ened between him and that suffering flesh.

CHAPTER XXXI

The thousand pounds were in Algernon's hands at last. He had made his
escape from Boyne's Bank early in the afternoon, that he might obtain the
cheque and feel the money in his pocket before that day's sun was
extinguished. There was a note for five hundred; four notes for a hundred
severally; and two fifties. And all had come to him through the mere
writing down of his name as a recipient of the sum!

It was enough to make one in love with civilization. Money, when it is
once in your pocket, seems to have come there easily, even if you have
worked for it; but if you have done no labour whatever, and still find it
there, your sensations (supposing you to be a butterfly youth--the
typical child of a wealthy country) exult marvellously, and soar above
the conditions of earth.

He knew the very features of the notes. That gallant old Five Hundred,
who might have been a Thousand, but that he had nobly split himself into
centurions and skirmishers, stood in his imaginative contemplation like a
grand white-headed warrior, clean from the slaughter and in
court-ruffles--say, Blucher at the court of the Waterloo Regent. The
Hundreds were his Generals; the Fifties his captains; and each one was
possessed of unlimited power of splitting himself into serviceable
regiments, at the call of his lord, Algernon.

He scarcely liked to make the secret confession that it was the largest
sum he had ever as yet carried about; but, as it heightened his pleasure,
he did confess it for half an instant. Five Hundred in the bulk he had
never attained to. He felt it as a fortification against every mishap in
life.

To a young man commonly in difficulties with regard to the paying of his
cabman, and latterly the getting of his dinner, the sense of elevation
imparted by the sum was intoxicating. But, thinking too much of the Five
Hundred waxed dangerous for the fifties; it dwarfed them to such
insignificance that it made them lose their self-respect. So, Algernon,
pursuing excellent tactics, set his mind upon some stray shillings that
he had a remainder of five pounds borrowed from old Anthony, when he
endeavoured to obtain repayment of the one pound and interest dating from
the night at the theatre. Algernon had stopped his mouth on that point,
as well as concerning his acquaintance with Dahlia, by immediately
attempting to borrow further, whenever Anthony led the way for a word