t many small sins, and
the incense that rises from a gold censer, offered by pious hands, will
do much to correct the pungency of even the sal test tears."

Build a chapel, Con; endow a nunnery,--or, if you don't like shutting
up young ladies, let it be a "monkery;" make an investment in hair-cloth
shirts and cord girdles; buy shares in the grand Purgatory scheme,
and take out "next world scrip," in the shape of masses, jubilees, and
novenas. You can keep a bishop, without feeling the cost, and have
a whole candle manufactory perpetually at the service of "Our Lady,"
without being obliged to curtail one of your own wax-lights. What a
revulsion did this bright thought give to all my previous doubtings!
not only satisfying my scruples here, but suggesting very comfortable
associations for hereafter. By this proceeding, Con, thought I, you are
"hedging against hereafter;" you may be a Sardanapalus while you live,
and a saint after death: it's betting upon the "double event," with all
the odds in your favor.

I must say, for the sake of my credit, that I resolved to "do the thing
handsomely." I determined that a finer virgin should not be seen than
mine, and that if a "Saint Cregan" could be discovered in the catalogue,
I'd adopt him as my patron, at any cost. Neither would I forget the poor
old miner in my pious offerings: he should have masses said for him for
a full twelvemonth to come, and I 'd offer a silver pickaxe to any of
the calendar who would deign to accept it. In a word, there was nothing
that money could do (and what can it not?) that I would not engage to
perform, so that the Church should consent to take me into partnership.

Never was a poor head exposed to such a conflict of discordant thoughts.
Plans of pleasures and pilgrimages; gorgeous visions of enjoyment
warring with fancies of sackcloth and scourges; sumptuous dinners,
equipages, theatres, balls, and festivities mingling with fastings,
processions, and mortifications, made up a chaos only a shade above
downright insanity.

The day wore on, and it was late in the afternoon ere I bethought me
of the poor Gambusino, beside whose open grave I still sat, lost in
speculation. "Poor fellow!" said I, as I hoisted his coffin on my
shoulder, "you have got a rich pall-bearer for one who died in such
poverty; you little thought you would be borne to the grave by a
millionnaire!" As I said this--I shame to own it--there was a tinge of
self-commendation in th