hortening his journey by swearing over half the distance,
and promising his partners his cordial forgiveness, if ever they
persuaded him again to go to London on a begging expedition!

Oh, Margaret! Margaret! Oh, spirit of the mild and gentle Mildred!
Must I add, that your good money paid this second loan--and yet a
third--a fourth--a fifth? When shall fond woman cease to give--when
shall mean and sordid man be satisfied with something less than all
she has to grant?

CHAPTER IV.

A DISSOLUTION OF PARTNERSHIP.

The most remarkable circumstance in that meeting of the partners,
which ended in Brammel's first visit to London, was the behaviour of
our very dear friend and ally--the volatile Planner--volatile, alas!
no longer. His best friend would not have recognized him on that
deeply interesting occasion. He was a subdued, a shaken man. Every
drop of his brave spirit had been squeezed out of him, and he stood
the mere pulp and rind of his former self. He who, for years, had been
accustomed to look at men, not only in the face, but very
impertinently over their heads, could not drag his shambling vision
now higher than men's shoe-strings. His eye, his heart, his soul was
on the ground. He was disappointed, crushed. Not a syllable did he
utter; not a single word of remonstrance and advice did he presume to
offer in the presence of his associates. He had a sense of guilt, and
men so situated are sometimes tongue-tied. He had, in truth, a great
deal to answer for, and enough to make a livelier man than he
dissatisfied and wretched. Every farthing which had passed from the
bank to the _Pantamorphica_ Association was irrecoverably gone. The
Association itself was in the same condition--gone irrecoverably
likewise. Nothing remained of that once beautiful and promising
vision, but some hundred acres of valueless land, a half-finished and
straggling brick wall, falling rapidly to decay, the foundations of a
theatre, and the rudiments of a temple dedicated to Apollo. Planner
had gazed upon the scene once, when dismal rain was pouring down upon
the ruins, and he burst into bitter tears, and sobbed like a child at
the annihilation of his hopes. He had not courage to look a second
time upon that desolation, and yet he found courage to turn away from
it, and to do a thing more desperate. Ashamed to be beaten, afraid to
meet the just rebuke of Allcraft, he flung himself recklessly into the
hands of a small band of needy specula