of dust to be cleared
away. It is my pride--it is my power--it is my revenge."

His visage assumed so completely the expression which I had always
imagined for Shylock, that I should scarcely have been surprised if I
had seen him produce the knife and the scales.

"You are surprised at all this," said he after a pause, in which he
fixed his searching eyes on me. "I see by your countenance, that you
think me a Goth, a monster, a savage.--I think myself none of those
things. I am a man; and, if I am not much deceived, I am also a
philosopher. My life has been a perpetual struggle through a world where
every one worships self. My nation are scorned, and they struggle too.
The Jew has been injured, not by the individual alone, but by all
mankind; and has he not a right to his revenge? He has at last found the
means. He is now absorbing the wealth of all nations. With the wealth he
will have the power; and another half century will not elapse, before
all the grand questions of public council--nay, of national
existence--must depend on the will of the persecuted sons of Abraham.
Who shall rise, or who shall fall; who shall make war, or who shall
obtain peace; what republic shall be created, or what monarchy shall be
rent in pieces--will henceforth be the questions, not of cabinets, but
of the 'Change. There are correspondences within this escritoire, worth
all the wisdom of all the ministers of earth. There are commands at the
point of this pen, which the proudest statesmanship dares not
controvert. There is in the chests round you a ruler more powerful than
ever before held the sceptre--the dictator of the globe; the true Despot
is Gold."

After this wild burst, he sank into silence; until, to change the fever
of his thoughts, I enquired for the health of his daughter. The father's
heart overcame him again.

"My world threatens to be a lonely one, Mr Marston," said he in a feeble
voice. "You see a heartbroken man. Forgive the bitterness with which I
have spoken. Mariamne, I fear, is dying; and what is wealth now to me? I
have left her in Poland among my people. She seemed to feel some slight
enjoyment in wandering from place to place; but her last letter tells me
that she is wearied of travelling, and has made up her mind to live and
die where she may be surrounded by her unhappy nation. I remain here
only to wind up my affairs, and in a week I quit England--and for ever."

But a new object caught my glance. Mordecai--