I emptied the bottle of rum, but I was not drunk. When I went to bed I

was as sober as I am at this moment. I did not go to bed to sleep. My

senses were in a strange ferment. The roof of my head seemed to open

and shut, and I fancied I could hear the seething of my brain below. I

presently fell into a kind of stupor.

It was past midnight when I recovered from this swoon, and I started

from the bed to my feet. Something had been whispering in my ear, and I

listened for a moment in hideous expectation that the words--for I did

hear words--would be repeated; but all was silent. I struck a light,

and after a time became more composed. Even the furniture of the room

was company to me. Before morning I had shaped my plan of revenge, and

it was in accordance with the words that had been spoken to me. Oh, my

God! what weak creatures we are! This fantasy possessed, pervaded me;

it did not grow,--it did not increase from day to day,--it came, and it

overcame me.

I returned the next morning to Bromley's house, and requested to see

Steiner. I apologised to him for the words I had used on the previous

day, and requested to be permitted to remain in my situation, if Mr.

Bromley would consent to it, until I could turn myself round; and I

hoped, in the mean time, that what had taken place would be overlooked

and forgotten. Steiner received me with a kind of civil arrogance, and

went to confer with his partner. They presently returned together, and

my request, after an admonitory lecture, rather confusedly delivered,

from Bromley, was acceded to; Steiner warning me at the same time to

conduct myself with more humility for the future, under pain of similar

punishment.

I did do so, and for six months nothing could exceed the attention

I paid to business, the zeal I evinced upon every occasion, the

forbearance I exercised under every provocation. And I had need of

forbearance. Bromley had been entirely perverted by his son-in-law;

and the kind old man of former years was changed into a morose and

almost brutal blackguard--to me,--only to me. Mrs. Steiner had likewise

suffered the influence of her husband to undermine, and for the time

to destroy her better feelings; and she treated me upon all occasions,

not merely with marked coldness, but with positive insult. I need

hardly say that Steiner enjoyed almost to satiety the advantage he had

gained over me. Even the very servants of the house took the cue from

their superiors, and looked upon me with contempt and disdain. The

little boy alone, who had received express commands never to speak to

me, sometimes found his way into the shop, and as he clung round my

neck, and bestowed unasked kisses upon my cheek, my hatred of the rest

swelled in my bosom almost to bursting.

The persecution I endured thus long was intense torment to me; the

reader, whoever he may be, will probably think so. He will be mistaken.

It was a source of inconceivable, of exquisite pleasure. It was a

justification to me; it almost made the delay of my vengeance appear

sinful.

It was now the 22nd of December 1808. I cannot refrain from recording

the date. Steiner had been during the last six weeks at Antwerp, and

was expected to return in a day or two. He had purchased at a sale

in that city a great quantity of pictures, which had just arrived,

and were now in the shop. They were severally of no great value, but

the purchase had brought Bromley's account at the banker's to a very

low ebb. Mrs. Steiner and the child were going to spend the Christmas

holidays with some relatives residing at Canterbury. She passed through

the shop silently and without even noticing me, and hurried the boy

along lest he should wish--and he did make an effort to do so--to take

his farewell of me. It was evening at the time, and Bromley was in his

back parlour. I was busy in the shop that evening; it was business of

my own, which I transacted secretly. Having completed it, I did what

was rather unusual with me; I opened the door of the parlour, and bade

Bromley good night.

All that evening I hovered about the neighbourhood. I had not

resolution to go from it. Now that the time was come when I should be

enabled, in all human probability, to fulfil, to glut my vengeance, my

heart failed me. The feeling which had supported me during the last six

months, which had been more necessary to my soul than daily sustenance

to my body, had deserted me then, but that by a powerful effort I

contrived to retain it. While I deplored having returned to Bromley's

employment, and the abject apology I had made to Steiner, that very

step and its consequences made it impossible for me to recede. It must

be. It was my fate to do it, and it was theirs that it should be done.

What trivial incidents cling to the memory sometimes, when they are

linked by association to greater events! I was, I remember standing

at the door of a small chandler's shop in Dean-street, almost lost to

myself, and to all that was passing about me.

The woman of the house tapped me on the shoulder.

"Will you be so good," she said, "as to move on; you are preventing my

customers from entering the shop."

"My good woman," I said, "I hope there is no harm in my standing here?"

"Not much harm," replied the woman, good-humouredly. "I hope you have

been doing nothing worse to-day?"

I started, and gazed at the woman earnestly. She smiled.

"Why, bless the man! you look quite flurried. I haven't offended you, I

hope?"

"No, no!" I muttered hastily, and moved away. The agony I endured for

the next hour I cannot describe.

I passed Bromley's house several times from the hour of nine till

half-past. All was silent, all still. What if my design should not take

effect! I almost hoped that it would not; and yet the boy who cleaned

out the shop must inevitably discover it in the morning. I trembled at

the contemplation of that, and my limbs were overspread with a clammy

dew. It was too late to make a pretext of business in the shop at that

time of night. Bromley was at home, and might, nay would, suspect me.

I resolved to be on the premises the first thing in the morning, and

retired in a state of mind to which no subsequent occurrence of my life

was ever capable of reducing me.

It was about half-past eleven o'clock, or nearer to twelve, that the

landlord of the Green Man, in Oxford-street, entered the parlour where

I was sitting, gazing listlessly upon two men who were playing a game

at dominos.

"There is a dreadful fire," said he, "somewhere on the other side of

the street;--in Berwick or Wardour-street, I think."

I sprang to my feet, and rushed out of the house, and, turning into

Hanway-yard, ran down Tottenham-court road, crossed the fields, (they

are now built upon,) and never stopped till I reached Pancras Church.

As I leaned against the wall of the churchyard some men came along.

"Don't you see the fire, master?" said one, as they passed me.

Then, for the first time, I did see the fire, tingeing the clouds

with a lurid and dusky red, and at intervals casting a shower of

broken flame into the air, which expanded itself in wide-spreading

scintillations.

God of Heaven! what had I done? Why was I here? I lived in the

neighbourhood of Bromley's house, and they would be sending for me. The

landlord, too, would afterwards remember having seen me in his parlour,

and informing me of the fire in the neighbourhood, and I should be

discovered. These thoughts were the duration of a moment, but they

decided me. I ran back again in a frenzy of remorse and terror, and in

a few minutes was in Wardour-street.

The tumult and confusion were at their height. The noise of the

engines, the outcries of the firemen, the uproar of the crowd, faintly

shadowed forth the tumult in my mind at that moment. I made my way

through the dense mass in advance of me, and at length reached the

house.

Bromley had just issued from it, and was wringing his hands, and

stamping his naked feet upon the pavement. He recognised me, and seized

me wildly by the arms.

"Oh! my good God! Gibson," said he, "my child!"

"What child--what child?" cried I, eagerly.

"Mine--mine! and the infant! they are in there!"

"They are gone out of town; don't you remember?" I thought the sudden

fright had deprived him of his senses.

"No, no, no! they were too late! the coach was gone!"

With a loud scream I dashed the old man from me, and flew to the door,

which was open. I made my way through the stifling smoke that seemed

almost to block up the passage, and sprang up stairs. The bed-room door

was locked. With a violent effort I wrenched off the lock, and rushed

into the room.

All was darkness; but presently a huge tongue of flame swept through

the doorway, and, running up the wall, expanded upon the ceiling;

and then I saw a figure in white darting about the room with angular

dodgings like a terrified bird in a cage.

"Where is the child?" I exclaimed, in a voice of frenzy.

Mrs. Steiner knew me, and ran towards me, clasping me with both arms.

She shook her head wildly, and pointed she knew not where.

"Here, Gibson,--here," cried the child, who had recognised my voice.

I threw off my coat immediately, and, seizing the boy, wrapt him

closely in it.

"This way, madam,--this way; at once, for Heaven's sake!" and I dragged

her to the landing.

There was hell about me then! The flames, the smoke, the fire, the

howlings; it was a living hell! But there was a shriek at that

moment! Mrs. Steiner had left my side. Gracious Heavens! she had been

precipitated below! A sickness came upon me then,--a sensation of being

turned sharply round by some invisible power; and, with the child

tightly clasped in my arms, I was thrown violently forward into the

flames, that seemed howling and yearning to devour me.

MASCALBRUNI.

I have frequently observed that there are some people who haunt you

in all parts of the world, and to whom you have a sort of secret

antipathy, yet who, by an attraction in spite of repulsion, are

continually crossing your path, as though they were sent as emissaries

to link themselves with your destiny, or on the watch mysteriously to

bring it about. One person in particular, whose name I do not even

know, if he has one, I have met fifty times in as many different

places, and we each say to ourselves, "'Tis he!--what, again!" So with

a personage too well known at home and abroad, of whom, by a curious

concatenation of circumstances, I am enabled to become the biographer.

Geronymo Mascalbruni was the son of a pauper belonging to a village

whose name I forget, in the marshes of Ancona. He had begged his way

when a boy to Rome, and supported himself for some time there, by

attending at the doors of the courts of justice, and running on errands

for the advocates or the suitors. His intelligence and adroitness did

not escape the observation of one of the attorneys, who, wanting a lad

of all work, took Mascalbruni into his service, and taught him to read

and write; finding him useful in his office, and having no children of

his own, he at length adopted him, _in formâ pauperis_, and gave him

a small share in his business. This man of the law did not bear the

most exemplary of characters, and perhaps it was in order to conceal

some nefarious practices to which Mascalbruni was privy that he made

the clerk his associate. Perhaps also he discovered in his character a

hardihood, combined with cunning and chicanery, that made him a ready

instrument for his purposes, and thus enabled him, like Teucer, to

fight behind the shield of another. Under this worthy master--a worthy

disciple--Mascalbruni continued for some years; till at length, tired

of confinement to the desk, and having the taste early acquired for a

roving and profligate life revived, he, during his old benefactor's

confinement to his bed with a rheumatic attack, administered to him a

dose of poison instead of medicine, and having robbed him of all the

money and plate that was portable, and of certain _coupons_, and _bons_

in the Neapolitan and other funds, standing in his name, he decamped,

and reached Florence in safety.

Every one has heard of the laxity of the Roman police. The impunity

of offenders, even when their crimes are established by incontestable

proof, is notorious. The relations of the lawyer, contrary to all their

expectations, (for he had never recognised them,) had come into their

inheritance, and little regarded the means, having attained the end.

They perhaps, also, from having had no admission into the house during

the old miser's life, were ignorant of the strength of his coffers;

and the disappearance of the murderer, who, by a will which they

discovered and burnt, had been made his sole heir, was by them deemed

too fortunate a circumstance; so that they neither inquired into the

manner of his death, nor had any _post mortem_ examination of the body.

They gave their respectable relative a splendid funeral, erected to his

memory a tomb in one of the rival churches that front the Piazza del

Popolo, in which his many virtues were not forgotten, and established

an annual mass for his _povera anima_, that no doubt saved him

"From many a peck of purgatorial coals."

Having quietly inurned the master, let us follow the man. The sum

which he carried with him is not exactly known, but it must have been

considerable. His stay in the Tuscan state was short, and we find

him with his ill-gotten wealth in "that common sewer of London and

of Rome," Paris. He was then about twenty years of age, had a good

person, talents, an insinuating address, and a sufficient knowledge

of the world, at least of the worst part of mankind, to avoid sinking

in that quagmire, which has swallowed up so many of the thoughtless

and inexperienced who have trusted to its flattering surface. In fact,

Nature seemed to have gifted him with the elements of an accomplished

sharper, and he seconded her attributes by all the resources of art.

He took an apartment in the Rue Neuve de Luxembourg, that street so

admirably situated between the Boulevards and the Gardens of the

Tuileries, and had engraven on his cards, "Il Marchese Mascalbruni." He

was attached to his name; it was a good, sonorous, well-sounding name;

and the addition of Marchese dovetailed well, and seemed as though it

had always, or ought always, to have belonged to it.

But before he made his _entrée_ in the world of Paris, he was aware

that he had much to learn; and, with the tact and nice sense of

observation and _disinvoltura nel maneggiar_ peculiar to his nature, he

soon set about accomplishing himself in the externals of a gentleman.

With this view he passed several hours a day in the _salle d'armes_,

where he made himself a first-rate fencer; and became so dexterous _au

tir_, that he could at the extremity of the gallery hit the bull's-eye

of the target at almost every other shot.

Pushkin himself was not more dexterous; and, like him, our hero in the

course of his career signalised himself by several rencontres which

proved fatal to his antagonists, into the details of but one of which

I shall enter. He heard that nothing gives a young man greater _éclat_

at starting into society than a duel. Among those who frequented

the _salle_ was an old officer who had served in the campaigns of

Napoleon, one of the _reliquiæ Danaum_, the few survivors of Moscow;

for those who did not perish on the road, mostly fell victims to the

congelations and fatigues of that memorable retreat. Mascalbruni,

now a match for the _maître d'armes_, frequently exercised with this

old _grognard_, who had the character of being a _crane_, if not a

_bourreau des cranes_;[12] and one day, before a numerous _gallerie_,

having struck the foil out of his hand, the fencer so far forgot

himself, in the shame and vexation of defeat by a youngster, as to pick

up the weapon and strike the Italian a blow on the shoulders with the

flat part of the foil, if it be not an Irishism so to call it. Those

who saw Mascalbruni at that moment would not have forgotten the traits

of his countenance. His eyes flashed with a sombre fire; his Moorish

complexion assumed a darker hue, as the blood rushed from his heart to

his brain in an almost suffocating tide; his breath came forth in long

and audible expirations; his features were convulsed with the rage

of a demoniac. I only describe what Horace Verney, who was present,

faithfully sketched from memory after the scene. Mascalbruni, tearing

off the button of his foil, vociferated, putting himself in position,

"_A la mort, à la mort!_" The lookers-on were panic-stricken; but the

silence was interrupted by the clinking of the steel. The aggressor

soon lay stretched in the agonies of death.

Though he had now taken his first degree, Mascalbruni's education

was not yet complete. He had made himself master of French, so as to

speak it almost without any of the accent of a foreigner; and having a

magnificent voice, he added to it all the science that one of his own

countrymen could supply, and became in the end a finished musician and

vocalist.

Such was the course of his studies; and now, with all the _préstige_ of

his singular _affaire_ to give him _éclat_, the Marchese Mascalbruni

made his _début_. By way of recreation, he had frequently gone into

the gambling-houses of the Palais Royal, and had been much struck with

these words, almost obliterated, on the walls of one of them, "_Tutus

veni, tutus abi._" Mascalbruni was determined to profit by the advice,

and to confirm its truth by one solitary exception--to come and depart

in safety, or rather a winner.

Mascalbruni invented a theory of his own, that has since been practised

by several of the _habitués_ of the hells, particularly by a man

denominated, in the _maisons de jeu_, L'Avocat. He won such enormous

sums of the bank, that, on his return to his lodgings one night, he was

assassinated, not without suspicion that he fell by the hands of some

kind bravo of the company. _Chi lo sa?_ But to revert to Mascalbruni.

_Impares numeri_ are said to be fortunate: strange to say, the number

three is the most so. Three was a mystic number. The triangle was

sacred to the Hindoos and Egyptians. There were three Graces, three

Furies, three Fates. He played a martingale of one, three, seven,

fifteen, &c. on triple numbers, _i. e._ after three of a colour, either

red or black, had come up, and not till then, he played, and opposed

its going a fourth; thus rendering it necessary that there should be

twelve or thirteen successive _coups_ of four, _et sequentia_, without

the intervention of a three. The gain, it is true, could not be great,

for he began with a five-franc piece: but it seemed sure; and so he

found it, making a daily profit of three or four louis in as many hours.

I have gone into this dry subject to show the character of the man, and

his imperturbable _sang-froid_. He did not, however, confine himself to

_rouge et noir_, but soon learned all the niceties of that scientific

game _écarté_. In addition to _sauter le coup_, which he practised with

an invisible dexterity, he used to file the ends of the fingers of

his right hand, so that he could feel the court-cards, which, having

a thicker coat of paint, are thus made easily sensible to the touch;

and would extract from each pack one or two, the knowledge of whose

non-existence was no slight advantage in discarding. He did not long

wait for associates in his art. There was formed at that time a club

in the Rue Richelieu on the principle of some of the English clubs,

it being entirely managed by a committee. Of this he became a member,

and afterwards got an introduction at the _salon_. Most of the English

at Paris joined this circle; and it was broken up in consequence of

the discovery of manœuvres and sleights of hand such as I have

described, but not until Mascalbruni had contrived to bear away a more

than equal share of the plunder. The English, of course, were the great

sufferers.

He now turned his face towards the Channel, and opened the campaign

in London on a much more extensive scale. He took up his quarters at

Higginbottom's hotel in the same year that young Napoleon came to

England, and only left it when it was given up to that lamented and

accomplished prince. It is not generally known that he ever visited

England. His sojourn in the capital was kept a profound secret. The

master of the hotel and all his servants took an oath of secrecy;

and Prince Esterhazy and the members of the Austrian embassy were

not likely to betray it. The prince passed a week with George the

Fourth at the Cottage at Windsor, and afterwards assisted at a

concert at the Hanover Square rooms, himself leading a concert on

the piano. This by the bye. Mascalbruni on that occasion attracted

all eyes, and fascinated all ears, and was greeted after a solo with

the loudest plaudits. He had now become the fashion, and, having

forged a letter from one of the cardinals at Rome to a patroness of

Almacks, obtained the _entrée_, and made one of the three hundred that

compose the world of London. You know, however, in this world that

there is another world--orb within orb--an _imperium in imperio_--the

Exclusives. It is difficult to define what the qualifications for an

exclusive are: it is not rank, connexion, talents, virtues, grace,

elegance, accomplishments. No. But I shall not attempt to explain the

inexplicable. Certain it is, however, that our hero was admitted into

the _coteries_ of this caste, as distinct--as much separated by a line

of demarcation drawn round them from the rest--as the Rajhpoot is from

the Raiot, who sprang, one from the head, the other from the heels of

Brahma.

It was on the daughter of one of these extra-exclusives that

Mascalbruni cast his eye. He flew at high game. The Honourable Miss M.

was the belle of the season. I remember seeing her the year before at a

fancy ball. A quadrille had been got up, for which were selected twelve

of the most beautiful girls to represent the twelve Seasons. Louisa

was May, and excelled the rest, (I do not speak of the present year,)

as much as that season of flowers does the other months. It was an

'incarnation of May!'--a metaphor of Spring, and Youth, and Morning!--a

rose-bud just opening its young leaves, that brings the swiftest

thought of beauty, though words cannot embody it:--a sylph borne by a

breath, a zephyr, as in the celebrated Hebe of John of Bologna, may

make intelligible the lightness of her step,--the ethereal grace of her

form. She was a nymph of Canova, without her affectation. Hers was the

poetry of motion,--

"It was the soul, which from so fair a frame

Look'd forth, and told us 'twas from heaven it came,"--

that would have been the despair of sculpture or poetry. I have never

seen but one who might compare with her, and she was engulfed that same

year in the waters of the inexorable Tiber,--Rosa Bathurst.[13]

Louisa M. was the only daughter of an Irish bishop. His see was one of

the most valuable in the sister island; and some idea may be formed

of his accumulated wealth, by the circumstance of his having received

thirty thousand pounds in one year by fines on the renewal of leases.

He had one son, then on a Continental tour with his tutor; but having

no entailed estates, and his fortune consisting of ready money, Louisa

was probably one of the _meilleures parties_ in the three kingdoms.

There was at that time a mania for foreign alliances. The grand tour,

which almost every family of distinction had taken, introduced a

rage for Continental customs and manners, which had in some degree

superseded our own.

A spring in Paris, and winter in Italy, left behind them regrets in

the minds of old and young, but especially the latter, who longed to

return to those scenes that had captivated their senses and seduced

their young imaginations. No language was spoken at the opera but

French or Italian,--no topics of conversation excited so much interest

as those which had formed the charm of their residence abroad,--and the

fair daughters of England drew comparisons unfavourable to fox-hunting

squires and insipid young nobles, when they thought of the accomplished

and fascinating foreigners from whom, in the first dawn of life, when

all their impressions were new and vivid, they had received such

flattering homage.

The mother of Louisa, still young, had not been insensible to

prepossessions; and had a _liaison_ at Rome, where she was

unaccompanied by her husband, the effects of which she had not

altogether eradicated.

It is said that the road to the daughter's affections is through

the heart of the mother. Certainly in Italy _cavalier-serventeism_

generally has this termination; and, though it is not yet openly

established in England, there are very many women in high life who have

some secret adorer, some favourite friend, to keep alive the flame

which too often lies smothered in the ashes of matrimony. I do not mean

that this attachment is frequently carried to criminal lengths; nor am

I ready to give much credence to the vain boastings of those foreigners

who, when they return to their own country, amuse their idle hours, and

idler friends, with a detailed account of their _bonnes fortunes_ in

London.

I shall not prostitute my narrative, had I the data for so doing, by

tracing step by step the well-organised scheme by which Mascalbruni

contrived to ingratiate himself with both the mother and the daughter.

He was young, handsome, and accomplished; an inimitable dancer, a

perfect musician. His dress, his stud, and cabriolet were in the best

taste, and he passed for a man of large fortune.

It may be asked how he supported this establishment? By play. Play,

in men whose means are ample, if considered a vice, is thought a very

venial one. He got admission into several clubs,--Crockford's among

the rest:--his games were _écarté_ and whist; games at which he was

without a match. Cool, cautious, and calculating, he lost with perfect

nonchalance, and won with the greatest seeming indifference.

There was a French _vicomte_, with whom he seemed to have no particular

acquaintance, but who was in reality his ally and confederate, and who

had accompanied him to England expressly that they might play into each

other's hands. He belonged to one of the oldest families, and had one

of those historical names that are a _passe par-tout_. I had seen him

at the _soirées_ of Paris, and he was in the habit at the _écarté_

table, if he had come without money, which was not unfrequently the

case, of claiming, when the division took place at the end of the game,

two napoleons; pretending that at its commencement he had bet one on

the winner. I need say no more.

He had signalised himself in several rencontres. I have him before

me now, as he used to appear in the Tuileries' gardens, with his

narrow hat, his thin face, and spare figure,--so spare, that sideways

one might as well have fired at the edge of a knife. To this man

Mascalbruni frequently pretended to have lost large sums, and it is

now well known that they divided the profits of their gains during the

season. No one certainly suspected either of unfair practices, though

their uniform success might have opened the eyes of the blindest. The

Marchioness of S.'s card-parties and those of Lady E. were a rich

harvest, as well as the private routs and _soirées_ to which they

obtained easy admission. Lady M. was well aware that Mascalbruni had a

_penchant_ for play; but it seemed to occupy so little of his thoughts

or intrench on his time, that it gave her no serious alarm.

I have not yet told you, however, as I ought to have done, that he was

a favoured suitor.

The bishop, who, by nature of his office, was seldom in town, was a

cypher in the family, and little thought of interfering with his lady

in the choice of a son-in-law.

But the season now drew to a close, and Mascalbruni received an

invitation to pass the summer at the episcopal palace in the Emerald

Isle. He had succeeded in gaining the affections, the irrevocable

affections of Louisa. Yes,--she loved him,

"Loved him with all the intenseness of first love!"

Time seemed to her to crawl with tortoise steps when he was

absent,--but how seldom was that the case! They sang together those

duets of Rossini that are steeped in passion. How well did his deep and

mellow voice marry itself with her contralto! They rode together, not

often in the parks, but through those shady and almost unfrequented

lanes of which there are so many in the environs of the metropolis;

they waltzed together; they danced the mazourka together,--that dance

which is almost exclusively confined to foreigners, from the difficulty

of its steps, and the grace required in its mazes.

They passed hours together alone,--they read together those scenes of

Metastasio, so musical in words, so easily retained in the memory. But

why do I dwell on these details? When I look on this picture and on

that, I am almost forced to renounce the opinion that kindred spirits

can alone love; for what sympathy of soul could exist between beings so

dissimilar, so little made for each other? Poor Louisa!

Mascalbruni accompanied them to Ireland. That summer was a continual

fête. It was settled that the wedding was to take place on their return

to town the ensuing season.

In the mean time the intended marriage had been long announced in

the Morning Post, and was declared in due form to the son at Naples.

Louisa, who was her brother's constant correspondent, in the openness

of her heart did not conceal from him that passion, no longer, indeed,

a secret. Her letters teemed with effusions of her admiration for the

talents, the accomplishments, and the virtues, for such they seemed, of

her intended--her _promesso sposo_, and the proud delight that a very

few months would seal their union.

William, who had now had some experience of the Italians, and who had

looked forward to his sister's marrying one of his college friends, an

Irishman with large estates in their immediate neighbourhood, could not

help expressing his disappointment, though it was urged with delicacy,

at this foreign connexion. He wrote also to the bishop, and, after

obtaining from him all the necessary particulars as to the Marchese

Mascalbruni,--through what channel he became acquainted with them, by

what letter got introduced to Lady ----, lost no time in proceeding

to Rome, though the mountains were then infested by brigands, and the

Pontine marshes, for it was the month of September, breathed malaria.

Our consul was then at Cività Vecchia, but willingly consented to

accompany Mr. M. to Rome, in order to aid in the investigation. He

was intimate with Cardinal ----, and they immediately proceeded to

his palace. They found from him that he had never heard the name of

Mascalbruni; that there was no _marchese_ in the pontifical states so

called; and he unhesitatingly declared the letter to be a forgery, and

its writer an impostor.

They then applied to the police, who, after some days' inquiry,

discovered that a person answering the description given had quitted

Rome a few years before, and had been a clerk in the office of a

_notario_.

No farther evidence was necessary to convict Mascalbruni of being

a swindler; and, not trusting to a letter's safe arrival, Mr. M.

travelled night and day till he reached the palace at ----.

It is not difficult to imagine the scene that ensued,--the indignation

of the father, the vexation and self-reproaches of the mother, or the

heart-rending emotions of the unfortunate girl.

Mascalbruni at first, with great effrontery, endeavoured to brave the

storm; contended that Louisa was bound to him by the most sacred ties,

the most solemn engagements; that his she should be,--or, if not his,

that she should never be another's; denounced them as her murderers;

and ended with threats of vengeance,--vengeance that, alas! he too well

accomplished.

It is not very well known what now became of Mascalbruni; but there is

reason to believe that he lay _perdu_ somewhere in the neighbourhood,

watching like a vulture over the prey from which he had been driven,

the corpse of what was once Louisa.

A suspicious-looking person was frequently seen at night-fall prowling

about the environs of the palace; and Miss M.'s _femme de chambre_,

with whom he is said to have carried on an intrigue, was observed by

the servants in animated conversation with a stranger in the garb of a

peasant among the shrubberies and pleasure grounds.

It was through her medium that Mascalbruni gained intelligence of all

that was passing in the palace.

The shock which Louisa had sustained was so sudden, so severe, that,

acting on a frame naturally delicate, it brought on a brain fever.

Her ravings were so dreadful, and so extraordinary; and so revolting

was the language in which she at times clothed them, that even her

mother--and no other was allowed to attend her--could scarcely stay

by her couch. How perfect a knowledge of human nature has Shakspeare

displayed in depicting the madness of the shamelessly-wronged and

innocent Ophelia!--The fragments of those songs to which her broken

accents gave utterance, especially that which ends with

"Who, in a maid, yet out a maid,

Did ne'er return again,"

may suggest an idea of the wanderings of the poor sufferer's heated

imagination.

For some weeks her life hung on a thread; but the affectionate cares

and sympathy of a mother, and a sense of the unworthiness of the

object of her regard, at last brought back the dawn of reason; and her

recovery, though slow, was sufficiently sure to banish all anxiety.

The afflictions as well as the affections of woman are, if I may judge

by my own experience, less profoundly acute than those of our own

sex. Whether this be owing to constitution or education, or that the

superior delicacy and fineness of the nervous system makes them more

easily susceptible of new impressions to efface the old, I leave it to

the physiologist or the psychologist to explain. The river that is the

most ruffled at the surface is seldom the deepest. Thus with Miss M.

Her passion, like

"A little brook, swoln by the melted snow,

That overflows its banks, pour'd in her heart

A scanty stream, and soon was dry again."[14]

In the course of three months the image of Mascalbruni, if not effaced

from her mind, scarcely awakened a regret; and, save that at times a

paleness overspread her cheek, rapidly chased by a blush, be it of

virgin innocence or shame, no one could ever have discovered in her

person or bearing any traces of the past.

At this time a paragraph appeared in the Court Journal of the day,

nearly in these words:

"Strange rumours are afloat in the Sister Island respecting a certain

Italian _marchese_, who figured at the clubs and about town during the

last season. Revelations of an extraordinary nature, that hastened

the return of the Honourable Mr. M. from the Continent, have led to

a rupture of the marriage of the belle of the season, which we are

authorised to say is definitively broken off."

It was a telegraph that the field was open for new candidates; but no

one on this side the water answered it. Louisa M. was no longer the

same,--the _préstige_ was fled,--the bloom of the peach was gone.

Scarcely had four months elapsed, however, when fresh preparations were

made for her marriage, and a day fixed for the nuptials.

The hour came; and behold, in the conventional language used on such

occasions, the happy pair, Lady M. the bride-maids, and a numerous

party of friends assembled in the chapel of the palace. The bishop

officiated.

The ceremony had already commenced, and the rite was on the point of

being ratified by that mystical type of union--the ring--when a figure

burst through the crowd collected about the doors; a figure more like a

spectre than a man.

So great a change had taken place in him, from the wild and savage

life that he had been leading among the mountains, the privations he

had endured, and the neglect of his person, that no one would have

recognised him for the observed of all observers, the once elegant and

handsome Mascalbruni. His hair, matted like the mane of a wild beast,

streamed over his face and bare neck. His cheek was fallen, his eyes

sunken in their sockets; yet in them burned, as in two dark caves, a

fierce and sombre fire. His lips were tremulous and convulsed with

passion; his whole appearance, in short, exhibited the same diabolical

rage and thirst of vengeance that had electrified the _salle d'armes_

in his memorable conflict. He advanced straight to the altar with long

and hurried steps, and, tearing aside the hands of the couple, the

ring fell over the communion rails to the ground. So profound was the

silence, so great the consternation and surprise the sight of this

apparition created in the minds of all, that the sound of the ring, as

it struck and rolled along the vaulted pavement, was audibly heard. It

was an omen of evil augury,--a warning voice as from the grave, to tell

of the death of premised joys--of hopes destroyed--of happiness for

ever crushed. He stood wildly waving his arms for a moment between the

pair, looking as though they had been transformed into stone, more like

two statues kneeling at a tomb than at the altar. Then he folded his

arms; gazed with a triumphant and ghastly smile at the bride; said, or

rather muttered, "Mine she is!" then, turning to the bridegroom, with a

sneer of scorn and mockery he howled, "Mine she has been; now wed her!"

With these laconic words he turned on his heel, and regained without

interruption the portal by which he had entered. So suddenly had all

this passed, so paralysed and panic-stricken were the spectators and

audience of this scene, that they could scarcely believe it to be other

than a dream, till they saw the bride extended without sense or motion

on the steps. Thus was she borne, the service being unconcluded, to her

chamber. The ceremony was privately completed the ensuing day.

No domestic felicity attended this ill-fated union. It was poisoned by

doubts and suspicions, and embittered by the memory of Mascalbruni's

words. "Mine she has been" continually rang in the husband's ears; and

on the anniversary of that eventful day, after a lingering illness of

many months, a martyr to disappointment and chagrin, she sunk into an

untimely grave.

The next we hear of Mascalbruni was his being at Cheltenham. There he

frequented the rooms under very different auspices, and had to compete

with another order of players than those he had been in the habit of

duping. He was narrowly watched, and detected in the act of pocketing

a queen from an _écarté_ pack. The consequence was his expulsion from

the club with ignominy. His name was placarded, and his fame, or rather

infamy, noised with a winged speed all over the United Kingdom.

It was no longer a place for him. In the course of the ensuing week the

following announcement was made in a well-known and widely-circulated

weekly paper. It was headed--

"_An Italian black sheep._

"We hope in a short time to present our readers with the exploits

of a new Count Fathom, a _soi disant_ marchese, better known than

trusted, the two first syllables of whose name more than rhyme

with _rascal_. And as it is our duty to un-_mask all_ such, we

shall confine ourselves at present to saying that he has been

weighed at a fashionable watering-place in Gloucestershire, and

found wanting, or rather practising certain sleights of hand for

which the charlatans of his own country are notorious. He had

better sing small here!"

Mascalbruni took the vulgar hint. His funds were nearly exhausted, and

with but a few louis in his pocket he embarked at Dover, and once more

repaired to Paris.

His prospects were widely different from those with which he had left

it. To play the game I have described at _rouge et noir_, requires

a capital. Every respectable house was closed against him. He now

disguised his appearance, so that his former acquaintance should not be

able to recognise him, and frequented the lowest hells--those _cloacæ_,

the resort of all the _vilains_ and _chenapans_, the lowest dregs of

the metropolis. By what practices this _mauvais sujet_ contrived to

support life here for some years is best known to the police, where his

name stands chronicled pretty legibly; it is probable that he passed

much of that time in one of the prisons, or on the roads.

Eighteen months had now elapsed, and the Honourable Mr. M. with his

bride, to whom he had been a short time married, took an apartment in

the Rue d'Artois. A man in a cloak--an _embocado_,--which means one who

enwraps his face in his mantle so that only his eyes are visible,--was

observed from the windows often passing and repassing the hotel. The

novelty of the costume attracted the attention of Mrs. M.; and the

blackness of his eyes, and their peculiarly gloomy expression, made

her take him for a Spaniard. She more than once pointed him out to her

husband, and said one day, "Look, William, there stands that man again.

He answers your description of a bandit, and makes me shudder to look

at him."

"Don't be alarmed, dear," replied Mr. M. smilingly; "we are not at

Terracina. It will be time enough to be frightened then."

The recollection of Mascalbruni had been almost effaced from his mind;

but, had he met him face to face, it is not unlikely that he _would_

have remembered the villain who had destroyed the hopes of his family,

and marred their happiness for ever.

For some time he never went out at night unaccompanied by his wife, and

always in a carriage. But a day came when he happened to dine without

her in the Rue St. Honoré. The weather being fine, and the party a late

one, he sent away his cabriolet, and after midnight proceeded to walk

home. Paris was at that time very badly lighted; the _reverberées_ at

a vast distance apart, suspended between the houses, giving a very dim

and feeble ray. Few persons--there being then no _trottoirs_--were

walking at that hour; and it so happened that not a soul was stirring

the whole length of the street. But, within a few yards of his own

door, the figure I have described rushed from under the shadow of a

_porte cochère_, and plunged a dagger in his heart. He fell without a

groan, and lay there till the patrol passed, when he was conveyed, cold

and lifeless, to the arms of his bride, who was anxiously awaiting his

return. Her agony I shall not make the attempt to depict: there are

some sorrows that defy description.

Notwithstanding the boasted excellence of the Parisian police, the

author of this crime, who I need not say was Mascalbruni, remained

undiscovered.

Strange as it may appear, I am enabled to connect two more links in the

chain of this ruffian's history, and thus, as it were, to become his

biographer. Having been in town at the period when he was in the zenith

of his glory, and being slightly acquainted with the family whom,

like a pestilence, it was his lot to destroy and blight, I was well

acquainted with his person, and he with mine; indeed, once seen, it was

not easy to mistake his.

After two winters at Naples, I travelled, by the way of Ravenna and

Rimini, to Venice. The carnival was drawing to a close, and, on

quitting a _soirée_ at Madame Benzon's, I repaired to the Ridotta. The

place was crowded to excess with that mercurial population, who during

this saturnalia, particularly its last nights, mingle in one orgie, and

seem to endeavour, by a kind of intoxication of the senses, and general

licentiousness, to drown the memory of the destitution and wretchedness

to which the iron despotism of the Austrian has reduced them. The scene

had a sort of magnetic attraction in it.

I had neither mask nor domino, but it is considered rather _distingué_

for men to appear without them; and, as I had no love-affair to carry

on, it was no bad means of obtaining one, had I been so inclined.

Among the other groups, I observed two persons who went intriguing

round the _salle_, appearing to know the secrets of many of their

acquaintances, whom it seemed their delight to torment and persecute,

and whom, notwithstanding their masks, they had detected by the voice,

which, however attempted to be disguised, betrays more than the eyes,

or even the mouth, though it is the great seat of expression. The pair

wore fancy dresses. The domino of the man was of Persian or Turkish

manufacture, a rich silk with a purple ground, in which were inwoven

palm-leaves of gold, The costume of the lady, who seemed of a portly

figure, not the most symmetrical, was a rich Venetian brocade, such

as we see in the gorgeous pictures of Paul Veronese, and much in use

during the dogal times of the republic. As they passed me, I heard

the lady say, looking at me, "That is a foreigner." "_Si signora, è

Inglese_," was the reply; "_lo conosco_." Who this could be who knew

me,--me, almost a stranger at Venice, I was curious to discover. By the

slow and drawling accent peculiar to the Romans, I felt satisfied he

was one, and fancied that I had heard that voice before,--that it was

not altogether unfamiliar to me.

I was desirous of unravelling the secret, for such it was, as the

man did not address me; and I remained at the Ridotta much later

than I should otherwise have done, in order to find out my unknown

acquaintance. I therefore kept my eye on the couple, hoping that

accident might favour my wish.

On the last nights of the carnival it is common to sup at the

Ridotta, and I at length watched the _incognito_ into a box with his

_inamorata_, where he took off his mask, and whom should I discover

under it but the identical hero of romance, the villain Mascalbruni.

He was an acquaintance who might well shun _my_ recognition, and I was

not anxious he should see I had attracted _his_ observation. As I was

returning to my hotel on the Grand Canal, I asked the gondolier if he

knew one Signor Mascalbruni. These boatmen are a kind of Figaros, and,

like the agents of the Austrian police, are acquainted with the names

and address of almost every resident in Venice, especially of those

who frequent the public places. The man, however, did not know _my

friend_ by that name,--perhaps he had changed it. But when I described

his costume, he said that the signor was the _cavalier servente_ of a

Russian princess, who had taken for a year one of the largest palaces

in Venice. "_Il signor_," he added, "_canta come un angelo_."

The idea of coupling an angel and Mascalbruni together amused me. "An

angel of darkness!" I was near replying; but thought it best to be

silent.

I had no wish to encounter Mascalbruni a second time. I went the

next day to Fusina, and thence to Milan; indeed I had made all the

preparations for my departure, nothing being more dull than the

_Carême_ at Venice.

Two years after this adventure, I was travelling in the Grisons, after

having made a tour of the _petits cantons_, with my knapsack on my

back, and a map of Switzerland in my pocket, to serve the place of a

guide,--a description of persons to whom I have almost as great an

objection as to cicerones, preferring rather to miss seeing what I

should like to see, than to be told what I ought to like to see; not

that it has fallen to the lot of many guides, or travellers either, to

be present at a spectacle such as I am going to describe. I had been

pacing nine good leagues; and that I saw it was merely accidental, for

if _it_ had not come in my way, _I_ should not have gone out of mine to

witness it.

Coire, the capital of the Grisons, my place of destination for the

night, had just appeared, when I observed a great crowd collecting

together immediately in front, but at some distance off, the peasants

running in all directions from the neighbouring hills, like so many

radii to meet in a centre.

One of these crossed me; and, on inquiring of him the occasion of

all this haste and bustle, I learned that an execution was about to

take place. My informant added with some pride that the criminal was

not a Swiss, but an Italian. He seemed perfectly acquainted with all

the particulars of the event that had transpired, for he had been

present at the trial; and, as we walked along the road together, in

his _patois_,--bad German, and worse French, with here and there a

sprinkling of Italian,--he related to me in his own way what I will

endeavour to translate.

"An Englishman of about twenty years of age was travelling, as you

may be, on foot, about seven weeks ago, in this canton, having lately

crossed the St. Gothard from Bellinzona. He was accompanied by a

courier, whom he had picked up at Milan. They halted for some days in

our town, waiting for the young gentleman's remittances from Genoa,

where his letters of credit were addressed. On their arrival at Coire

they had a guide; but the Italian persuaded his master, who seemed

much attached to him, to discharge Pierre, on the pretence that he

was thoroughly acquainted with the country, and spoke the language,

which indeed he did. He was a dark brigand-looking fellow, with a

particularly bad expression of countenance, and a gloomy look about

his eyes; and, for my part, I am surprised that the young man should

have ventured to trust himself in his company, for I should not like to

meet his fellow on the road by myself even in the day-time. Well: the

Englishman's money, a good round sum,--they say, two hundred napoleons

d'or,--was paid him by an order on our bankers; and then they set out,

but not as before.

"They had only been two days in company, when the villainous Italian,

who either did not know the road over the mountains, or had purposely

gone out of the way, thought it a good opportunity of perpetrating

an act, no doubt long planned, which was neither more nor less than

despatching his master. It was a solitary place, and a fit one for a

deed of blood. A narrow path had been worn in the side of a precipice,

which yawned to the depth of several hundred feet over a torrent that

rushed, as though impatient of being confined, foaming and boiling

through a narrow chasm opened for itself through the rocks. I could

show you the spot, for I know it well, having a right of _commune_ on

the mountains; and have often driven my cows, after the melting of the

snows, up the pass, to feed on the herbage that, mixed with heath and

rhododendrons, forms a thick carpet under foot. It is a pasture that

makes excellent cheese.

"But, solitary as the place looks, the Italian did not know that there

are several _chalets_, mine among the rest, in the Alp; and herdsmen.

As for me, I happened to be down in the plain, or I might have been an

eye-witness of much of what I am about to describe. I was saying that

the spot seemed to suit his purpose; and his impatience to ease his

master of his gold was such, that, happily for the ends of justice, he

could not wait till night-fall, or none but (and here he pointed to

the sky) He above might have been privy to the crime. It was, however,

mid-day. Into the deep-worn pass I have mentioned runs a rivulet,

which, sparkling on the green bank, had made for itself a little

basin. The day was hot and sultry; and the young gentleman, tempted,

it would seem, by the gentle murmur of the water as it fell rippling

over the turf, and its crystal brightness, stooped down to drink. The

Italian watched this opportunity, sprung upon him like a tiger, and

plunged a dagger, which he always carried concealed about him, into the

Englishman's back. Fortunately, however, the point hit upon the belt in

which he carried his money, perhaps on the napoleons; for, before the

assassin could give him a second blow, he sprang up and screamed for

help, calling 'Murder, murder!'

"Three of the herdsmen whom I have mentioned heard the cries, and

came running towards the direction whence they proceeded, when they

discovered two men struggling with each other; but, before they could

reach them, one had fallen, and the other was in the act of rifling

him, in order afterwards to hurl him down the precipice into the bed

of the river. So intent was he on the former of these occupations,

that he did not perceive my countrymen till they seized him. He made

much resistance; but his dagger was not within his reach. They bound

his hands, and, together with the lifeless corpse of his master,

transported him to Coire, where, not to enter into the trial, he was

condemned to death.

"But he has been now some weeks in prison, in consequence of our not

being able to procure a _bourreau_; and we have been forced to send for

one to Bellinzona, no Grison being willing to perform the office. He

arrived last night; and how do you think, sir? According to our laws,

he is to be executed with a sword that has not been used for forty

years,--no murder having been committed in the canton during all that

period,--though no sword could be applied to better purpose than it

will in a few moments."

Whilst he was thus speaking, we reached the dense circle already

formed. On seeing a stranger approach, they made room for me; and

curiosity to witness this mode of execution, the remnant of barbarous

times, as well as to see the Italian, induced me to enter the Place de

Grève.

At the first glance I recognised Mascalbruni. He was stripped of his

shirt, and on his knees; by his side was a Jesuit to whom he had just

made his confession; and over him, on an elevation from the ground by

means of a large stone, stood the _prevôt_, with a sword of prodigious

length and antique shape, and covered with the rust of ages, pendent in

his hands.

The lower part of Mascalbruni's face was fallen, whilst all above the

mouth was drawn upward as from some powerful convulsion. The eyes, that

used to bear the semblance of living coals, had in them a concentrated

and sullen gloom. The cold and damp of the cell, and the scantiness of

his diet, which consisted of bread and water, had worn his cheek to the

bone, and given it the sallowness of one in the black stage of cholera.

His face was covered with a thick beard, every hair of which stood

distinct from its fellows; and his matted locks, thickly sprinkled with

grey, trailed over his ghastly features and neck in wild disorder.

His shoulders down to the waist were, as I said, bare; and they and

his arms displayed anatomically a muscular strength that might have

served as a model for a gladiator. Over all was thrown an air of utter

prostration moral and physical,--the desolation of despair.

A few yards to the right, the priest, with his eyes uplifted to heaven,

seemed absorbed in prayer; and between them the _bourreau_, who might

have superseded Tristan in his office, and been a dangerous rival in

the good graces of Louis the Eleventh. He called to mind a figure of

Rubens',--not the one who is turning round in the Descent of the Cross

at Antwerp, and saying to the thief, writhing in horrible contortions

after he has wrenched his lacerated foot from the nail, "_Sacre,

chien_,"--but a soldier in another of his pictures in the Gallery at

Brussels (the representation of some martyrdom,) who has just torn off

the ear of the saint with a pair of red-hot pincers, and is eyeing it

with a savage complacency.

It was, in short, exactly such a group, with its pyramidical form and

startling contrasts of colour and expression, as the great Flemish

painter could have desired.

A dead silence, which the natural horror, the novelty of the scene

created, prevailed among the assembled crowd; and it spoke well for the

morality and good feeling of the simple peasantry, that not a woman was

present on the occasion.

The hand of the swordsman was raised, and the stroke fell on the

neck of the culprit; but, horrible to say,--what was it then to

witness?--though given with no common vigour, so blunt was the

instrument, that, instead of severing the head, it only inflicted a

gash which divided the tendons of the neck, and the undecapitated body

fell doubled up, whilst only a few _gouts_ of blood issued from the

wound.

The tortured wretch's groans and exclamations found an echo in all

bosoms; and it was not till after two more sabre strokes that the head

lay apart, and rolled upwards in the dust. I then saw what I have heard

described of Charlotte Cordé, after she had been guillotined;--the

muscles of the face were convulsed as if with sensibility, and the eyes

glared with horrid meaning, as though the soul yet lingered there. Even

the executioner could scarcely meet their scowl without shuddering.

It was the first and last spectacle of this kind at which I mean ever

to be present; and I should not have awaited its awful termination,

could I have penetrated through the living wall that was a barrier to

my exit.

You may now guess from whom I obtained many of the details contained

in this memoir of Mascalbruni. It was from the confessor, who had

endeavoured, but in vain, to give him spiritual consolation in the

dungeon and at the block. The Jesuit and myself had mutual revelations

to make to each other, connecting the present with the past, and which

have enabled me to weave the dark tissue of his life's thread into

one piece. I repeat the last words of the good old man at our final

interview,--"May God have mercy on his soul!"

F. MEDWIN.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 12: Military terms for a professed duellist, and a

duellist-killer.]

[Footnote 13: Singularly enough, when her body was discovered near

the Ponte Rotto, she was untouched by the fish, as though they even

ventured not to deface her celestial purity. She looked like a marble

form that slept.]

[Footnote 14: Faust.]

SMOKE.

"A trifle light as air."

Swift sang a broomstick, and with matchless lore

Rehearsed the contents of a housemaid's drawer:

Great Burns's genius shone sublime in lice;

Old Homer epicised on frogs and mice;

And, leaping from his swift Pindaric car,

Great Byron eulogised the light cigar;

Pope for a moment left the critic's chair,

And sang the breezy fan that cools the fair;

And he whose harp to loftiest notes was strung,

E'en Mantua's Swan, the homely salad sung;

Colossal Johnson, famed for dictionary,

A sprig of myrtle; Cowper, a canary,

Nor scorn'd the humble snail; and Goldsmith's lyre

A haunch of venison nobly did inspire;--

Of such light themes the loftiest lyres have spoke,

And my small shell shall sound the praise of smoke.

Essence sublime! serenely curling vapour!

Fierce from a steam-boat, gentle from a taper,--

Daughter of fire, descendant of the sun,

Breath of the peaceful pipe and murderous gun,--

How gloriously thou roll'st from chimneys high,

To seek companion clouds amidst the sky!

Thrice welcome art thou to the traveller's sight,

And his heart hails thee with sincere delight;

As soft thou sail'st amid the ethereal blue,

Visions of supper float before his view!

Emblem of peace in council, when profound

The sacred calumet goes slowly round!

Breath of the war, thou canopiest the fight,

And veil'st the bloody field in murky night!

Precursor of the cannon's deadly shot,

And soft adorner of the peasant's cot;

With Etna's roaring flames dost thou arise,

And from the altar's top perfume the skies!

I see thee now

To the breezes bow,

Thy spiral columns lightly bending

In gentle whirls

And graceful curls,

Thy soft grey form with the azure blending.

When Nature's tears in dewy showers descend,

Close to the earth thine aerial form doth bend;

But when in light

And beauty bright,

With radiant smile she gladdens all,

And the sun's soft beam

On thy shadowy stream

Does in a ray of glory fall,

Thou risest high

'Mid the deep blue sky,

Like a silver shaft from a fairy hall!

When from the light cigar thy sweet perfume

In od'rous cloudlets hovers round the room,

Inspired by Fancy's castle-building power,

Thy fragile form cheers many a lonely hour.

O'er every wave thy misty flag is seen

Careering lightly over billows green;

And when, 'mid creaming foam and sparkling spray,

Celestial Venus rose upon the day,

Thy vapoury wreath the goddess did enshroud,

And wrapt her beauties in a milk-white cloud.

'Twas thou, majestic! led the way before

Retreating Israel from th' Egyptian shore;

From out thy sable cloud, 'mid lightning's flash,

The trumpet's clangour and the thunder's crash,

From Sinai's mount the law divine was given,

Thy veil conceal'd the Majesty of Heaven!

When sun, and moon, and heaven's bright hosts expire,

And the great globe decays in flames of fire,

Then shalt thou rise, thy banner be unfurl'd

Above the smouldering ruins of the world!

SNODGRASS.

SOME PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF A DISAPPOINTED MAN.

WITH AN ILLUSTRATION BY GEORGE CRUIKSHANK.

Are you a sympathetic reader? If not, I pray you to pass over the

few pages which constitute this article, and indulge your risible

propensity with the happier effusions of the laughing philosophers of

this Miscellany. I have no cachinnatory ambition, and would have my

leaves well watered, not with the sunny drops of joy, but with the

camomilical outpourings of sorrow.

Concluding that my request is granted, I will now proceed, sympathetic

reader, to narrate a few passages of my "strange, eventful history."

I am a disappointed man,--nay, I was even a disappointed baby; for

it was calculated that the parental anticipations of my forebears

would have been realised on the 1st of May 1792, whereas, by some

contradictory vagary of Dame Nature, I entered this valley of tears on

the 1st of April! This ought to have been considered prognosticatory

of my future disappointments, and the law of Sparta should have been

rigidly enforced; for what are crooked limbs to a crooked destiny?

It was the intention of my father (whose name was Jacob Wise) to have

had me christened after my maternal uncle, Theodosius Otter, Esq.; but,

having selected a stuttering godfather, I was unfortunately baptized

as "The-odd-dose-us Oth-er Wise." Nor was this the only disappointment

which attended me on this occasion, for the pew-opener having received

instructions to clean the copper coal-scuttle in the vestry-room, the

basin which contained the vitriol necessary for that purpose was by

some means or other placed in the font; and to this day I have more the

appearance of a tattooed Indian than a Christian Englishman.

My babyhood was composed of a series of disappointments. My hair was to

have been, in the words of the monthly nurse, "the most beautifulest

horburn," but sprouted forth a splendid specimen of that vegetable dye

called carroty. I was to have been "as straight as an arrow;" but a cup

of tea having been spilled over me as I lay in the servant's lap before

the kitchen fire, I became so dreadfully warped that I am now a sort of

demi-parenthesis, or, as a malicious punster once called me, "a perfect

bow."

I had the measles very mildly, as it was affirmed, for the whole

virulence of the disorder displayed itself in one enormous pustule on

the tip of my nose. This luminary so excited my infant wonder, that my

eyes (really fine for green) were continually riveted to the _spot_,

and have never forgotten it, for one or other of them is invariably

engaged in searching for the lost treasure.

I was not in convulsions above a dozen times during teething; but no

sooner had I completed my chaplet of pearls, than the striking-weight

of a Dutch clock which overhung my cradle dropped into my mouth, and

convinced me of the extreme simplicity of dental surgery.

[Illustration: A Disappointed Man]

My "going alone" was the source of an infinitude of anxieties to my

excellent mamma, who was so magnificently proportioned that it

was many months before I could make the circuit of her full-flounced

printed calico wrapper without resting. Poor mamma! she lost her life

from a singular mistake. The house in which we lived had taken fire,

and two good-natured neighbours threw Mrs. Wise out of the window

instead of a feather-bed. She alighted on the head of Captain S----,

who was then considered the _softest_ man in the three kingdoms, and

received little injury by the ejectment; but her feelings were so

lacerated by the mistake, that she refused all food, and lived entirely

by suction, till she died _from_ it.

I will pass over my school-days, merely observing _en passant_ that

"Each day some unlucky disaster

Placed me in the vocative case with my master,"

a squabby, tyrannical, double-jointed pedagogue. He was nicknamed

_Cane-and-Able_, and I can testify to the justness of the nomenclature.

At college the same _mis_-fortune attended me. There was ever an

under-current of disappointment, which rendered all my exertions

nugatory. If I was by accident "full of the god," I could never knock

down any one but a proctor. If I determined on keeping close in my

rooms, the wind immediately changed to N.E. by N. at which point my

chimneys smoked like a community of Ya-Mynheers. My maternal uncle,

Theodosius Otter, Esq. had signified that my expectations from him must

be regulated entirely by my academical distinctions, and I was "pluck'd

for my little-go." This occurred three months before the old booby's

death. My legacy consisted of a presentation to the Gooseborough free

school.

The time at length arrived for me to fall in love. I experienced the

first symptom of this epidemic at a bombazine ball in the city of

Norwich. Selina Smithers was the name of my fair enslaver: she was

about nineteen, fair as Russia tallow, tall, and somewhat slender.

Indeed her condition is perhaps better described by "the slightest

possible approximation to lanky." During one short quadrille she told

me of all her tastes, hopes, experience, family connexions, (including

a brother at sea,) expectations probable and possible, and of two

thousand seven hundred and forty-five pounds, fourteen shillings, and

sixpence, standing in her own name in the three and a half per cents.

With the last _chassez_ I was a victim. At the close of the ball I

handed Selina and her mamma into a green fly, and found the next

morning that I had a violent cold in my head, and a violent heat in my

heart.

As I flourished the brass knocker of Mrs. Smithers' door on the

following day, the clock of St. Andrew's church struck two; and

chimed a quarter past, as a girl strongly resembling a kidney-potato,

red and dirty, gave me ingress into a room with green blinds, seven

horsehair-bottomed chairs, a round mahogany table, four oil-paintings

(subjects and masters unknown), two fire-screens of yellow calico

fluted, and a very shabby square piano. On the music-rest was the song,

"We met,--'twas in a crowd." Singular coincidence,--_we_ met in a crowd!

The door opened, and Selina bounded into the room like a young fawn.

Our eyes met, and then simultaneously sought the carpet. I know not

what object her pale blue orbs encountered; but mine fell on the

half-picked head of a red herring! "Can it be possible," thought I,

"that Selina--Pshaw! her brother has returned from sea;" and to his

account I placed the body of the vulgar fish. I took her hand, and

gracefully led her to a chair, and then seated myself beside her. Our

conversation grew animated,--confiding. She recapitulated the amount

of her three and a half per cents, and in the most considerate manner

inquired into _my_ pecuniary situation. I was then possessed of seven

thousand pounds; for my father, during the three last years of his

life, had been twice burned out, and once sold up, and was thus enabled

to leave me independent. She could not conceal her delight at my

prosperous situation,--generous creature! Possessing affluence herself,

she rejoiced at the well-doing of others. Day after day passed in this

delightful manner, until I ventured to solicit her to become my wife.

Judge of my ecstasy when, bending her swan-like neck until her fair

cheek rested on the velvet collar of my mulberry surtout, she whispered

almost inaudibly,

"How can you ask me such a question?"

"How can I ask you such a question? Because--because it is necessary to

my happiness. Oh! name the happy hour when Hymen's chain--that chain

which has but one link--shall bind you to me for ever!"

She paused a moment, and then faltered out,

"To-morrow week."

I fell upon my knees. Selina did the same; for, in my joy at her

compliance, I had forgotten that one chair was supporting us both.

Oh, what a busy day was that which followed! I entered Skelton's (the

tailor's) shop with the journeymen. I ordered three complete suits!

As the rolls were taken into Quillit's parlour, I was shown into the

office. The worthy lawyer thrice scalded his throat in his anxiety to

comply with my repeated requests to "see him immediately." He came at

last. A few brief sentences explained the nature of my business, and he

hastened to accompany me to Selina. I was so excited by the novelty of

my situation, that I fell over the maid who was cleaning the step of

the door, and narrowly escaped dragging Quillit after. Had he fallen, I

shudder at the contemplation of the probable result; for he was a man

well to do in the world, and enjoyed a rotundity of figure unrivalled

in the good city of Norwich. His black waistcoat might have served for

a bill of fare to an eating-house, for it exhibited samples of all Mrs.

Glass's choicest preparations.

Away we went, realising the poet's description of Ajax and Camilla:

"When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,

The line too labours, and the words move slow:

Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain,

Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main."

We resembled Reason and Hope, or one of Pickford's barges and a

towing-horse.

The little brass knocker was again in my hand, the kidney-potato was

again at the door, and I led in the perspiring lawyer, but looked in

vain for that expression of admiration which I fondly anticipated would

have illumined his little grey eyes at the sight of my Venusian Selina.

"This is Mr. Quillit," said I.

"Indeed?" replied Selina.

"We have come, mum," said Quillit, "to arrange a very necessary

preliminary to the delicate ceremony which my friend Wise has informed

me will take place on this day week."

Selina blushed. Her mother (bless me! I've quite overlooked her!)

screwed up her face into an expression between laughing and crying; and

I--I pushed one hand through my hair, and the other into my breeches

pocket.

"Mum," continued Quillit, "our business this morning is to make the

arrangements for your marriage-settlement; and my friend Wise wishes to

know what part of your two thousand----"

"Seven hundred and forty-five pounds, fourteen shillings, and

sixpence," said I _sotto voce_.

"--You wish settled upon yourself."

"Oh, nothing,--I require nothing!" exclaimed Selina.

"Hur--!" said I, half rising from my chair in ecstasy at her

disinterestedness.

"Hem!" coughed Quillit, and took out his toothpick.

"Nothing!" I at length ejaculated. "No, Selina; you shall not be

subject to the accidents of fortune. Mr. Quillit, put down two thousand

pounds." And so he did.

The day before my intended nuptials I had paid my customary visit to

Selina, and it was arranged that the _settlement_ should be executed

(what a happy union of terms!) that night. I had left but a few minutes

when I missed my handkerchief. I returned for it. The kidney-potato

shot out of the house as I turned the corner of the street. I found

the door ajar, and, not considering any ceremony necessary, I walked

into the parlour. I had put my handkerchief into the left pocket of my

coat when I was somewhat startled by a burst of very boisterous male

and female merriment. I paused. A child's treble was then heard, and in

a moment after _a child_--_a live child_ entered the room crying most

piteously. It ceased on beholding me; and when its astonishment had

subsided, it sobbed out,

"I want mamma!"

"Mamma?" said I. "And who's mamma?"

My query was answered from the first floor.

"Come to mamma, dear!" shouted--Selina!

I don't know what the sensations of a humming-top in full spin may be,

but I should imagine they are very similar to those which I experienced

at this particular moment. When I recovered, I was stretched on the

hearth-rug with my head in the coal-scuttle, surrounded by my Selina,

her mother, the maid, and I suppose her "brother at sea."

"What is the matter, love?" said ---- You know whom I mean,--I can't

write her name again.

"Nothing, madam," I replied, "nothing; only I anticipated being married

to-morrow,--but I shall be disappointed."

The ensuing week I received notice of action for a breach of promise of

marriage; the ensuing term the cause was tried before an intelligent

jury; and the ensuing day Quillit handed me a bill for seven hundred

and sixty-two pounds, one shilling, and eightpence, being the amount

of damages and costs in Smithers _versus_ Wise. I paid Quillit, sold

my house and furniture at Norwich, and took up my abode at Bumbleby,

in Lancashire, resolving to be as love-proof as Miss Martineau, which

resolution I have religiously observed to this day.

I was, however, involved in one other tender affair, by proxy, which

produced me more serious annoyances than even my own.

I became acquainted with a merry good-looking fellow, of the name

of Thomas Styles, who had come from somewhere, and was related to

somebody, but no one recollected the who or the where. In the same town

lived an old gentleman, who rejoiced in the singular name of Smith. He

was blessed with one daughter and a wife. The latter did not reside

with him, having taken up her permanent residence in a small octagonal

stone building in the dissenters' burial ground. Styles, by one of

those accidents common in novels, but very occasional in real life,

had become acquainted with Miss Smith. They had gone through those

comparative states of feeling,--acquaintance, friendship, love; and,

when I was introduced to him, he was just in want of a good fellow to

help him into matrimony. I was just the boy; my expensive experience,

my good-nature, my leisure,--in short, there was nothing wanting to fit

me for this confidential character. Now, be it known that old Smith had

very strong parliamentary predilections, and one of his _sine quâ nons_

was, that his son-in-law should be M.P. for somewhere,--Puddle-dock

would do,--but an M.P. he must be. Politics were of no consequence; but

he must have a decided opinion that the Bumbleby railway would be most

beneficial, if carried through a swampy piece of ground which Smith had

recently purchased. Styles was of the same opinion; but then he was

only a member of the "Bull's-eye Bowmen," and Mr. Snuffmore's sixpenny

whist club. I had made myself particularly uncomfortable one afternoon,

in Styles' summer-house, with three glasses of brandy and water and

four mild havannas, when old Smith rushed in to announce the gratifying

intelligence that Mr. Topple, the member for our place, had fallen into

the crater of Mount Vesuvius, and that nothing had been heard from him

since, but a solitary interjection, in consequence of which there was a

vacancy in the representation. The writ had been issued, and so had an

address from Mr. Wiseman, a gentleman possessing every virtue under the

sun, save and except a due sense of the advantages of Smith's swamp to

the railway. This was conclusive. Smith made a speech, which, being for

interest and not for fame, was short and emphatic.

"Tom, you must contest this election, or never darken my doors again."

"My dear, sir," said Tom, "nothing would give me greater pleasure;

but----"

"I'll do all that. I'll form a committee _instanter_," replied Smith;

"leave all to me. Capital hand at an address--pith, nothing but pith.

Ever see my letter in support of the erection of a pound for stray

cattle?--pithy and conclusive:--'Inhabitants of Bumbleby, twenty

shillings make a pound.' The motion was carried."

"One moment," said Tom. "It will appear so presumptuous on my part,

unless a deputation waited on me."

"Certainly,--better, by all means,--I'll form one directly," said Smith.

"In the mean time, issue a placard to prevent the electors making

promises, and----"

"I will," said Smith. And so he did; for in an hour afterwards there

was not a dead wall in Bumbleby but was papered from one end to the

other.

"Other Wise," said Styles, as Smith waddled up the garden, "this won't

do for me. I couldn't make a speech of ten consecutive lines, if the

revenues of the Duchy of Cornwall were depending upon it."

"Pooh!" replied I, rolling my head about in that peculiar style which

an over-indulgence in bibicals will induce.

"It's a fact," replied Tom. "Now, my dear fellow, you can serve me and

your country at the same time. Smith would be equally gratified at your

return for Bumbleby; your opinions are the same as my own; and your

abilities require no panegyric from me."

Whether it was the suddenness of the probable glory, or the effect

of the tobacco and brandy and water, I sat speechless. Silence gives

consent, says an old adage, and so did the town of Bumbleby the next

morning, for every quarter cried out "Other Wise for ever!" It was

too late to retract; and accordingly I was nominated, seconded, and

unanimously elected by a show of hands. A poll was demanded; and, after

a short contest of two days, it was announced in very large letters,

and still larger figures,

Wiseman, 786

Other Wise, 92

Majority, --694

I was satisfied, and so was my party. During the preparation for this

unfortunate contest I had allowed Styles to draw _ad libitum_ upon my

banker. His friendship knew no bounds; his liberality was as boundless;

and so chagrined was he at the defeat I had experienced, that he left

the next morning without an adieu. I must confess that I was rather

disappointed at his sudden retreat, and considerably more so on finding

that his exertions in my behalf had reduced my income from four hundred

pounds to forty pounds per annum. For the first time I doubted his

friendship. Subsequent inquiries convinced me he was a scoundrel, and I

commenced an immediate pursuit of him, and an action at law.

Some three months afterwards, I was sauntering about the streets in

the neighbourhood of St. James's Square, when I encountered Styles.

His surprise was as great as mine, but not so enduring; for, advancing

towards me with all the coolness of the 1st of December, he exclaimed,

"Other Wise, how are you? I dare say you thought my sudden departure

odd; I did myself; but I couldn't help it. I'm sorry to hear how much

your contest has distressed you. I was the cause. Give me your check

for fifty pounds, and here's a bill for five hundred, due to-morrow."

Suiting the action to the word, he handed me an acceptance for that

amount inclosed in a dirty piece of paper. All this was so rapidly

said and done, that before I was aware of it I had given him a draft

on Drummond, shaken hands with him, and was mechanically discussing a

mutton-chop and a bottle of sherry, which I had unconsciously ordered

in the delirium which succeeded Styles' unheard-of generosity.

I went the next day to Messrs. Podge and Co. in Lombard-street, with my

promise-to-pay--Eldorado in my pocket. I entered the counting-house,

presented my bill, and fully expected to have received either

bank-notes or gold in exchange. I waited a few minutes, and was then

ushered into a back-room, and politely requested to account for this

money promissory document.

"From whom did you receive this bill?" said a gentleman with a powdered

head and an immense watch-chain.

"From Mr. Styles."

"Where does he live?"

"I don't know exactly; but I hope there is nothing irregular."

"You can step in, Banks," said the powdered head; and a stout well-fed

man, in a blue coat, with the City arms on the button, _did_ step

in, and very unceremoniously proceeded to inspect the contents of my

various pockets. "Conclusive!" said the powdered head, as he minutely

examined a small piece of crumpled paper which had occupied one of the

pockets of my small-clothes.

I was handed into a hackney-coach, and then into the Mansion-house,

where I was informed that I was to live rent-free for the next week in

his Majesty's jail of Newgate. The bill was a forgery!

The day of trial approached. I walked into the dock with _mens

conscia recti_ depicted on my countenance. I knew I was innocent of

any felonious intention or knowledge; and was certainly very much

_disappointed_ at being found guilty upon the silent evidence of

the little piece of crumpled paper, which was covered with pen and

ink experiments on the signature of John Allgold and Co. whose name

occupied the centre of Styles' bill. The recorder (in a very impressive

manner, I must allow, for his white handkerchief was waving about the

whole time) passed sentence of death upon me, and I was ordered to be

taken from thence, and on the Monday following to be hung by the neck

till I was dead. A pleasant termination, truly!

I was led, stupified by the result of my trial, back to the prison.

When I regained the use of my faculties, my awful situation became

horridly apparent. There was I, an innocent and injured man, condemned

to suffer the extreme penalty of the law. For endeavouring to gain

possession of my own, I was about to become a spectacle for the

fish-fags and costermongers of London,--to have my name handed down

to posterity by that undying trumpeter of evil-doers, Mr. Catnach, of

the Seven-dials, who alternately delights the public with "three yards

long of every new song, and all for a penny," and "the last dying

speech and confession" of those who, dreading to be bed-ridden, and

possessing an unconquerable aversion to doctors' stuff and virtue,

have danced upon nothing, and died with their shoes on. "How often,"

thought I, "have I seen a withered hag kneeling at the rails of an

area, exciting the sympathies and curiosity of servants of all-work,

and greasy melting cooks, by the recital of atrocities that the hand

of man never executed. 'Here's a full, true, and 'tickler account of a

horrid murder, which was performed in the New-cut, Lambeth, on the body

of a baked-'tater manufacturer, who was savagely and inhumanly murdered

by that ferocious and hard-hearted villain, Benjamin Burker;--here you

have the account how, arter putting a poor man's plaister, composed of

pitch and bird-lime, over the unhappy _indivigual's mouf_ until the

breath was out on his body, he shoved him into the oven, and lived

seven days and nights on baked taters and the manyfacterers.' Thus

might I be misrepresented. The thought was madness!"

The morning at length arrived for my execution; but, oh! the horrors

of the night that preceded it! Young, and in the full enjoyment of

life, the morrow was to bring me death! In a little week, the hand

which I then gazed on, would be a banquet for the red worm of the

grave. Even the mother who watched the cradle of my infancy would

have turned loathingly away from the corrupted mass; the earth which

covered me would be thought unhallowed, and my name would become

symbolical with crime. But even this, was nothing to the contemplation

of the scene I had still to enact. To be led forth "the observed of

all observers," who would look on me with an eye, not of pity, but of

morbid curiosity,--to hang quivering in the air,--and to feel, while

consciousness remained, that each shuddering of struggling nature was

imparting a savage delight to those who could be the willing witnesses

of the sacrifice of a fellow-creature! My brain sickened with its

agony, and I fell into a stupor which my jailor called sleep. I was

pinioned, and led forth to die. Life had now no charm for me,--I

was beyond the reach of hope, and death was a desired blessing. The

hangman's hands were about my neck,--the blood curdled in my veins

as I felt the deadly embrace of the cord. I longed for the signal of

departure; but I was again disappointed. I was reprieved,--for I awoke,

and found that the bill and all its frightful consequences were but

the result of having eaten a hearty supper of pork-chops very much

underdone! So I was once again a disappointed man, though, on this

occasion, I must own, most agreeably so.

THE PROFESSOR.--A TALE.

BY GOLIAH GAHAGAN.

"Why, then, the world's mine oyster."

CHAPTER I.

I have often remarked that, among other ornaments and curiosities,

Hackney contains more ladies' schools than are to be found in almost

any other village, or indeed city, in Europe. In every green rustic

lane, to every tall old-fashioned house there is an iron gate, an

ensign of blue and gold, and a large brass plate, proclaiming that a

ladies' seminary is established upon the premises. On one of these

plates is written--(or rather was,--for the pathetic occurrence which

I have to relate took place many years ago)--on one of these plates, I

say, was engraven the following inscription:

BULGARIA HOUSE.

Seminary for Young Ladies from three to twenty.

BY THE MISSES PIDGE.

(Please wipe your shoes.)

The Misses Pidge took a limited number of young ladies, (as limited, in

fact, or as large as the public chose,) and instructed them in those

branches of elegant and useful learning which make the British female

so superior to all other shes. The younger ones learned the principles

of back-stitch, cross-stitch, bob-stitch, Doctor Watts's hymns, and

"In my cottage near a wood." The elder pupils diverged at once from

stitching and samplers: they played like Thalberg, and pirouetted like

Taglioni; they learned geography, geology, mythology, entomology,

modern history, and simple equations (Miss Z. Pidge); they obtained

a complete knowledge of the French, German, and Italian tongues, not

including English, taught by Miss Pidge; Poonah painting and tambour

(Miss E. Pidge); Brice's questions and elocution (Miss F. Pidge); and,

to crown all, dancing and gymnastics (which had a very flourishing look

in the Pidge prospectus, and were printed in German text,)--DANCING and

GYMNASTICS, we say, by Professor DANDOLO. The names of other professors

and assistants followed in modester type.

Although the signor's name was decidedly foreign, so English was

his appearance, and so entirely did he disguise his accent, that

it was impossible to tell of what place he was a native, if not of

London, and of the very heart of it; for he had caught completely the

peculiarities which distinguish the so-called cockney part of the City,

and obliterated his h's and doubled his v's, as if he had been for all

his life in the neighbourhood of Bow-bells. Signor Dandolo was a stout

gentleman of five feet nine, with amazing expanse of mouth, chest, and

whiskers, which latter were of a red hue.

I cannot tell how this individual first received an introduction to the

academy of the Misses Pidge, and established himself there. Rumours

say that Miss Zela Pidge at a Hackney ball first met him, and thus

the intimacy arose; but, since the circumstances took place which I

am about to relate, that young lady declares that _she_ was not the

person who brought him to Bulgaria House,--nothing but the infatuation

and entreaties of Mrs. Alderman Grampus could ever have induced her

to receive him. The reader will gather from this, that Dandolo's

after-conduct at Miss Pidge's was not satisfactory,--nor was it; and

may every mistress of such an establishment remember that confidence

can be sometimes misplaced; that friendship is frequently but another

name for villany.

But to our story. The stalwart and active Dandolo delighted for some

time the young ladies at Miss Pidge's by the agility which he displayed

in the dance, as well as the strength and manliness of his form, as

exhibited in the new amusement which he taught. In a very short time,

Miss Binx, a stout young lady of seventeen, who had never until his

appearance walked half a mile without puffing like an apoplectic Lord

Mayor, could dance the cachouca, swarm up a pole with the agility

of a cat, and hold out a chair for three minutes without winking.

Miss Jacobs could very nearly climb through a ladder (Jacob's ladder

he profanely called it); and Miss Bole ring such changes upon the

dumb-bells as might have been heard at Edmonton, if the bells could

have spoken. But the most promising pupil of Professor Dandolo, as

indeed the fairest young creature in the establishment of Bulgaria

House, was Miss Adeliza Grampus, daughter of the alderman whose name

we have mentioned. The pride of her mother, the idol of her opulent

father, Adeliza Grampus was in her nineteenth year. Eyes have often

been described; but it would require bluer ink than ours to depict

the orbs of Adeliza; the snow when it first falls in Cheapside is not

whiter than her neck,--when it has been for some days upon the ground,

trampled by dustmen and jarvies, trodden down by sweeps and gentlemen

going to business, not blacker than her hair. Slim as the Monument on

Fish-street-hill, her form was slender and tall: but it is needless to

recapitulate her charms, and difficult indeed to describe them. Let

the reader think of his first love, and fancy Adeliza. Dandolo, who

was employed to instruct her, saw her, and fancied her too, as many a

fellow of his inflammable temperament would have done in his place.

There are few situations in life which can be so improved by an

enterprising mind as that of a dancing-master,--I mean in a tender

or amatory point of view. The dancing-master has over the back, the

hands, the feet and shoulders of his pupils an absolute command; and,

being by nature endowed with so much authority, can speedily spread

his sway from the limbs to the rest of the body, and to the mind

inclusive. "_Toes a little more out, Miss Adeliza_," cries he with the

tenderest air in the world; "back a _little_ more straight," and he

gently seizes her hand, he raises it considerably above the level of

her ear, he places the tips of his left-hand fingers gently upon the

young lady's spine, and in this seducing attitude gazes tenderly into

her eyes! I say that no woman at any age can stand this attitude and

this look, especially when darted from such eyes as those of Dandolo.

On the two first occasions when the adventurer attempted this audacious

manœuvre, his victim blushed only and trembled; on the third she

dropped her full eyelids and turned ghastly pale. "A glass of water,"

cried Adeliza, "or I faint." The dancing-master hastened eagerly

away to procure the desired beverage, and, as he put it to her lips,

whispered thrillingly in her ear, "Thine, thine for ever, Adeliza!"

Miss Grampus sank back in the arms of Miss Binx, but not before her

raptured lover saw her eyes turning towards the ceiling, and her clammy

lips whispering the name of "Dandolo."

When Madame Schroeder, in the opera of Fidelio, cries, "Nichts, nichts,

mein Florestan," it is as nothing compared to the tenderness with which

Miss Grampus uttered that soft name.

"Dandolo!" would she repeat to her confidante, Miss Binx; "the name

was beautiful and glorious in the olden days; five hundred years

since, a myriad of voices shouted it in Venice, when one who bore it

came forward to wed the sea--the Doge's bride! the blue Adriatic! the

boundless and eternal main! The frightened Turk shrunk palsied at the

sound; it was louder than the loudest of the cannon, or the stormy

screaming of the tempest! Dandolo! how many brave hearts beat to hear

that name! how many bright swords flashed forth at that resistless

war-cry! Oh, Binx," would Adeliza continue, fondly pressing the arm of

that young lady, "is it not passing strange that one of that mighty

ducal race should have lived to this day, and lived to love _me_! But

I, too," Adeliza would add archly, "am, as you know, a daughter of the

sea."

The fact was, that the father of Miss Adeliza Grampus was a

shellfishmonger, which induced the young lady to describe herself as

a daughter of Ocean. She received her romantic name from her mother

after reading Miss Swipes's celebrated novel of Toby of Warsaw, and had

been fed from her youth upwards with so much similar literary ware,

that her little mind had gone distracted. Her father had sent her from

home at fifteen, because she had fallen in love with the young man who

opened natives in the shop, and had vowed to slay herself with the

oyster-knife. At Miss Pidge's her sentiment had not deserted her; she

knew all Miss Landon by heart, had a lock of Mr. Thomas Moore's hair or

wig, and read more novels and poetry than ever. And thus the red-haired

dancing-master became in her eyes a Venetian nobleman, with whom it was

her pride and pleasure to fall in love.

Being a parlour-boarder at Miss Pidge's seminary, (a privilege which

was acquired by paying five annual guineas extra,) Miss Grampus was

permitted certain liberties which were not accorded to scholars of the

ordinary description. She and Miss Binx occasionally strolled into the

village by themselves; they visited the library unattended; they went

upon little messages for the Misses Pidge; they walked to church alone,

either before or after the long row of young virgins who streamed

out on every Sabbath day from between the filigree iron railings of

Bulgaria House. It is my painful duty to state that on several of

these exclusive walks they were followed, or met, by the insidious and

attentive teacher of gymnastics.

Soon Miss Binx would lag behind, and--shall I own it?--would make up

for the lost society of her female friend by the company of a man,

a friend of the professor, mysterious and agreeable as himself. May

the mistresses of all the establishments for young ladies in this

kingdom, or queendom rather, peruse this, and reflect how dangerous

it is for young ladies of any age,--ay, even for parlour-boarders--to

go out alone! In the present instance Miss Grampus enjoyed a more

than ordinary liberty, it is true: when the elder Misses Pidge would

remonstrate, Miss Zela would anxiously yield to her request; and

why?--the reason may be gathered from the following conversation which

passed between the infatuated girl and the wily _maître de danse_.

"How, Roderick," would Adeliza say, "how, in the days of our first

acquaintance, did it chance that you always addressed yourself to that

odious Zela Pidge, and never deigned to breathe a syllable to me?"

"My lips didn't speak to you, Addly," (for to such a pitch of

familiarity had they arrived,) "but my heyes did."

Adeliza was not astonished by the peculiarity of his pronunciation,

for, to say truth, it was that commonly adopted in her native home and

circle. "And mine," said she tenderly, "they followed when yours were

not fixed upon them, for _then_ I dared not look upwards. And though

all on account of Miss Pidge you could not hear the accents of my

voice, you might have heard the beatings of my heart!"

"I did, I did," gasped Roderick; "I eard them haudibly. I never spoke

to you then, for I feared to waken that foul friend sispicion. I wished

to henter your seminary, to be continually near you, to make you love

me; therefore I wooed the easy and foolish Miss Pidge, therefore I took

upon me the disguise of--ha! ha!--of a dancing-master." (And the young

man's countenance assumed a grim and demoniac smile.) "Yes; I degraded

my name and my birthright,--I wore these ignoble trappings, and all for

the love of thee, my Adeliza!" Here Signor Dandolo would have knelt

down, but the road was muddy; and, his trousers being of nankeen, his

gallant purpose was frustrated.

But the story must out, for the conversation above narrated has

betrayed to the intelligent reader a considerable part of it. The fact

is, as we have said, that Miss Zela Pidge, dancing at the Hackney

assembly, was introduced to this man; that he had no profession,--no

means even of subsistence; that he saw enough of this lady to be aware

that he could make her useful to his purpose; and he who had been, we

believe it in our conscience, no better than a travelling mountebank or

harlequin, appeared at Bulgaria House in the character of a professor

of gymnastics. The governess in the first instance entertained for

him just such a _penchant_ as the pupil afterwards felt; the latter

discovered the weakness of her mistress, and hence arose Miss Pidge's

indulgence, and Miss Grampus's fatal passion.

"Mysterious being!" continued Adeliza, resuming the conversation which

has been broken by the above explanatory hints, "how did I learn to

love thee? Who art thou?--what dire fate has brought thee hither in

this lowly guise to win the heart of Adeliza?"

"Hadeliza," cried he, "you say well; _I am not what I seem_. I cannot

tell thee what I am; a tale of horror, of crime, forbids the dreadful

confession. But dark as I am, and wretched, nay, wicked and desperate,

I love thee, Hadeliza,--love thee with the rapturous devotion of purer

days: the tenderness of happier times! I am sad now and fallen, lady;

suffice it that I once was happy, ay, respectable."

Adeliza's cheek grew deadly pale, her step faltered, and she would have

fallen to the ground, had she not been restrained by the strong arm of

her lover. "I know not," said she, as she clung timidly to his neck,

"I know not, I hask not, if guilt's in that art, I know that I love

thee, whatever thou hart."

"_Gilt_ in my heart," said Dandolo, "gilt in the heart of Roderick?

No, never!" and he drew her towards him, and on her bonnet, her veil,

her gloves, nay, on her very cheeks, he imprinted a thousand maddening

kisses. "But say, my sweet one," continued he, "who art _thou_? I know

you as yet, only by your lovely baptismal name, and your other name of

Grampus."

Adeliza looked down and blushed. "My parents are lowly," she said.

"But how then came you at such a seminary?" said he; "twenty pound a

quarter, extras and washing not included."

"They are humble, but wealthy."

"Ha! who is your father?"

"An alderman of yon metropolis."

"An alderman! and what is his profession?"

"I blush to tell; he is--_an oystermonger_."

"AN OYSTERMONGER!" screamed Roderick in the largest capitals. "Ha!

ha! ha! this is too much!" and he dropped Adeliza's hand, and never

spoke to her during the rest of her walk. They moved moodily on for

some time, Miss Binx and the other young man marching astonished in

the rear. At length they came within sight of the seminary. "Here is

Bulgaria House," cried the maiden steadily; "Roderick, we must part!"

The effort was too much for her: she flung herself hysterically into

his arms.

But, oh, horror! a scream was heard from Miss Binx, who was seen

scuttling at double-quick time towards the school-house. Her young

man had bolted completely; and close at the side of the lovely though

imprudent couple, stood the angry--and justly angry--Miss Zela Pidge!

"Oh, Ferdinand," said she, "is it thus you deceive me? Did I bring you

to Bulgaria House for this?--did I give you money to buy clothes for

this, that you should go by false names, and make love to that saucy,

slammerkin, sentimental Miss Grampus? Ferdinand, Ferdinand," cried she,

"is this true,--can I credit my eyes?"

"D--your eyes!" said the signor angrily as he darted at her a withering

look, and retired down the street. His curses might be heard long

after he had passed. He never appeared more at Bulgaria House, for he

received his dismissal the next day.

That night all the front windows of the Miss Pidges' seminary were

smashed to shivers.

* * * * *

On the following Thursday _two_ places were taken in the coach to town.

On the back seat sate the usher, on the front the wasted and miserable

Adeliza Grampus.

* * * * *

CHAPTER II.

But the matter did not end here. Miss Grampus's departure elicited

from her a disclosure of several circumstances which, we must say,

in no degree increased the reputation of Miss Zela Pidge. The

discoveries which she made were so awkward, the tale of crime and

licentiousness revealed by her so deeply injurious to the character of

the establishment, that the pupils emigrated from it in scores. Miss

Binx retired to her friends at Wandsworth, Miss Jacobs to her relations

in Houndsditch, and other young ladies not mentioned in this history

to other and more moral schools; so that absolutely, at the end of a

single half year, such had been the scandal of the story, the Misses

Pidge were left with only two pupils,--Miss Dibble, the articled young

lady, and Miss Bole, the grocer's daughter, who came in exchange for

tea, candles, and other requisites supplied to the establishment by her

father.

"I knew it, I knew it!" cried Zela passionately, as she trod the

echoing and melancholy school-room; "he told me that none ever

prospered who loved him,--that every flower was blighted upon which he

shone! Ferdinand, Ferdinand! you have caused ruin there" (pointing to

the empty cupboards and forms); "but what is that to the blacker ruin

_here_!" and the poor creature slapped her heart, and the big tears

rolled down her chin, and so into her tucker.

A very, very few weeks after this, the plate of Bulgaria House was

removed for ever. That mansion is now designated "Moscow Hall, by Mr.

Swishtail and assistants:"--the bankrupt and fugitive Misses Pidge have

fled, Heaven knows whither! for the steamers to Boulogne cost more than

five shillings in those days.

Alderman Grampus, as may be imagined, did not receive his daughter

with any extraordinary degree of courtesy. "He was as grumpy," Mrs. G.

remarked, "on the occasion as a sow with the measles."--But had he not

reason? A lovely daughter who had neglected her education, forgotten

her morals for the second time, and fallen almost a prey to villains!

Miss Grampus for some months was kept in close confinement, nor ever

suffered to stir, except occasionally to Bunhill-row for air, and to

church for devotion. Still, though she knew him to be false,--though

she knew that under a different, perhaps a prettier name, he had

offered the same vows to another,--she could not but think of Roderick.

That _Professor_ (as well--too well--he may be called!) knew too

well her father's name and reputation to experience any difficulty

in finding his abode. It was, as every City man knows, in Cheapside;

and thither Dandolo constantly bent his steps: but though he marched

unceasingly about the mansion, he never (mysteriously) would pass it.

He watched Adeliza walking, he followed her to church; and many and

many a time as she jostled out at the gate of the Artillery-ground, or

the beadle-flanked portal of Bow, a tender hand would meet hers, an

active foot would press upon hers, a billet discreetly delivered was as

adroitly seized, to hide in the recesses of her pocket-handkerchief,

or to nestle in the fragrance of her bosom! Love! Love! how ingenious

thou art! thou canst make a ladder of a silken thread, or a weapon

of a straw; thou peerest like sunlight into a dungeon; thou scalest,

like forlorn hope, a castle wall; the keep is taken!--the foeman has

fled!--the banner of love floats triumphantly over the corpses of the

slain![15]

Thus, though denied the comfort of personal intercourse, Adeliza and

her lover maintained a frequent and tender correspondence. Nine times

at least in a week, she by bribing her maid-servant, managed to convey

letters to the Professor, to which he at rarer intervals, though with

equal warmth, replied.

"Why," said the young lady in the course of this correspondence, "why,

when I cast my eyes upon my Roderick, do I see him so wofully changed

in outward guise? He wears not the dress which formerly adorned him. Is

he poor?--is he in disguise?--do debts oppress him, or traitors track

him for his blood? Oh that my arms might shield him!--Oh that my purse

might aid him! It is the fondest wish of

"ADELIZA G.

"P.S.--Aware of your fondness for shell-fish, Susan will leave a barrel

of oysters at the Swan with Two Necks, directed to you, as per desire.

"AD. G.

"P.S.--Are you partial to kippered salmon? The girl brings three pounds

of it wrapped in a silken handkerchief. 'Tis marked with the hair of

"ADELIZA.

"P.S.--I break open my note to say that you will find in it a small pot

of anchovy paste: may it prove acceptable. Heigho! I would that I could

accompany it.

"A.G."

It may be imagined, from the text of this note, that Adeliza had

profited not a little by the perusal of Mrs. Swipes's novels; and

it also gives a pretty clear notion of the condition of her lover.

When that gentleman was a professor at Bulgaria House, his costume

had strictly accorded with his pretensions. He wore a black German

coat loaded with frogs and silk trimming, a white broad-brimmed

beaver, hessians, and nankeen tights. His costume at present was

singularly changed for the worse: a rough brown frock-coat dangled

down to the calves of his brawny legs, where likewise ended a pair of

greasy shepherd's-plaid trousers; a dubious red waistcoat, a blue or

bird's-eye neckerchief, and bluchers, (or half-boots,) remarkable for

thickness and for mud, completed his attire. But he looked superior to

his fortune; he wore his grey hat very much on one ear; he incessantly

tugged at his smoky shirt-collar, and walked jingling the halfpence

(when he had any) in his pocket. He was, in fact, no better than an

adventurer, and the innocent Adeliza was his prey.

Though the Professor read the first part of this letter with hope and

pleasure, it may be supposed that the three postscripts were still

more welcome to him,--in fact, he literally did what is often done in

novels, he _devoured_ them; and Adeliza, on receiving a note from him

the next day, after she had eagerly broken the seal, and with panting

bosom and flashing eye glanced over the contents,--Adeliza, we say, was

not altogether pleased when she read the following:

"Your goodness, dearest, passes belief; but never did poor fellow need

it more than your miserable, faithful Roderick. Yes! I _am_ poor,--I

_am_ tracked by hell-hounds,--I _am_ changed in looks, and dress, and

happiness,--in all but love for thee!

"Hear my tale! I come of a noble Italian family,--the noblest, ay,

in Venice. We were free once, and rich, and happy; but the Prussian

autograph has planted his banner on our towers,--the talents of his

haughty heagle have seized our wealth, and consigned most of our race

to dungeons. I am not a prisoner, only an exile. A mother, a bed-ridden

grandmother, and five darling sisters, escaped with me from Venice, and

now share my poverty and my home. But I have wrestled with misfortune

in vain; I have struggled with want, till want has overcome me.

Adeliza, I WANT BREAD!

"The kippered salmon was very good, the anchovies admirable. But, oh,

my love! how thirsty they make those who have no means of slaking

thirst! My poor grandmother lies delirious in her bed, and cries in

vain for drink. Alas! our water is cut off; I have none to give her.

The oysters was capital. Bless thee, bless thee! angel of bounty! Have

you any more sich, and a few shrimps? My sisters are _very_ fond of

them.

"Half-a-crown would oblige. But thou art too good to me already, and I

blush to ask thee for more. "Adieu, Adeliza,

"the wretched but faithful

"RODERICK FERDINAND,

"(38th Count of Dandolo.)

"Bell-yard, June --."

A shade of dissatisfaction, we say, clouded Adeliza's fair features

as she perused this note; and yet there was nothing in it which the

tenderest lover might not write. But the shrimps, the half-crown, the

horrid picture of squalid poverty presented by the count, sickened her

young heart; the innate delicacy of the woman revolted at the thought

of all this misery.

But better thoughts succeeded: her breast heaved as she read and

re-read the singular passage concerning the Prussian autograph, who had

planted his standard at Venice. "I knew it!" she cried, "I knew it!--he

is of noble race! O Roderick, I will perish, but I will help thee!"

Alas! she was not well enough acquainted with history to perceive that

the Prussian autograph had nothing to do with Venice, and had forgotten

altogether that she herself had coined the story which this adventurer

returned to her.

But a difficulty presented itself to Adeliza's mind. Her lover asked

for money,--where was she to find it? The next day the till of the shop

was empty, and a weeping apprentice dragged before the Lord Mayor. It

is true that no signs of the money were found upon him; it is true

that he protested his innocence; but he was dismissed the alderman's

service, and passed a month at Bridewell, because Adeliza Grampus had a

needy lover!

"Dearest," she wrote, "will three-and-twenty and sevenpence suffice?

'Tis all I have: take it, and with it the fondest wishes of your

Adeliza.

"A sudden thought! Our apprentice is dismissed. My father dines abroad;

I shall be in the retail establishment all the night, _alone_.

"A.G."

No sooner had the Professor received this note than his mind was made

up. "I will see her," he said; "I will enter that accursed shop." He

did, and _to his ruin_.

* * * * *

That night Mrs. Grampus and her daughter took possession of the bar or

counter, in the place which Adeliza called the retail establishment,

and which is commonly denominated the shop. Mrs. Grampus herself

operated with the oyster-knife, and served the Milton morsels to the

customers. Age had not diminished her skill, nor had wealth rendered

her too proud to resume at need a profession which she had followed

in early days. Adeliza flew gracefully to and fro with the rolls, the

vinegar bottle with perforated cork, and the little pats of butter.

A little boy ran backwards and forwards to the Blue Lion over the

way, for the pots of porter, or for the brandy and water, which some

gentlemen take after the play.

Midnight arrived. Miss Grampus was looking through the window, and

contrasting the gleaming gas which shone upon the ruby lobsters, with

the calm moon which lightened up the Poultry, and threw a halo round

the Royal Exchange. She was lost in maiden meditation, when her eye

fell upon a pane of glass in her own window: squeezed against this,

flat and white, was the nose of a man!--that man was Roderick Dandolo!

He seemed to be gazing at the lobsters more intensely than at Adeliza;

he had his hands in his pockets, and was whistling Jim Crow.[16]

Miss Grampus felt sick with joy; she staggered to the counter, and

almost fainted. The Professor concluded his melody, and entered at

once into the shop. He pretended to have no knowledge of Miss Grampus,

but _aborded_ the two ladies with easy elegance and irresistible

good-humour.

"Good evening, ma'am," said he, bowing profoundly to the _elder_ lady.

"What a precious hot evening, _to_ be sure!--hot, ma'am, and hungry, as

they say. I could not resist them lobsters, 'specially when I saw the

lady behind 'em."

At this gallant speech Mrs. Grampus blushed, or looked as if she would

blush, and said,

"Law, sir!"

"Law, indeed, ma'am," playfully continued the Professor; "you're a

precious deal better than law,--you're _divinity_, ma'am; and this, I

presume, is your sister?"

He pointed to Adeliza as he spoke, who, pale and mute, stood fainting

against a heap of ginger-beer bottles. The old lady was quite won by

this stale compliment.

"My daughter, sir," she said. "Addly, lay a cloth for the gentleman. Do

you take hoysters, sir, hor lobsters? Both is very fine."

"Why, ma'am," said he, "to say truth, I have come forty miles since

dinner, and don't care if I have a little of both. I'll begin, if you

please, with that there, (Lord bless its claws, they're as red as your

lips!) and we'll astonish a few of the natives afterwards, _by_ your

leave."

Mrs. Grampus was delighted with the manners and the appetite of the

stranger. She proceeded forthwith to bisect the lobster, while the

Professor in a _dégagé_ manner, his cane over his shoulder, and a

cheerful whistle upon his lips, entered the little parlour, and took

possession of a box and a table.

He was no sooner seated than, from a scuffle, a giggle, and a smack,

Mrs. Grampus was induced to suspect that something went wrong in the

oyster-room.

"Hadeliza!" cried she; and that young woman returned blushing now like

a rose, who had been as pale before as a lily.

Mrs. G. herself took in the lobster, bidding her daughter sternly to

stay in the shop. She approached the stranger with an angry air, and

laid the lobster before him.

"For shame, sir!" said she solemnly; but all of a sudden she began to

giggle like her daughter, and her speech ended with an "_Have done

now!_"

We were not behind the curtain, and cannot of course say what took

place; but it is evident that the Professor was a general lover of the

sex.

Mrs. Grampus returned to the shop, rubbing her lips with her fat

arms, and restored to perfect good-humour. The little errand-boy was

despatched over the way for a bottle of Guinness and a glass of brandy

and water.

"HOT WITH!" shouted a manly voice from the eating-room, and Adeliza was

pained to think that in her presence her lover could eat so well.

He ate indeed as if he had never eaten before: here is the bill as

written by Mrs. Grampus herself.

"Two lobsters at 3_s._ 6_d._ 7_s._ 0_d._

Sallit 1 3

2 Bottils Doubling Stott 2 4

11 Doz. Best natifs 7 4

14 Pads of Botter 1 2

4 Glasses B & W. 4 0

Bredd (love & 1/2) 1 2

Brakitch of tumler 1 6

---------

"To Samuel Grampus, 1 5 9

"At the Mermaid in Cheapside.

"Shell-fish in all varieties. N.B. a great saving in taking a quantity."

"A saving in _taking a quantity_," said the stranger archly. "Why,

ma'am, you ought to let me off _very cheap_;" and the Professor, the

pot-boy, Adeliza, and her mamma, grinned equally at this pleasantry.

"However, never mind the pay, missis," continued he; "we an't agoing

to quarrel about _that_. Hadd another glass of brandy and water to the

bill, and bring it me, when it shall be as I am now."

"Law, sir," simpered Mrs. Grampus, "how's that?"

"_Reseated_, ma'am, to be sure," replied he as he sank back upon the

table. The old lady went laughing away, pleased with her merry and

facetious customer; the little boy picked up the oyster-shells, of

which a mighty pyramid was formed at the Professor's feet.

"Here, Sammy," cried out shrill Mrs. Grampus from the shop, "go over to

the Blue Lion and get the gentleman his glass: but no, you are better

where you are, pickin' up them shells. Go you, Hadeliza; it is but

across the way."

Adeliza went with a very bad grace; she had hoped to exchange at

least a few words with him her soul adored; and her mother's jealousy

prevented the completion of her wish.

She had scarcely gone, when Mr. Grampus entered from his dinner-party.

But, though fond of pleasure, he was equally faithful to business:

without a word, he hung up his brass-buttoned coat, put on his hairy

cap, and stuck his sleeves through his apron.

As Mrs. Grampus was tying it, (an office which this faithful lady

regularly performed,) he asked her what business had occurred during

his absence.

"Not so bad," said she; "two pound ten to-night, besides one pound

eight to receive;" and she handed Mr. Grampus the bill.

"How many are there on 'em?" said that gentleman smiling, as his eye

gladly glanced over the items of the account.

"Why, that's the best of all: how many do you think?"

"If four did it," said Mr. Grampus, "they wouldn't have done badly

neither."

"What do you think of _one_?" cried Mrs. G. laughing, "and he an't done

yet. Haddy is gone to fetch him another glass of brandy and water."

Mr. Grampus looked very much alarmed. "Only one, and you say he an't

paid?"

"No," said the lady.

Mr. Grampus seized the bill, and rushed wildly into the dining-room:

the little boy was picking up the oyster-shells still, there were so

many of them; the Professor was seated on the table, laughing as if

drunk, and picking his teeth with his fork.

Grampus, shaking in every joint, held out the bill: a horrid thought

crossed him; he had seen that face before!

The Professor kicked sneeringly into the air the idle piece of paper,

and swung his legs recklessly to and fro.

"What a flat you are," shouted he in a voice of thunder, "to think I'm

a goin' to pay! Pay! I never pay--I'M DANDO!"

The people in the other boxes crowded forward to see the celebrated

stranger; the little boy grinned as he dropped two hundred and

forty-four oyster-shells, and Mr. Grampus rushed madly into his front

shop, shrieking for a watchman.

As he ran, he stumbled over something on the floor,--a woman and a

glass of brandy and water lay there extended. Like Tarquinia reversed,

Elijah Grampus was trampling over the lifeless body of Adeliza.

Why enlarge upon the miserable theme? The confiding girl, in returning

with the grog from the Blue Lion, had arrived at the shop only in time

to hear the fatal name of DANDO. She saw him, tipsy and triumphant,

bestriding the festal table, and yelling with horrid laughter! The

truth flashed upon her--she fell!

Lost to worldly cares in contemplating the sorrows of their idolized

child, her parents forgot all else beside. Mrs. G. held the

vinegar-cruet to her nostrils; her husband brought the soda-water

fountain to play upon her; it restored her to life, but not to sense.

When Adeliza Grampus rose from that trance she was a MANIAC!

But what became of _the deceiver_? The gormandizing ruffian, the lying

renegade, the fiend in human shape, escaped in the midst of this scene

of desolation. He walked unconcerned through the shop, his hat cocked

on one side as before, swaggering as before, whistling as before:

far in the moonlight might you see his figure; long, long in the

night-silence rang his demoniac melody of Jim Crow!

* * * * *

When Samuel the boy cleaned out the shop in the morning, and made the

inventory of the goods, a silver fork, a plated ditto, a dish, and a

pewter pot were found to be wanting. Ingenuity will not be long in

guessing the name of _the thief_.

* * * * *

Gentles, my tale is told. If it may have deterred one soul from vice,

my end is fully answered: if it may have taught to school-mistresses

carefulness, to pupils circumspection, to youth the folly of sickly

sentiment, the pain of bitter deception; to manhood the crime, the

_meanness_ of gluttony, the vice which it occasions, and the wicked

passions it fosters; if these, or any of these, have been taught by the

above tale, Goliah Gahagan seeks for no other reward.

NOTE. Please send the proceeds as requested per letter; the bearer

being directed not to give up the manuscript without.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 15: We cannot explain this last passage; but it is so

beautiful, that the reader will pardon the omission of sense, which the

author certainly could have put in if he liked.]

[Footnote 16: I know this is an anachronism; but I only mean that he

was performing one of the popular melodies of the time.--G.G.]

BIDDY TIBS, WHO CARED FOR NOBODY.