consequently not
well suited to deal with those who, more cautious by temperament, and
less given to exhibit their feelings, find their profit in trading upon
the warmer and less suspectful natures of others. In proportion as his
daily disappointment preyed upon him, he displayed the effect in his
manner and appearance, and at length, between mental agitation and
bodily fatigue, became the mere wreck of what he had been. It was thus
that, after a long day passed in toil and excitement, he strolled into
one of the squares after nightfall, to seek in the solitude of the spot
some calm and tranquillity for his harassed spirit.

It was the autumn,--that season when Dublin is almost deserted by its
residents, and scarcely any of those who constitute what is called
society were in the capital. Mac-Naghten, therefore, was not likely to
find any to interfere with the loneliness he sought for, and loitered
unmolested for hours through the lanes and alleys of the silent square.
There was a certain freshness in the night air that served to rally his
jaded frame; and he felt, in the clear and half* frosty atmosphere, a
sense of invigoration that made him unwilling to leave the spot.
While thus gathering strength for the coming day, he thought he heard
footsteps in the walk behind him; he listened, and now distinctly heard
the sound of a voice talking in loud tones, and the shuffling sounds of
feet on the gravel. Stepping aside into the copse, he waited to see who
and for what purpose might they be who came there at this unfrequented
hour.

To his astonishment, a solitary figure moved past, walking with short,
hasty steps, while he talked and gesticulated to himself with every
appearance of intense excitement. Mac-Naghten had but to hear a word
or two, at once to recognize the speaker as Curtis--that strange,
half-misanthropic creature, who, partly from fault, and in part from
misfortune, now lived in a state of friendless isolation.

It was rumored that, although his bearing and manner before the Court
displayed consummate coolness and self-possession, that the effect of
the recent trial had been to shake his intellect seriously, and, while
impressing upon him more strongly the notion of his being selected and
marked out for persecution by the Government, to impart to him a kind
of martyr's determination to perish in the cause. At no time were he and
Dan congenial spirits. Their natures and their temperaments were widely
differ