into which she shrouded herself so anxiously, that her fine proportions were developed every where. She was dressed in a peignoir white as snow. Her auburn hair escaped luxuriantly from a madras, ingeniously wound round her head a la Creole-(by the bye, I once kept a large assortment of French goods). The halfopen door presented a coup d'œil for which a painter would have given a world. The bed was thrown into the most picturesque confusion. Her dreams must have been very violent-a snowy pillow lay at the foot; the blue silken coverlet, garnished with white lace, was half flung on the carpet. Behind one of the lionjaws carved into the foot of the acajou bed, lay a white satin shoe; another straggled farther off. Over a gilded chair dangled a robe crumpled into shapelessness; stockings, which a breath might have wafted away, were slung round a screen; flowers, bracelets, gloves, garters, and girdles, were strewed all over the room. She must have hurried to bed without the attendance of her maid; all was luxury and disorder. A vague, voluptuous odour pervaded the apartment. As these vanities lay scattered before me, I could not restrain a smile of pity. In their proper places they might have driven a dozen of men into delirium; here they gave strong indications of passion-of reckless passion, with misery and shame, scorn and utter desolation, close on the heels-nay they lurked already beneath the bronzed eyelids of her ladyship. She was an exquisite piece of workmanship-the very image of passion-wild, overpowering, restless, careering on to destruction." The man cast a feverish glance at me. "Her eyes sparkled with a sleepy fire-she resembled one of the Herodiades, whom we owe to Leonardo da Vinci-(I have dealt in pictures too). Yes, a powerful woman she was; a matured form of beauty, with a tropical haze around her-nothing meanall noble, her colour, her traits, her very paleness lighted up here and there by red streaks; they all showed fire and love; and yet she seemed stronger even than love. She made a deep impression on me. My heart beat almost. It is long since it beat last. I was already paid; for what are two hundred pounds for a sensation?-a sensation which recalls our sweetest hours before expiring phantasy! "Mr Lomond,' she said, 'will you please to take a chair? Will you be so good as to wait?' "Till to-morrow noon, Madam,' I answered, folding up the bill which I had presented to her; till to-morrow noon; then we shall see further.' "My glance must have told her what was passing within me. Pshaw! thought I, pay for thy luxury-pay for thy happiness, thy dissipation, the monopoly which thou exercisest.-For the hapless wretch whom thy fastidious eye scorns to look upon, there is Bowstreet, and Newgate, and its juries and judges, and the gallows; but thou who reposest on silk and lace, for thee are the scorpions of shame, and the world's sneer and contempt. "A protest!' said the beautiful woman; Mr Lomond, you cannot be so cruel-so utterly-Mr Lomond!'. "Her words were interrupted by a rap at the door. "Not at present! not at present!' ejaculated she; I am engaged; I am not at leisure,' she added imperiously. "Caroline! I must see you,' said a manly voice. "Impossible, my dear!' returned she in a softer, but still very positive tone. "You are not in earnest? Who is it whom you talk with?" and with these words the door opened, and a middle-aged gentleman walked in. The lady cast a beseeching glance at me. I understood it.-She was my slave. Ah! there was a time when I would have been fool enough, not to protest. "Who is this man?' asked the baronet, measuring me from head to foot. began to darken. She hesitated-she advanced. "The baronet cast another glance at me, and then turned towards the window. The bill was still in my grasp, gaping most unmercifully at the beauty. At this direful sight she hurried towards me, and, with a broken whisper, pressed a diamond into my hand. Take it and go.-Go, for heaven's sake!' "I glanced at the jewel, slipped the bill between the fingers of her ladyship, and turned away. "The diamond was worth full three hundred. When I descended I found two brilliant carriages for her ladyship; a couple of liveried loungers brushed their coats, a third stood gaping and laughing. Ah, look! said I to myself, what leads these people to my poor house; what brings the Duke and the Marquis, the Earl and the Viscount before my door in the shape of supplicants; what makes them lose hundreds of thousands, and brings women to betray their husbands, men their country and themselves? They must live in style and extravagance!-just as I was thus meditating, there arrived in his elegant tilbury, the young man who had transferred the bill to me. 66 6 Sir,' I said, as he alighted, here is one hundred pounds. You will be so good as to deliver it into the hands of her ladyship, and you will at the same time be pleased to tell her, that I shall keep the diamond at her disposal until next Wednesday at two o'clock, should she be inclined to redeem the pledge." "The youth took the hundred pound note, a sardonic smile playing over his countenance. "Ah! she has paid then, has she? All the better.' "This smile, these words, they said every thing. Her ladyship was already perdita! "And now I passed to the mansion of his Grace of ; half a dozen of gold-laced servants marshalled my way, and I entered the sanctuarium of the Duke. Every thing sumptuous, but stern, like the possessor; yet dissipation was gleaming through. "His Grace kept his seat, and presented me with a cheque on -on- -No, I cannot mention it! but the cheque While his keen eye rested on me, I remained, to all appearance, cold and indifferent. "You understand me, Mr Lomond? I shall you soon again.' He put his finger on his lips. silent?" perhaps want Can you be "I knew where the wind blew from. I knew what had passed -what was to come. The high and mighty heads across the channel have some interest in "the Question" at issue-A great interest. They, too, club their share, and is the instru ment. Part of it might surely go to the conveyancer to discharge some trifling debts of honour-trifles of ten or twenty thousand." "Mr Lomond !" said I, in amazement The man continued." His Grace was in my power-is still in my power, this cheque must bear interest for every hour. I am offered by the banker four thousand already.-Do you understand now, young man, why I mused ?" My landlord paused, laid his green spectacles on the table, his ghastly countenance expanded, his reddish eyes hung with a chilling glare upon me. "Do you now understand my pleasures?" said he, with a rising voice-the first time I had heard him raisc his voice. "Do you reckon it nothing, to penetrate into the innermost recesses of the human heart, to read the crooked counsels of statesmen, to lay bare the most hidden folds of society, to have placed before one's eyes the life of the proudest-born, of the brave, the crafty, and the beautiful, in utter nakedness and in utter helplessness. These scenes, ever shifting, every varying, in a thousand and a thousand ways; those hideous gamblings, those despairing joys and bootless ravings, which lead to the scaffold, those hysteric laughs of despair, those frantic festivals of dissipation green and grey. Now a father, who cuts his throat because he can no longer endure the cries of his starving children; again, a woman who offers the very jewel for which she has bartered name and happiness. O, these actors! these inimitable actors! Here Garrick, and Kean, and Kemble might have studied; but their art is lost on me. Often, indeed, a love-sick girl, an old merchant, a starving worthy mechanic, or a mother who panted to conceal the scandal of a beloved child-a noble lord on the brink of ruin-often have they made my hair stand erect like the mane of a frightened horse; but now I can look at these scenes, I can, young man; nothing now deceives me; nothing will. I can pierce the heart through; and what do I want? I possess every thing. I may buy ministers and consciences; that is in my power. The fairest women are rushing upon their knees before me. Here, young man, here in this room," said the withered usurer, "here have paid me homage, beauties, to delineate whose charms would outstrip the artist's skill. But I stand immoveable in my scorn, for I am past this frenzy; and I revenge myself on mankind who spurned and buffetted me while I was young and vigorous, but helpless and pennyless, and with no house to shelter, no friend to console me. I have tasted and am satiated. I am one of forty, who are the silent, the mute, the unknown kings of this country, the arbiters of life-for gold is life. Forty we are, bound together by the same ties, the same interests, though not the same motives. Once every week we assemble and compare notes, reveal the mysteries of finance, and of existence; no fortune, no condition escapes our view. We hold the secrets of every family from the highest to the lowest. In our black book there are notes as terrible to man and woman as those in the book of judgment. Public credit and private happiness, the safety of the bank, and the stability of commerce, depend ten times in the year upon us. What is your secret police? It is we who analyse, who anatomise the world and its We love money; we love it, but we love power still more, and money power. Yes, yes, it is value. "Here," said the little grey man, pointing round his comfortless walls; "here, within these dingy naked walls; here the lofty hero, who has fought and won battles by dozens, becomes humble as the sinner, who is on the eve of being launched into eternity; here the most enraptured lover, whom a word from the lips of his divinity would drive mad, here he will beg with folded hands; here prays the merchant, who never acknowledged the name of his Creator; here she bends low-low, before whom the stateliest noble would kiss the dust. Here the artist and mechanic, the farmer and the landlord, learn to unite in prayer. Here," added he, drawing his hand over his brow, "is the scale in which the destiny of thousands, of London itself, is balanced. Do you then believe that I have no rejoicing, no pleasure, no poetry, under this cold and shrivelled mask? that there beats no feeling under these blasted muscles?" He laid his hand on my shoulder, and rivetted his eye once more upon me. "Yes, you shall hear more-yes-" and so saying he turned and retreated to his bed-room. me into a frightful monster. I arose, and staggered towards the door almost stupified. I tottered down stairs. The little grey man had swollen up before He had changed into a fantastic He was the incarnate representative of the archExistence, man, and beauty, looked hideous in my eyes; for all, all appeared subservient to his infernal power. horrible being. demon. SONNETS. CHLOE, that name was transport to my ear, Like thought-wing'd accents from the caves of hell, YOUTH's fairy-land recedes, and year by year Takes from us, with the relish, the regret The early past appears, and all between Fades traceless from remembrance.-It is not, As some might deem, a mockery in our lot That thus we change just e'er death close the scene. Where more than youthful joy will unto man be giv'n. U S. B. |