth from a cloud.--Much didst thou do to beautify
+chimney-tops, much to adorn the snuggeries where thou didst dwell.
+Thieving with thee took a substantial shape; and the robberies Of the
+public passed into a metempsychosis of mortar, and became public-houses.
+So there and thus, building and planning, didst thou spin out thy latter
+yarn, till Death came upon thee; and when we looked around, lo! thy
+brother was on thy hearth. And thy parasites and thy comrades and thine
+ancient pals and thy portly blowens, they made a murmur, and they packed
+up their goods; but they turned ere they departed, and they would have
+worshipped thy brother as they worshipped thee,--but he would not! And
+thy sign-post is gone and mouldered already; and to the Jolly Angler has
+succeeded the Jolly Tar! And thy picture is disappearing fast from the
+print-shops, and thy name from the mouths of men! And thy brother, whom
+no one praised while thou didst live, is on a steeple of panegyric built
+above the churchyard that contains thy grave. O shifting and volatile
+hearts of men! Who would be keeper of a public? Who dispense the wine
+and the juices that gladden, when the moment the pulse of the band
+ceases, the wine and the juices are forgotten?
+
+To History,--for thy name will be preserved in that record which,
+whether it be the calendar of Newgate or of nations, telleth its alike
+how men suffer and sin and perish,--to History we leave the sum and
+balance of thy merits and thy faults. The sins that were thine were
+those of the man to whom pleasure is all in all: thou wert, from root to
+branch, sap and in heart, what moralists term the libertine; hence
+the light wooing, the quick desertion, the broken faith, the organized
+perfidy, that manifested thy bearing to those gentler creatures who
+called thee 'Gentleman George.' Never to one solitary woman, until
+the last dull flame of thy dotage, didst thou so behave as to give no
+foundation to complaint and no voice to wrong. But who shall say be
+honest to one, but laugh at perfidy to another? Who shall wholly confine
+treachery to one sex, if to that sex he hold treachery no offence? So
+in thee, as in all thy tribe, there was a laxness of principle, an
+insincerity of faith, even unto men: thy friends, when occasion suited,
+thou couldst forsake; and thy luxuries were dearer to thee than justice
+to those who supplied them. Men who love and live for pleasure as thou,
+are usually good-natured; for their devotion to pleasure arises from the
+strength of their constitution, and the strength of their constitution
+preserves them from the irritations of weaker nerves. So went thou
+good-natured and often generous; and often with thy generosity didst
+thou unite a delicacy that showed thou hadst an original and a tender
+sympathy with men. But as those who pursue pleasure are above all
+others impatient of interruption, so to such as interfered with thy main
+pursuit thou didst testify a deep, a lasting, and a revengeful anger.
+Yet let not such vices of temperament be too severely judged! For
+to thee were given man's two most persuasive tempters, physical and
+moral,--Health and Power! Thy talents, such as they were,--and they were
+the talents of a man of the world,--misled rather than guided thee, for
+they gave thy mind that demi-philosophy, that indifference to exalted
+motives, which is generally found in a clever rake. Thy education was
+wretched; thou hadst a smattering of Horace, but thou couldst not write
+English, and thy letters betray that thou went wofully ignorant of
+logic. The fineness of thy taste has been exaggerated; thou wert
+unacquainted with the nobleness of simplicity; thy idea of a whole
+was grotesque and overloaded, and thy fancy in details was gaudy and
+meretricious. But thou hadst thy hand constantly in the public purse,
+and thou hadst plans and advisers forever before thee; more than all,
+thou didst find the houses in that neighbourbood wherein thou didst
+build, so preternaturally hideous that thou didst require but little
+science to be less frightful in thy creations. If thou didst not improve
+thy native village and thy various homes with a solid, a lofty, and a
+noble taste, thou didst nevertheless very singularly improve. And thy
+posterity, in avoiding the faults of thy masonry, will be grateful for
+the effects of thy ambition. The same demi-philosophy which influenced
+thee in private life exercised a far benigner and happier power over
+thee in public. Thou wert not idly vexatious in vestries, nor ordinarily
+tyrannic in thy parish; if thou wert ever arbitrary it was only when thy
+pleasure was checked, or thy vanity wounded. At other times thou didst
+leave events to their legitimate course, so that in thy latter years
+thou wert justly popular in thy parish; and in the grave thy great good
+fortune will outshine thy few bad qualities, and men will say of thee
+with a kindly, not an erring judgment, "In private life he was not worse
+than the Rufers who came to this bar; in public life he was better than
+those who kept a public before him." Hark! those huzzas! what is the
+burden of that chorus? Oh, grateful and never time-serving Britons, have
+ye modified already for another the song ye made so solely in honour of
+Gentleman George: and must we, lest we lose the custom of the public and
+the good things of the tap-room,--roust we roar with throats yet hoarse
+with our fervour for the old words, our ardour for the new--
+
+              "Here's to Mariner Bill, God bless him!
+               God bless him!
+               God bless him!
+               Here 's to Mariner Bill, God bless him!"
+
+
+
+
+
+TOMLINSONIANA;
+
+OR,
+
+THE POSTHUMOUS WRITINGS
+
+OF THE CELEBRATED
+
+AUGUSTUS TOMLINSON,
+
+PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF -------
+
+ADDRESSED TO HIS PUPILS,
+
+AND COMPRISING
+
+                                   I
+ MAXIMS ON THE POPULAR ART OF CREATING, ILLUSTRATED BY TEN CHARACTERS,
+BEING AN INTRODUCTION TO THAT NOBLE SCIENCE BY WHICH EVERY MAN MAY
+BECOME                             HIS OWN ROGUE.
+
+                                   II
+  BRACHYLOGIA; OR, ESSAYS CRITICAL, SENTIMENTAL, MORAL, AND ORIGINAL.
+
+                              INTRODUCTION.
+
+Having lately been travelling in Germany, I spent some time at that
+University in which Augustus Tomlinson presided as Professor of Moral
+Philosophy. I found that that great man died, after a lingering illness,
+in the beginning of the year 1822, perfectly resigned to his fate, and
+conversing, even on his deathbed, on the divine mysteries of Ethical
+Philosophy. Notwithstanding the little peccadilloes to which I have
+alluded in the latter pages of "Paul Clifford," and which his pupils
+deemed it advisable to hide from--
+
+               "The gaudy, babbling, and remorseless day,"
+
+his memory was still held in a tender veneration. Perhaps, as in the
+case of the illustrious Burns, the faults of a great man endear to you
+his genius. In his latter days the PROFESSOR was accustomed to wear a
+light-green silk dressing-gown, and, as he was perfectly bald, a
+little black velvet cap; his small-clothes were pepper and salt. These
+interesting facts I learned from one of his pupils. His old age was
+consumed in lectures, in conversation, and in the composition of the
+little morceaux of wisdom we present to the public. In these essays and
+maxims, short as they are, he seems to have concentrated the wisdom of
+his industrious and honourable life. With great difficulty I procured
+from his executors the manuscripts which were then preparing for the
+German press. A valuable consideration induced those gentlemen to become
+philanthropic, and to consider the inestimable blessings they would
+confer upon this country by suffering me to give the following essays
+to the light, in their native and English dress, on the same day whereon
+they appear in Germany in the graces of foreign disguise.
+
+At an age when, while Hypocrisy stalks, simpers, sidles, struts, and
+hobbles through the country, Truth also begins to watch her adversary in
+every movement, I cannot but think these lessons of Augustus Tomlinson
+peculiarly well-timed. I add them as a fitting Appendix to a Novel that
+may not inappropriately be termed a Treatise on Social Frauds; and if
+they contain within them that evidence of diligent attention and that
+principle of good in which the satire of Vice is only the germ of its
+detection, they may not, perchance, pass wholly unnoticed; nor be even
+condemned to that hasty reading in which the Indifference of to-day is
+but the prelude to the Forgetfulness of to-morrow.
+
+                                CONTENTS.
+
+     MAXIMS ON THE POPULAR ART OF CHEATING, Illustrated by Ten
+     Characters, being an Introduction to that noble Science by which
+     every Man may become his own Rogue
+
+     BRACHYLOGIA:
+          On the Morality taught by the Rich to the Poor
+          Emulation
+          Caution against the Scoffers of "Humbug"
+          Popular Wrath at Individual Imprudence
+          Dum deflnat Amnis
+          Self-Glorifiers
+          Thought on Fortune
+          Wit, and Truth
+          Auto-theology
+          Glorious Constitution
+          Answer to the Popular Cant that Goodness in a Statesman is
+          better than        Ability
+          Common-sense
+          Love, and Writers on Love
+          The Great Entailed
+          The Regeneration of a Knave
+          Style
+
+                                 MAXIMS
+
+                                   ON
+
+                      THE POPULAR ART OF CHEATING,
+
+                     ILLUSTRATED BY TEN CHARACTERS;
+
+BEING AN INTRODUCTION TO THAT NOBLE SCIENCE BY WHICH EVERY MAN MAY
+BECOME                             HIS OWN ROGUE.
+
+                Set a thief to catch a thief.---Proverb.
+
+                                    I.
+
+Whenever you are about to utter something astonishingly false, always
+begin with, "It is an acknowledged fact," etc. Sir Robert Filmer was
+a master of this method of writing. Thus, with what a solemn face that
+great man attempted to cheat! "It is a truth undeniable that there
+cannot be any multitude of men whatsoever, either great or small, etc.,
+but that in the same multitude there is one man amongst them that in
+nature hath a right to be King of all the rest,--as being the next heir
+to Adam!"
+
+                                   II.
+
+When you want something from the public, throw the blame of the asking
+on the most sacred principle you can find. A common beggar can read you
+exquisite lessons on this the most important maxim in the art of popular
+cheating. "For the love of God, sir, a penny!"
+
+                                   III.
+
+Whenever on any matter, moral, sentimental, or political, you find
+yourself utterly ignorant, talk immediately of "The Laws of Nature."
+As those laws are written nowhere,--[Locke]--they are known by nobody.
+Should any ask you how you happen to know such or such a doctrine as the
+dictate of Nature, clap your hand to your heart and say, "Here!"
+
+                                   IV.
+
+Yield to a man's tastes, and he will yield to your interest.
+
+                                    V.
+
+When you talk to the half-wise, twaddle; when you talk to the ignorant,
+brag; when you talk to the sagacious, look very humble, and ask their
+opinion.
+
+                                   VI.
+
+Always bear in mind, my beloved pupils, that the means of livelihood
+depend not on the virtues, but the vices of others. The lawyer, the
+statesman, the hangman, the physician, are paid by our sins; nay, even
+the commoner professions--the tailor, the coachmaker, the upholsterer,
+the wine-merchant--draw their fortunes, if not their existence, from
+those smaller vices, our foibles. Vanity is the figure prefixed to the
+ciphers of Necessity. Wherefore, oh my beloved pupils! never mind what a
+man's virtues are; waste no time in learning them. Fasten at once on his
+infirmities. Do to the One as, were you an honest man, you would do to
+the Many. This is the way to be a rogue individually, as a lawyer is a
+rogue professionally. Knaves are like critics,--[Nullum simile est
+quod idem.--EDITOR.]--"flies that feed on the sore part, and would have
+nothing to live on were the body in health."--[Tatler].
+
+                                   VII.
+
+Every man finds it desirable to have tears in his eyes at times,--one
+has a sympathy with humid lids. Providence hath beneficially provided
+for this want, and given to every man, in its divine forethought,
+misfortunes painful to recall. Hence, probably, those human calamities
+which the atheist rails against! Wherefore, when you are uttering
+some affecting sentiment to your intended dupe, think of the greatest
+misfortune you ever had in your life; habit will soon make the
+association of tears and that melancholy remembrance constantly
+felicitous. I knew, my dear pupils, a most intelligent Frenchman, who
+obtained a charming legacy from an old poet by repeating the bard's
+verses with streaming eyes. "How were you able to weep at will?" asked I
+(I was young then, my pupils). "Je pensois," answered he, "a mon
+pauvre pere, qui est mort." The union of sentiment with the ability of
+swindling made that Frenchman a most fascinating creature!
+
+                                  VIII.
+
+Never commit the error of the over-shrewd, and deem human nature worse
+than it is. Human nature is so damnably good that if it were not for
+human art, we knaves could not live. The primary elements of a man's
+mind do not sustain us; it is what he owes to "the pains taken with his
+education," and "the blessings of civilized society!"
+
+                                   IX.
+
+Whenever you doubt, my pupils, whether your man be a quack or not,
+decide the point by seeing if your man be a positive asserter. Nothing
+indicates imposture like confidence. Volney saith well, "that the most
+celebrated of charlatans--[Mahomet]--and the boldest of tyrants begins
+his extraordinary tissue of lies by these words, 'There is no doubt in
+this book!'"
+
+                                    X.
+
+There is one way of cheating people peculiar to the British Isles, and
+which, my pupils, I earnestly recommend you to import hither,--cheating
+by subscription. People like to be plundered in company; dupery then
+grows into the spirit of party. Thus one quack very gravely requested
+persons to fit up a ship for him and send him round the world as its
+captain to make discoveries; and another patriotically suggested that
+L10,000 should be subscribed--for what?--to place him in parliament!
+Neither of these fellows could have screwed an individual out of a
+shilling had he asked him for it in a corner; but a printed list, with
+"His Royal Highness" at the top, plays the devil with English guineas.
+A subscription for individuals may be considered a society for the
+ostentatious encouragement of idleness, impudence, beggary, imposture,
+and other public virtues!
+
+                                   XI.
+
+Whenever you read the life of a great man, I mean a man eminently
+successful, you will perceive all the qualities given to him are the
+qualities necessary even to a mediocre rogue. "He possessed," saith the
+biographer, "the greatest address [namely, the faculty of wheedling];
+the most admirable courage [namely, the faculty of bullying]; the most
+noble fortitude [namely, the faculty of bearing to be bullied]; the most
+singular versatility [namely, the faculty of saying one thing to one
+man, and its reverse to another]; and the most wonderful command over
+the mind of his contemporaries [namely, the faculty of victimizing
+their purses or seducing their actions]." Wherefore, if luck cast you in
+humble life, assiduously study the biographies of the great, in order to
+accomplish you as a rogue; if in the more elevated range of society, be
+thoroughly versed in the lives of the roguish: so shall you fit yourself
+to be eminent!
+
+                                   XII.
+
+The hypocrisy of virtue, my beloved pupils, is a little out of fashion
+nowadays; it is sometimes better to affect the hypocrisy of vice. Appear
+generously profligate, and swear with a hearty face that you do not
+pretend to be better than the generality of your neighbours. Sincerity
+is not less a covering than lying; a frieze great-coat wraps you as well
+as a Spanish cloak.
+
+                                  XIII.
+
+When you are about to execute some great plan, and to defraud a number
+of persons, let the first one or two of the allotted number be the
+cleverest, shrewdest fellows you can find. You have then a reference
+that will alone dupe the rest of the world. "That Mr. Lynx is
+satisfied," will amply suffice to satisfy Mr. Mole of the honesty of
+your intentions! Nor are shrewd men the hardest to take in; they rely on
+their strength: invulnerable heroes are necessarily the bravest. Talk to
+them in a business-like manner, and refer your design at once to their
+lawyer. My friend John Shamberry was a model in this grand stroke of
+art. He swindled twelve people to the tune of some thousands, with no
+other trouble than it first cost him to swindle--whom do you think?--the
+Secretary to the Society for the Suppression of Swindling!
+
+                                   XIV.
+
+Divide your arts into two classes,--those which cost you little labour,
+those which cost much. The first,--flattery, attention, answering
+letters by return of post, walking across a street to oblige the man you
+intend to ruin; all these you must never neglect. The least man is worth
+gaining at a small cost. And besides, while you are serving yourself,
+you are also obtaining the character of civility, diligence,
+and good-nature. But the arts which cost you much labour--a long
+subservience to one testy individual; aping the semblance of a virtue,
+a quality, or a branch of learning which you do not possess, to a person
+difficult to blind,--all these never begin except for great ends, worth
+not only the loss of time, but the chance of detection. Great pains
+for small gains is the maxim of the miser. The rogue should have more
+grandeur d'ame!--[Greatness of soul].
+
+                                   XV.
+
+Always forgive.
+
+                                   XVI.
+
+If a man owe you a sum of money--pupils though you be of mine, you may
+once in your lives be so silly as to lend--and you find it difficult
+to get it back, appeal, not to his justice, but to his charity. The
+components of justice flatter few men! Who likes to submit to an
+inconvenience because he ought to do it,--without praise, without
+even self--gratulation? But charity, my dear friends, tickles up human
+ostentation deliciously. Charity implies superiority; and the feeling of
+superiority is most grateful to social nature. Hence the commonness of
+charity, in proportion to other virtues, all over the world; and hence
+you will especially note that in proportion as people are haughty
+and arrogant, will they laud almsgiving and encourage charitable
+institutions.
+
+                                  XVII.
+
+Your genteel rogues do not sufficiently observe the shrewdness of the
+vulgar ones. The actual beggar takes advantage of every sore; but the
+moral swindler is unpardonably dull as to the happiness of a physical
+infirmity. To obtain a favour, neglect no method that may allure
+compassion. I knew a worthy curate who obtained two livings by the
+felicity of a hectic cough, and a younger brother who subsisted for ten
+years on his family by virtue of a slow consumption.
+
+                                  XVIII.
+
+When you want to possess yourself of a small sum, recollect that the
+small sum be put into juxtaposition with a great. I do not express
+myself clearly--take an example. In London there are sharpers who
+advertise L70,000 to be advanced at four per cent; principals only
+conferred with. The gentleman wishing for such a sum on mortgage goes to
+see the advertiser; the advertiser says he must run down and look at the
+property on which the money is to be advanced; his journey and expenses
+will cost him a mere trifle,--say, twenty guineas. Let him speak
+confidently; let the gentleman very much want the money at the interest
+stated, and three to one but our sharper gets the twenty guineas,--so
+paltry a sum in comparison to L70,000 though so serious a sum had the
+matter related to halfpence!
+
+                                   XIX.
+
+Lord Coke has said: "To trace an error to its fountainhead is to refute
+it." Now, my young pupils, I take it for granted that you are interested
+in the preservation of error; you do not wish it, therefore, to be
+traced to its fountain head. Whenever, then, you see a sharp fellow
+tracking it up, you have two ways of settling the matter. You may say,
+with a smile, "Nay, now, sir, you grow speculative,--I admire your
+ingenuity;" or else look grave, colour up, and say, "I fancy, sir, there
+is no warrant for this assertion in the most sacred of all authorities!"
+The Devil can quote Scripture, you know; and a very sensible Devil it is
+too!
+
+                                   XX.
+
+Rochefoucauld has said: "The hate of favourites is nothing else but the
+love of favour." The idea is a little cramped; the hate we bear to any
+man is only the result of our love for some good which we imagine
+he possesses, or which, being in our possession, we imagine he has
+attacked. Thus envy, the most ordinary species of hate, arises from our
+value for the glory, or the plate, or the content we behold; and revenge
+is born from our regard for our fame that has been wounded, or our acres
+molested, or our rights invaded. But the most noisy of all hatreds is
+hatred for the rich, from love for the riches. Look well on the poor
+devil who is always railing at coaches and four! Book him as a man to be
+bribed!
+
+                                   XXI.
+
+My beloved pupils, few have yet sufficiently studied the art by which
+the practice of jokes becomes subservient to the science of swindlers.
+The heart of an inferior is always fascinated by a jest. Men know this
+in the knavery of elections. Know it now, my pupils, in the knavery of
+life! When you slap yon cobbler so affectionately on the back, it is
+your own fault if you do not slap your purpose into him at the same
+time. Note how Shakspeare (whom study night and day,--no man hath
+better expounded the mysteries of roguery!) causes his grandest and most
+accomplished villain, Richard III., to address his good friends, the
+murderers, with a jocular panegyric on that hardness of heart on which,
+doubtless, those poor fellows most piqued themselves,--
+
+     "Your eyes drop millstones, where fools' eyes drop tears--
+     I like you, lads!"
+
+Can't you fancy the knowing grin with which the dogs received this
+compliment, and the little sly punch in the stomach with which Richard
+dropped those loving words, "I like you, lads!"
+
+                                  XXII.
+
+As good-nature is the characteristic of the dupe, so should good-temper
+be that of the knave; the two fit into each other like joints. Happily,
+good-nature is a Narcissus, and falls in love with its own likeness.
+And good-temper is to good-nature what the Florimel of snow was to the
+Florimel of flesh,--an exact likeness made of the coldest materials.
+
+                                  XXIII.
+
+                       BEING THE PRAISE OF KNAVERY.
+
+A knave is a philosopher, though a philosopher is not necessarily a
+knave. What hath a knave to do with passions? Every irregular desire he
+must suppress; every foible he must weed out; his whole life is spent in
+the acquisition of knowledge: for what is knowledge?--the discovery of
+human errors! He is the only man always consistent yet ever examining;
+he knows but one end, yet explores every means; danger, ill-repute, all
+that terrify other men, daunt not him; he braves all, but is saved from
+all: for I hold that a knave ceaseth to be the knave--he hath passed
+into the fool--the moment mischief befalls him. He professes the art of
+cheating; but the art of cheating is to cheat without peril. He is
+teres et rotundas; strokes fly from the lubricity of his polish, and the
+shiftings of his circular formation. He who is insensible of the glory
+of his profession, who is open only to the profit, is no disciple of
+mine. I hold of knavery, as Plato hath said of virtue, "Could it be seen
+incarnate, it would beget a personal adoration!" None but those who are
+inspired by a generous enthusiasm will benefit by the above maxims, nor
+(and here I warn you solemnly from the sacred ground, till your head be
+uncovered, and your feet be bared in the awe of veneration) enter with
+profit upon the following descriptions of character,--that Temple of the
+Ten Statutes, wherein I have stored and consecrated the most treasured
+relics of my travelled thoughts and my collected experience.
+
+                             TEN CHARACTERS.
+
+                                    I.
+
+The mild, irresolute, good-natured, and indolent man. These qualities
+are accompanied with good feelings, but no principles. The want of
+firmness evinces also the want of any peculiar or deeply rooted system
+of thought. A man conning a single and favourite subject of meditation
+grows wedded to one or the other of the opinions on which he revolves. A
+man universally irresolute has generally led a desultory life, and never
+given his attention long together to one thing. This is a man most easy
+to cheat, my beloved friends; you cheat him even with his eyes open.
+Indolence is dearer to him than all things; and if you get him alone and
+put a question to him point blank, he cannot answer, No.
+
+                                   II.
+
+The timid, suspicious, selfish, and cold man. Generally a character of
+this description is an excellent man of business, and would at first
+sight seem to baffle the most ingenious swindler. But you have
+one hope,--I have rarely found it deceive me,--this man is usually
+ostentatious. A cold, a fearful, yet a worldly person has ever an eye
+upon others; he notes the effect certain things produce on them; he is
+anxious to learn their opinions, that he may not transgress; he likes to
+know what the world say of him; nay, his timidity makes him anxious
+to repose his selfishness on their good report. Hence he grows
+ostentatious, likes that effect which is favourably talked of, and that
+show which wins consideration. At him on this point, my pupils!
+
+                                   III.
+
+The melancholy, retired, sensitive, intellectual character. A very good
+subject this for your knaveries, my young friends, though it requires
+great discrimination and delicacy. This character has a considerable
+portion of morbid suspicion and irritation belonging to it,--against
+these you must guard; at the same time its prevailing feature is a
+powerful but unacknowledged vanity. It is generally a good opinion of
+himself, and a feeling that he is not appreciated by others, that make
+a man reserved; he deems himself unfit for the world because of
+the delicacy of his temperament, and the want of a correspondent
+insensibility in those he sees! This is your handle to work on. He is
+peculiarly flattered, too, on the score of devotion and affection; he
+exacts in love, as from the world, too much. He is a Lara, whose females
+must be Medoras; and even his male friends should be extremely like
+Kaleds! Poor man! you see how easily he can be duped. Mem.--Among
+persons of this character are usually found those oddities, humours,
+and peculiarities which are each a handle. No man lives out of the world
+with impunity to the solidity of his own character. Every new outlet to
+the humour is a new inlet to the heart.
+
+                                   IV.
+
+The bold, generous, frank, and affectionate man,--usually a person of
+robust health. His constitution keeps him in spirits, and his spirits
+in courage and in benevolence. He is obviously not a hard character, my
+good young friends, for you to deceive; for he wants suspicion, and all
+his good qualities lay him open to you. But beware his anger when he
+finds you out! He is a terrible Othello when his nature is once stung.
+Mem.--A good sort of character to seduce into illegal practices; makes
+a tolerable traitor or a capital smuggler. You yourselves must never
+commit any illegal offence,--aren't there cat's-paws for the
+chestnuts? As all laws are oppressions (only necessary and often sacred
+oppressions, which you need not explain to him), and his character
+is especially hostile to oppression, you easily seduce the person we
+describe into braving the laws of his country. Yes! the bold, generous,
+frank, and affectionate man has only to be born in humble life to be
+sure of a halter!
+
+                                    V.
+
+The bold, selfish, close, grasping man will in all probability cheat
+you, my dear friends. For such a character makes the master-rogue, the
+stuff from which Nature forms a Richard the Third. You had better leave
+such a man quite alone. He is bad even to serve. He breaks up his tools
+when he has done with them. No, you can do nothing with him, my good
+young men!
+
+                                   VI.
+
+The eating, drinking, unthoughtful, sensual, mechanical man,--the
+ordinary animal. Such a creature has cunning, and is either cowardly or
+ferocious; seldom in these qualities he preserves a medium. He is not
+by any means easy to dupe. Nature defends her mental brutes by the
+thickness of their hide. Win his mistress if possible; she is the best
+person to manage him. Such creatures are the natural prey of artful
+women; their very stolidity covers all but sensuality. To the Samson-the
+Delilah.
+
+                                   VII.
+
+The gay, deceitful, shrewd, polished, able man,--the courtier, the
+man of the world. In public and stirring life this is the fit
+antagonist,--often the successful and conquering rival of Character V.
+You perceive a man like this varies so greatly in intellect--from the
+mere butterfly talent to the rarest genius, from the person you see
+at cards to the person you see in Cabinets, from the ----- to the
+Chesterfield, from the Chesterfield to the Pericles--that it is
+difficult to give you an exact notion of the weak points of a character
+so various. But while he dupes his equals and his superiors, I consider
+him, my attentive pupils, by no means a very difficult character for
+an inferior to dupe. And in this manner you must go about it. Do not
+attempt hypocrisy; he will see through it in an instant. Let him think
+you at once, and at first sight, a rogue. Be candid on that matter
+yourself; but let him think you a useful rogue. Serve him well and
+zealously; but own that you do so, because you consider your interest
+involved in this. This reasoning satisfies him; and as men of this
+character are usually generous, he will acknowledge its justice
+by throwing you plenty of sops, and stimulating you with bountiful
+cordials. Should he not content you herein, appear contented; and
+profit in betraying him (that is the best way to cheat him), not by his
+failings, but by opportunity. Watch not his character, but your time.
+
+                                  VIII.
+
+The vain, arrogant, brave, amorous, flashy character. This sort of
+character we formerly attributed to the French, and it is still more
+common to the Continent than that beloved island which I shall see no
+more! A creature of this description is made up of many false virtues;
+above others, it is always profuse where its selfishness is appealed to,
+not otherwise. You must find, then, what pleases it, and pander to its
+tastes. So will ye cheat it,--or ye will cheat it also by affecting the
+false virtues which it admires itself,--rouge your sentiments highly,
+and let them strut with a buskined air; thirdly, my good young men, ye
+will cheat it by profuse flattery, and by calling it in especial "the
+mirror of chivalry."
+
+                                   IX.
+
+The plain, sensible, honest man,--a favourable, but not elevated
+specimen of our race. This character, my beloved pupils, you may take in
+once, but never twice. Nor can you take in such a man as a stranger; he
+must be your friend or relation, or have known intimately some part
+of your family. A man of this character is always open, though in a
+moderate and calm degree, to the duties and ties of life. He will always
+do something to serve his friend, his brother, or the man whose father
+pulled his father out of the Serpentine. Affect with him no varnish;
+exert no artifice in attempting to obtain his assistance. Candidly state
+your wish for such or such a service, sensibly state your pretensions,
+modestly hint at your gratitude. So may you deceive him once, then leave
+him alone forever!
+
+                                    X.
+
+The fond, silly, credulous man, all impulse and no reflection,--how my
+heart swells when I contemplate this excellent character! What a Canaan
+for you does it present! I envy you launching into the world with
+the sanguine hope of finding all men such! Delightful enthusiasm
+of youth,--would that the hope could be realized! Here is the very
+incarnation of gullibility. You have only to make him love you, and no
+hedgehog ever sucked egg as you can suck him. Never be afraid of his
+indignation; go to him again and again; only throw yourself on his
+neck and weep. To gull him once is to gull him always; get his first
+shilling, and then calculate what you will do with the rest of his
+fortune. Never desert so good a man for new friends; that would
+be ungrateful in you! And take with you, by the way, my good young
+gentlemen, this concluding maxim: Men are like lands; you will get
+more by lavishing all your labour again and again upon the easy than by
+ploughing up new ground in the sterile! Legislators,--wise, good, pious
+men,--the Tom Thumbs of moral science, who make giants first, and
+then kill them,--you think the above lessons villanous. I honour your
+penetration. They are not proofs of my villany, but of your folly! Look
+over them again, and you will see that they are designed to show that
+while ye are imprisoning, transporting, and hanging thousands every day,
+a man with a decent modicum of cunning might practise every one of those
+lessons which seem to you so heinous, and not one of your laws could
+touch him!
+
+                              BRACHYLOGIA;
+
+                                  OR,
+
+          ESSAYS, CRITICAL, SENTIMENTAL, MORAL, AND ORIGINAL.
+
+                        ADDRESSED TO HIS PUPILS
+
+                         BY AUGUSTUS TOMLINSON.
+
+     The irony in the preceding essays is often lost sight of in the
+     present.  The illness of this great man, which happened while
+     composing these little gems, made him perhaps more in earnest
+     than when in robust health.--Editor's Note.
+
+             ON THE MORALITY TAUGHT BY THE RICH TO THE POOR.
+
+As soon as the urchin pauper can totter out of doors, it is taught to
+pull off its hat, and pull its hair to the quality. "A good little boy,"
+says the squire; "there's a ha'penny for you." The good little boy glows
+with pride. That ha'penny instils deep the lesson of humility. Now goes
+our urchin to school. Then comes the Sunday teaching,--before church,
+which enjoins the poor to be lowly, and to honour every man better off
+than themselves. A pound of honour to the squire, and an ounce to the
+beadle. Then the boy grows up; and the Lord of the Manor instructs him
+thus: "Be a good boy, Tom, and I'll befriend you. Tread in the steps of
+your father; he was an excellent man, and a great loss to the parish;
+he was a very civil, hard-working, well-behaved creature; knew his
+station;--mind, and do like him!" So perpetual hard labour and plenty of
+cringing make the ancestral virtues to be perpetuated to peasants till
+the day of judgment! Another insidious distillation of morality is
+conveyed through a general praise of the poor. You hear false friends of
+the people, who call themselves Liberals and Tories, who have an idea of
+morals half chivalric, half pastoral, agree in lauding the unfortunate
+creatures whom they keep at work for them. But mark the virtues the poor
+are always to be praised for,--industry, honesty, and content. The
+first virtue is extolled to the skies, because industry gives the rich
+everything they have; the second, because honesty prevents an iota
+of the said everything being taken away again; and the third, because
+content is to hinder these poor devils from ever objecting to a lot so
+comfortable to the persons who profit by it. This, my pupils, is the
+morality taught by the rich to the poor!
+
+                                EMULATION.
+
+The great error of emulation is this: we emulate effects without
+inquiring into causes. When we read of the great actions of a man,
+we are on fire to perform the same exploits, without endeavouring to
+ascertain the precise qualities which enabled the man we imitate to
+commit the actions we admire. Could we discover these, how often might
+we discover that their origin was a certain temper of body, a certain
+peculiarity of constitution, and that, wish we for the same success, we
+should be examining the nature of our bodies rather than sharpening
+the faculties of our minds,--should use dumbbells, perhaps, instead of
+books; nay, on the other hand, contract some grievous complaint rather
+than perfect our moral salubrity. Who should say whether Alexander would
+have been a hero had his neck been straight; or Boileau a satirist, had
+he never been pecked by a turkey? It would be pleasant to see you, my
+beloved pupils, after reading "Quintus Curtius," twisting each other's
+throat; or, fresh from Boileau, hurrying to the poultry-yard in the hope
+of being mutilated into the performance of a second "Lutrin."
+
+                CAUTION AGAINST THE SCOFFERS OF "HUMBUG."
+
+My beloved pupils, there is a set of persons in the world, daily
+increasing, against whom you must be greatly on your guard; there is
+a fascination about them. They are people who declare themselves
+vehemently opposed to humbug,--fine, liberal fellows, clear-sighted, yet
+frank. When these sentiments arise from reflection, well and good,--they
+are the best sentiments in the world; but many take them up second hand.
+They are very inviting to the indolence of the mob of gentlemen who see
+the romance of a noble principle, not its utility. When a man looks
+at everything through this dwarfing philosophy, everything has a great
+modicum of humbug. You laugh with him when he derides the humbug in
+religion, the humbug in politics, the humbug in love, the humbug in the
+plausibilities of the world; but you may cry, my dear pupils, when he
+derides what is often the safest of all practically to deride,--the
+humbug in common honesty! Men are honest from religion, wisdom,
+prejudice, habit, fear, and stupidity; but the few only are wise; and
+the persons we speak of deride religion, are beyond prejudice, unawed by
+habit, too indifferent for fear, and too experienced for stupidity.
+
+                 POPULAR WRATH AT INDIVIDUAL IMPRUDENCE.
+
+You must know, my dear young friends, that while the appearance of
+magnanimity is very becoming to you, and so forth, it will get you
+a great deal of ill-will if you attempt to practise it to your own
+detriment. Your neighbours are so invariably, though perhaps insensibly,
+actuated by self-interest--self-interest--[Mr. Tomlinson is wrong
+here; but his ethics were too much narrowed to Utilitarian
+principles.--EDITOR.]--is so entirely, though every twaddler denies
+it, the axis of the moral world--that they fly into a rage with him who
+seems to disregard it. When a man ruins himself, just hear the abuse he
+receives; his neighbours take it as a personal affront!
+
+                            DUM DEFLUAT AMNIS.
+
+One main reason why men who have been great are disappointed, when
+they retire to private life, is this: Memory makes a chief source of
+enjoyment to those who cease eagerly to hope; but the memory of the
+great recalls only that public life which has disgusted them. Their
+private life hath slipped insensibly away, leaving faint traces of the
+sorrow or the joy which found them too busy to heed the simple and quiet
+impressions of mere domestic vicissitude.
+
+                             SELF-GLORIFIERS.
+
+Providence seems to have done to a certain set of persons--who always
+view their own things through a magnifying medium, deem their house
+the best in the world, their gun the truest, their very pointer a
+miracle--as Colonel Hanger suggested to economists to do; namely,
+provide their servants each with a pair of large spectacles, so that a
+lark might appear as big as a fowl, and a twopenny loaf as large as a
+quartern.
+
+                           THOUGHT ON FORTUNE.
+
+It is often the easiest move that completes the game. Fortune is like
+the lady whom a lover carried off from all his rivals by putting an
+additional lace upon his liveries.
+
+                              WIT AND TRUTH.
+
+People may talk about fiction being the source of fancy, and wit being
+at variance with truth. Now, some of the wittiest things in the world
+are witty solely from their truth. Truth is the soul of a good saying.
+"You assert," observes the Socrates of modern times, "that we have a
+virtual representation; very well, let us have a virtual taxation too!"
+Here the wit is in the fidelity of the sequitur. When Columbus broke the
+egg, where was the wit? In the completeness of conviction in the broken
+egg.
+
+                              AUTO-THEOLOGY.
+
+Not only every sect but every individual modifies the general attributes
+of the Deity towards assimilation with his own character: the just man
+dwells on the justice, the stern upon the wrath; the attributes that do
+not please the worshipper he insensibly forgets. Wherefore, O my pupils,
+you will not smile when you read in Barnes that the pygmies declared
+Jove himself was a pygmy. The pious vanity of man makes him adore his
+own qualities under the pretence of worshipping those of his God.
+
+                          GLORIOUS CONSTITUTION.
+
+A sentence is sometimes as good as a volume. If a man ask you to give
+him some idea of the laws of England, the answer is short and easy: In
+the laws of England there are somewhere about one hundred and fifty laws
+by which a poor man may be hanged, but not one by which he can obtain
+justice for nothing!
+
+                    ANSWER TO THE POPULAR CANT THAT
+                      GOODNESS IN A STATESMAN IS
+                          BETTER THAN ABILITY.
+
+As in the world we must look to actions, not motives, so a knave is the
+man who injures you; and you do not inquire whether the injury be the
+fruit of malice or necessity. Place, then, a fool in power, and he
+becomes unconsciously the knave. Mr. Addington stumbled on the two very
+worst and most villanous taxes human malice could have invented,--one on
+medicines, the other on justice. What tyrant's fearful ingenuity could
+afflict us more than by impeding at once redress for our wrongs, and
+cure for our diseases? Mr. Addington was the fool in se, and therefore
+the knave in office; but, bless you! he never meant it!
+
+                              COMMON-SENSE.
+
+Common-sense,--common-sense,--of all phrases, all catchwords, this is
+often the most deceitful and the most dangerous. Look, in especial,
+suspiciously upon common-sense whenever it is opposed to discovery.
+Common-sense is the experience of every day. Discovery is something
+against the experience of every day. No wonder, then, that when Galileo
+proclaimed a great truth, the universal cry was, "Pshaw! common-sense
+will tell you the reverse." Talk to a sensible man for the first time on
+the theory of vision, and hear what his common-sense will say to it. In
+a letter in the time of Bacon, the writer, of no mean intellect himself,
+says: "It is a pity the chancellor should set his opinion against the
+experience of so many centuries and the dictates of common-sense."
+Common-sense, then, so useful in household matters, is less useful in
+the legislative and in the scientific world than it has been generally
+deemed. Naturally, the advocate for what has been tried, and averse
+to what is speculative, it opposes the new philosophy that appeals to
+reason, and clings to the old which is propped by sanction.
+
+                        LOVE, AND WRITERS ON LOVE.
+
+My warm, hot-headed, ardent young friends, ye are in the flower of your
+life, and writing verses about love,--let us say a word on the
+subject. There are two species of love common to all men and to most
+animals,--[Most animals; for some appear insensible to the love of
+custom]--one springs from the senses, the other grows out of custom.
+Now, neither of these, my dear young friends, is the love that you
+pretend to feel,--the love of lovers. Your passion, having only its
+foundation (and that unacknowledged) in the senses, owes everything else
+to the imagination. Now, the imagination of the majority is different
+in complexion and degree in every country and in every age; so also, and
+consequently, is the love of the imagination. As a proof, observe that
+you sympathize with the romantic love of other times or nations only
+in proportion as you sympathize with their poetry and imaginative
+literature. The love which stalks through the "Arcadia" or "Amadis
+of Gaul" is to the great bulk of readers coldly insipid or solemnly
+ridiculous. Alas! when those works excited enthusiasm, so did the love
+which they describe. The long speeches, the icy compliments, expressed
+the feeling of the day. The love madrigals of the time of Shenstone,
+or the brocade gallantries of the French poets in the last century, any
+woman now would consider hollow or childish, imbecile or artificial.
+Once the songs were natural, and the love seductive. And now, my young
+friends, in the year 1822, in which I write, and shall probably die, the
+love which glitters through Moore, and walks so ambitiously ambiguous
+through the verse of Byron; the love which you consider now so deep and
+so true; the love which tingles through the hearts of your young ladies,
+and sets you young gentlemen gazing on the evening star,--all that love
+too will become unfamiliar or ridiculous to an after age; and the young
+aspirings and the moonlight dreams and the vague fiddle-de-dees which
+ye now think so touching and so sublime will go, my dear boys, where
+Cowley's Mistress and Waller's Sacharissa have gone before,--go with the
+Sapphos and the Chloes, the elegant "charming fairs," and the chivalric
+"most beauteous princesses!" The only love-poetry that stands through
+all time and appeals to all hearts is that which is founded on either
+or both the species of love natural to all men,--the love of the senses,
+and the love of custom. In the latter is included what middle-aged men
+call the rational attachment, the charm of congenial minds, as well
+as the homely and warmer accumulation of little memories of simple
+kindness, or the mere brute habitude of seeing a face as one would see
+a chair. These, sometimes singly, sometimes skilfully blended, make the
+theme of those who have perhaps loved the most honestly and the most
+humanly; these yet render Tibullus pathetic, and Ovid a master over
+tender affections; and these, above all, make that irresistible and
+all-touching inspiration which subdues the romantic, the calculating,
+the old, the young, the courtier, the peasant, the poet, the man of
+business, in the glorious love-poetry of Robert Burns.
+
+                           THE GREAT ENTAILED.
+
+The great inheritance of man is a commonwealth of blunders. One race
+spend their lives in botching the errors transmitted to them by another;
+and the main cause of all political, that is, all the worst and most
+general, blunders is this,--the same rule we apply to individual cases
+we will not apply to public. All men consent that swindling for a horse
+is swindling,--they punish the culprit and condemn the fault. But in a
+State there is no such unanimity. Swindling, Lord help you! is called
+by some fine name; and cheating grows grandiloquent, and styles itself
+"Policy." In consequence of this there is always a battle between those
+who call things by their right names and those who pertinaciously
+give them the wrong ones. Hence all sorts of confusion. This confusion
+extends very soon to the laws made for individual cases; and thus in
+old States, though the world is still agreed that private swindling is
+private swindling, there is the Devil's own difficulty in punishing the
+swindling of the public. The art of swindling now is a different thing
+to the art of swindling a hundred years ago; but the laws remain the
+same. Adaptation in private cases is innovation in public; so, without
+repealing old laws, they make new. Sometimes these are effectual, but
+more often not. Now, my beloved pupils, a law is a gun which if it
+misses a pigeon always kills a crow; if it does not strike the guilty,
+it hits some one else. As every crime creates a law, so in turn every
+law creates a crime; and hence we go on multiplying sins and evils, and
+faults and blunders, till society becomes the organized disorder for
+picking pockets.
+
+                       THE REGENERATION OF A KNAVE.
+
+A man who begins the world by being a fool often ends it by becoming
+a knave; but he who begins as a knave, if he be a rich man (and so not
+hanged), may end, my beloved pupils, in being a pious creature. And this
+is the wherefore: "a knave early" soon gets knowledge of the world. One
+vice worn out makes us wiser than fifty tutors. But wisdom causes us to
+love quiet, and in quiet we do not sin. He who is wise and sins not can
+scarcely fail of doing good; for let him but utter a new truth, and even
+his imagination cannot conceive the limit of the good he may have done
+to man!
+
+                                  STYLE.
+
+Do you well understand what a wonderful thing style is? I think not; for
+in the exercises you sent me, your styles betrayed that no very earnest
+consideration had been lavished upon them. Know, then, that you must
+pause well before you take up any model of style. On your style often
+depends your own character,--almost always the character given you by
+the world. If you adopt the lofty style,--if you string together noble
+phrases and swelling Sonora,--you have expressed, avowed, a frame of
+mind which you will insensibly desire to act up to; the desire gradually
+begets the capacity. The life of Dr. Parr is Dr. Parr's style put in
+action; and Lord Byron makes himself through existence unhappy for
+having accidentally slipped into a melancholy current of words. But
+suppose you escape this calamity by a peculiar hardihood of temperament,
+you escape not the stamp of popular opinion. Addison must ever be held
+by the vulgar the most amiable of men, because of the social amenity of
+his diction; and the admirers of language will always consider Burke a
+nobler spirit than Fox, because of the grandeur of his sentences. How
+many wise sayings have been called jests because they were wittily
+uttered! How many nothings swelled their author into a sage, ay,
+a saint, because they were strung together by the old hypocrite
+nun,--Gravity!
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Paul Clifford, Complete, by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
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