try, though something scarcely to be defined,
but equivocal and provocative of suspicion, made him displeasing to
the prudent, and vaguely alarmed the experience of the sober, still,
no positive accusation was attached to the general integrity of his
character, and the mere dissipation of his habits was naturally little
known out of his familiar circle. Hence he had the most presumptuous
confidence in himself,--a confidence native to his courage, and
confirmed by his experience. His conscience was so utterly obtuse that
he might almost be said to present the phenomenon of a man without
conscience at all. Unlike Conrad, he did not "know himself a villain;"
all that he knew of himself was that he was a remarkably clever fellow,
without prejudice or superstition. That, with all his gifts, he had
not succeeded better in life, he ascribed carelessly to the surpassing
wisdom of his philosophy. He could have done better if he had enjoyed
himself less; but was not enjoyment the be-all and end-all of this
little life? More often, indeed, in the moods of his bitter envy, he
would lay the fault upon the world. How great he could have been, if he
had been rich and high-born! Oh, he was made to spend, not to save,--to
command, not to fawn! He was not formed to plod through the dull
mediocrities of fortune; he must toss up for the All or the Nothing! It
was no control over himself that made Varney now turn his thoughts from
certain grave designs on Percival St. John to the brutal debauchery of
his three companions,--rather, he then yielded most to his natural
self. And when the morning star rose over the night he passed with low
profligates and venal nymphs; when over the fragments on the board and
emptied bottles and drunken riot dawn gleamed and saw him in all the
pride of his magnificent organization and the cynicism of his measured
vice, fair, fresh, and blooming amidst those maudlin eyes and flushed
cheeks and reeling figures, laughing hideously over the spectacle he had
provoked, and kicking aside, with a devil's scorn, the prostrate form of
the favoured partner whose head had rested on his bosom, as alone with
a steady step, he passed the threshold and walked into the fresh,
healthful air,--Gabriel Varney enjoyed the fell triumph of his hell-born
vanity, and revelled in his sentiment of superiority and power.

Meanwhile, on quitting Varney young Percival strolled on as the whim
directed him. Turning down the Haymarket, he gaine