His age-his kindness, disarmed Pen's anger somewhat, and made Arthur feel no little compunction for the deed which he was about to do. He knew that the announcement which he was about to make would destroy the darling hope of the old gentleman's life, and create in his breast a woful anger and commotion.

"Hey-hey-I'm off, sir," nodded the Elder; "but I'd like to read a speech of yours in the Times before I go—' Mr. Pendennis said, Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking-hey, sir? hey, Arthur? Begad, you look dev'lish well and healthy, sir. I always said my brother Jack would bring the family right. You must go down into the west, and buy the old estate, sir. Nec tenui pennâ, hey? We'll rise again, sir-rise again on the wing-and, begad, I shouldn't be surprised that you will be a Baronet before you die."

His words smote Pen. "And it is I," he thought, "that am going to fling down the poor old fellow's air-castle. Well, it must be. Here goes.-I-I went into your lodgings at Bury Street, though I did not find you," Pen slowly began-" and I talked with Morgan, uncle."

"Indeed!" The old gentleman's cheek began to flush involuntarily, and he muttered, "The cat's out of the bag now, begad!"

"He told me a story, sir, which gave me the deepest surprise and pain," said Pen.

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The Major tried to look unconcerned. What-that story about— about--Whatdoyoucall 'em, hey?"

"About Miss Amory's father-about Lady Clavering's first husband, and who he is, and what."

"Hem-a devilish awkward affair!" said the old man, rubbing his nose. "I-I've been aware of that-eh-confounded circumstance for some time."

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"I wish I had known it sooner, or not at all," said Arthur, gloomily. “He is all safe," thought the Senior, greatly relieved. "Gad! I should have liked to keep it from you altogether-and from those two poor women, who are as innocent as unborn babes in the transaction." You are right. There is no reason why the two women should hear it; and I shall never tell them-though that villain, Morgan, perhaps may," Arthur said, gloomily. 'He seems disposed to trade upon his secret, and has already proposed terms of ransom to me. I wish I had known of the matter earlier, sir. It is not a very pleasant thought to me that I am engaged to a convict's daughter."

"The very reason why I kept it from you-my dear boy. But Miss Amory is not a convict's daughter, don't you see? Miss Amory is the daughter of Lady Clavering, with fifty or sixty thousand pounds for a fortune; and her father-in-law, a Baronet and country gentleman, of high reputation, approves of the match, and gives up his seat in Parliament to his son-in-law. What can be more simple?"

"Is it true, sir?"

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Begad, yes, it is true, of course it's true. Amory 's dead. I tell you he is dead. The first sign of life he shows, he is dead. He can't

appear. We have him at a dead-lock, like the fellow in the play-the Critic, hey?-devilish amusing play, that Critic. Monstrous witty man Sheridan; and so was his son. By Gad, sir, when I was at the Cape, I remember

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The old gentleman's garrulity, and wish to conduct Arthur to the Cape, perhaps arose from a desire to avoid the subject which was nearest his nephew's heart; but Arthur broke out, interrupting him— If you had told me this tale sooner, I believe you would have spared me and yourself a great deal of pain and disappointment; and I should not have found myself tied to an engagement from which I can't, in honour, recede."

"No begad, we 've fixed you-and a man who's fixed to a seat in Parliament, and a pretty girl, with a couple of thousand a-year, is fixed to no bad thing, let me tell you," said the old man.

"Great Heavens, sir!" said Arthur; "are you blind? Can't

you see?"

"See what, young gentleman?" asked the other.

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See, that rather than trade upon this secret of Amory's," Arthur cried out, "I would go and join my father-in-law at the hulks! See, that rather than take a seat in Parliament as a bribe from Clavering for silence, I would take the spoons off the table! See, that you have given me a felon's daughter for a wife; doomed me to poverty and shame; cursed my career when it might have been—when it might have been so different but for you! Don't you see that we have been playing a guilty game, and have been over-reached ;—that in offering to marry this poor girl, for the sake of her money, and the advancement she would bring, I was degrading myself, and prostituting my honour?

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"What in Heaven's name do you mean, sir?" cried the old man. I mean to say that there is a measure of baseness which I can't pass," Arthur said. "I have no other words for it, and am sorry if they hurt you. I have felt, for months past, that my conduct in this affair has been wicked, sordid, and worldly. I am rightly punished by the event, and having sold myself for money and a seat in Parliament, by losing both."

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man.

How do you mean that you lose either?" shrieked the old gentle"Who the devil's to take your fortune or your seat away from you? By G-, Clavering shall give 'em to you. You shall have every shilling of eighty thousand pounds."

"I'll keep my promise to Miss Amory, sir," said Arthur. "And, begad, her parents shall keep their's to you."

"Not so, please God," Arthur answered. "I have sinned, but, Heaven help me, I will sin no more. I will let Clavering off from that bargain which was made without my knowledge. I will take no money with Blanche but that which was originally settled upon her; and I will try to make her happy. You have done it. You have brought this on me, sir. But you knew no better: and I forgive

"Arthur-in God's name-in your father's, who, by Heavens, was

the proudest man alive, and had the honour of the family always at heart-in mine-for the sake of a poor broken down old fellow, who has always been dev'lish fond of you-don't fling this chance away-I pray you, I beg you, I implore you, my dear, dear boy, don't fling this chance away. It's the making of you. Your 're sure to get on. You'll be a Baronet; it's three thousand a year: dammy, on my knees, there, I beg of you, don't do this."

And the old man actually sank down on his knees, and seizing one of Arthur's hands, looked up piteously at him. It was cruel to remark the shaking hands, the wrinkled and quivering face, the old eyes weeping and winking, the broken voice. "Ah, sir," said Arthur, with a groan. "You have brought pain enough on me, spare me this. You have wished me to marry Blanche. I marry her. For God's sake, sir, rise, I can't bear it."

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You-you mean to say that you will take her as a beggar, and be one yourself?" said the old gentleman, rising up and coughing violently.

"I look at her as a person to whom a great calamity has befallen, and to whom I am promised. She cannot help the misfortune; and as she had my word when she was prosperous, I shall not withdraw it now she is poor. I will not take Clavering's seat, unless afterwards it should be given of his free will. I will not have a shilling more than her original fortune."

"Have the kindness to ring the bell," said the old gentleman. "I have done my best, and said my say; and I'm a dev'lish old fellow. And-and-it don't matter. And-and Shakspeare was right-and Cardinal Wolsey-begad—' and had I but served my God as I 've served you'—yes, on my knees, by Jove, to my own nephew-I mightn't have been-Good night, sir, you needn't trouble yourself to call again."

Arthur took his hand, which the old man left to him; it was quite passive and clammy. He looked very much oldened; and it seemed as if the contest and defeat had quite broken him.

On the next day he kept his bed, and refused to see his nephew.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

IN WHICH THE DECKS BEGIN TO CLEAR.

W

HEN, arrayed in his dressing-gown, Pen, walked up, according to custom, to Warrington's chambers next morning, to inform his friend of the issue of the last night's interview with his uncle; and to ask, as usual, for George's advice and opinion, Mrs. Flanagan, the laundress, was the only person whom Arthur found in the dear old cham bers. George had taken a carpet-bag, and was gone. His address was to his brother's house, in Suffolk. Packages addressed to the newspaper and review for

which he wrote lay on the table, awaiting delivery.

"I found him at the table, when I came, the dear gentleman! Mrs. Flanagan said, "writing at his papers, and one of the candles was burned out; and hard as his bed is, he wasn't in it all night, sir."

Indeed, having sat at the Club until the brawl there became intolerable to him, George had walked home, and had passed the night finishing some work on which he was employed, and to the completion of which he bent himself with all his might. The labour was done, and the night was worn away somehow, and the tardy November dawn came and looked in on the young man as he sate over his desk. In the next day's paper, or quarter's review, many of us very likely admired the work of his genius, the variety of his illustration, the fierce vigour of his satire, the depth of his reason. There was no hint in his writing of the other thoughts which occupied him, and always accompanied him in his work -a tone more melancholy than was customary, a satire more bitter

VOL. II.

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and impatient than that which he afterwards showed, may have marked the writings of this period of his life to the very few persons who knew his style or his name. We have said before, could we know the man's feelings as well as the author's thoughts-how interesting most books would be!—more interesting than merry. I suppose harlequin's face behind his mask is always grave, if not melancholy-certainly each man who lives by the pen, and happens to read this, must remember, if he will, his own experiences, and recal many solemn hours of solitude and labour. What a constant care sate at the side of the desk and accompanied him! Fever or sickness were lying possibly in the next room: a sick child might be there, with a wife watching over it terrified and in prayer or grief might be bearing him down, and the cruel mist before the eyes rendering the paper scarce visible as he wrote on it, and the inexorable necessity drove on the pen. What man among us has not had nights and hours like these? But to the manly heart-severe as these pangs are, they are endurable: long as the night seems the dawn comes at last, and the wounds heal, and the fever abates, and rest comes, and you can afford to look back on the past misery with feelings that are anything but bitter.

Two or three books for reference, fragments of torn up manuscript, drawers open, pens and inkstand, lines half visible on the blotting paper, a bit of sealing wax twisted and bitten and broken into sundry pieces— such relics as these were about the table, and Pen flung himself down in George's empty chair-noting things according to his wont, or in spite of himself. There was a gap in the book-case (next to the old College Plato, with the Boniface Arms), where Helen's Bible used to be. He has taken that with him, thought Pen. He knew why his friend was gone. Dear, dear old George!

Pen rubbed his hand over his eyes. O, how much wiser, how much better, how much nobler he is than I, he thought. Where was such a friend, or such a brave heart? Where shall I ever hear such a frank voice, and kind laughter? Where shall I ever see such a true gentleman? No wonder she loved him. God bless him. What was I com

pared to him? What could she do else but love him? To the end of our days we will be her brothers, as fate wills that we can be no more. We'll be her knights, and wait on her: and when we 're old, we'll say how we loved her. Dear, dear old George!

When Pen descended to his own chambers, his eye fell on the letterbox of his outer door, which he had previously overlooked, and there was a little note to A. P., Esq., in George's well-known handwriting, George had put into Pen's box probably as he was going away.

“Dr Pen,—I shall be half way home when you breakfast, and intend to stay over Christmas, in Norfk, or elsewhere.

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"I have my own opinion of the issue of matters about which we talked St. yesterday; and think my presence de trop. "Vale.

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"Give my very best regards and adieux to your cousin."

G. W."