to adjust her close widow's cap, too plainly
showed how fruitless was the attempt to deceive herself.

We sat down by the head of the sofa, but said nothing, for we saw the
breath of life was passing gently but rapidly from the young form before
us. At every respiration, his heart beat more slowly.

The boy placed one hand in ours, grasped his mother's arm with the other,
drew her hastily towards him, and fervently kissed her cheek. There was
a pause. He sunk back upon his pillow, and looked long and earnestly in
his mother's face.

'William, William!' murmured the mother, after a long interval, 'don't
look at me so--speak to me, dear!'

The boy smiled languidly, but an instant afterwards his features resolved
into the same cold, solemn gaze.

'William, dear William! rouse yourself; don't look at me so, love--pray
don't! Oh, my God! what shall I do!' cried the widow, clasping her hands
in agony--'my dear boy! he is dying!' The boy raised himself by a
violent effort, and folded his hands together--'Mother! dear, dear
mother, bury me in the open fields--anywhere but in these dreadful
streets. I should like to be where you can see my grave, but not in
these close crowded streets; they have killed me; kiss me again, mother;
put your arm round my neck--'

He fell back, and a strange expression stole upon his features; not of
pain or suffering, but an indescribable fixing of every line and muscle.

The boy was dead.

SCENES

CHAPTER I--THE STREETS--MORNING

The appearance presented by the streets of London an hour before sunrise,
on a summer's morning, is most striking even to the few whose unfortunate
pursuits of pleasure, or scarcely less unfortunate pursuits of business,
cause them to be well acquainted with the scene. There is an air of
cold, solitary desolation about the noiseless streets which we are
accustomed to see thronged at other times by a busy, eager crowd, and
over the quiet, closely-shut buildings, which throughout the day are
swarming with life and bustle, that is very impressive.

The last drunken man, who shall find his way home before sunlight, has
just staggered heavily along, roaring out the burden of the drinking song
of the previous night: the last houseless vagrant whom penury and police
have left in the streets, has coiled up his chilly limbs in some paved
comer, to dream of food and warmth. The drunken, the dissipated, and the
wretched have disappeared; the more sober