call on you this evening, or to-morrow morning, at your hotel?
Where do you stop, sir?"

"This evening be it, if it hasten M'Keown's liberation. Remember,
however, Mr. Basset, I'll hold no converse with you on any other subject
till that be settled, and to my perfect satisfaction."

"A bargain, sir," said he, with a grin of satisfaction; and dropping
back, he suffered me to proceed.

Along the quays I went, and down Dame Street, accompanied by a great mob
of people, who thought in my acquittal they had gained a triumph. For
so it was; every case had its political feature, and seemed to be
intimately connected with the objects of one party or the other.
Partisan cheers,--the watchwords of faction,--were uttered as I went,
and I was made to suffer that least satisfactory of all conditions,
which bestows notoriety without fame, and popularity without merit.

As I entered the hotel, I recognized many of the persons I had seen
there before; but their looks were no longer thrown towards me with the
impertinence they then assumed. On the contrary, a studied desire to
evince courtesy and politeness was evident. "How strange is it!" thought
I; "how differently does the whole world smile to the rich man and to
the poor!" Here were many who could in nowise derive advantage from my
altered condition,--as perfectly independent of me as I of them; and
yet even they showed that degree of deference in their manner which the
expectant bestows upon a patron. So it is, however. The position which
wealth confers is recognized by all; the individual who fills it is but
an attribute of the station.

Life had, indeed, opened on me with a new and very different aspect; and
I felt, as I indulged in the daydreams which the sudden possession of
fortune excites, that to enjoy thoroughly the blessings of independence,
one must have experienced, as I had, the hard pressure of adversity. It
seemed to me that the long road of gloomy fate had at length reached its
turning point, and that I should now travel along a calmer and happier
path. Thoughts of the new career that lay before me were blended with
the memories of the past; hopes they were, but dashed with the shadows
which a blighted affection will throw over the whole stream of life.
Still that evening was one of happiness; not of that excited pleasure
derived from the attainment of a long coveted object, but the calmer
enjoyment felt in the safety of the haven by him who has experienced the