so much last night that he may have forgot. But I fear he means mischief, and I came here to say so, and hoping that you might be kep' on your guard, Doctor F., and if you have to quarrel with him, I don't know what you ever will do, I am sure no more than if you had to fight a chimney-sweep in the street. I have been awake all night thinking, and as soon as ever I saw the daylight, I determined I would run and tell you."

"When he called Philip that name, did the boy seem much disturbed?" asked the Doctor.

"Yes; he referred to it again and again-though I tried to coax him out of it. But it was on his mind last night, and I am sure he will think of it the first thing this morning. Ah, yes, Doctor! conscience will sometimes let a gentleman doze; but after discovery has come, and opened your curtains, and said, 'You desired to be called early!' there's little use in trying to sleep much. You look very much frightened, Doctor F.," the nurse continues. "You haven't such a courage as Philip has; or as you had when you were a young man, and came a-leading poor girls astray. You used to be afraid of nothing then. Do you remember that fellow on board the steamboat in Scotland in our wedding-trip, and, la! I thought you was going to kill him. That poor little Lord Cinqbars told me ever so many stories then about your courage and shooting people. It wasn't very courageous, leaving a poor girl without even a name, and scarce a guinea, was it? But I ain't come to call up old stories-only to warn you. Even in old times, when he married us, and I thought he was doing a kindness, I never could abide this horrible man. In Scotland, when you was away shooting with your poor little lord, the things Hunt used to say and look was dreadful. I wonder how ever you, who were gentlemen, could put up with such a fellow! Ah, that was a sad honeymoon of ours! I wonder why I'm a-thinking of it now? I suppose it's from having seen the picture of the other one-poor lady!"

"I have told you, Caroline, that I was so wild and desperate at that unhappy time, I was scarcely accountable for my actions. If I left you, it was because I had no other resource but flight. I was a ruined, penniless man, but for my marriage with Ellen Ringwood. You don't suppose the marriage was happy? Happy! when have I ever been happy? My lot is to be wretched, and bring wretchedness down on those I love! On you, on my father, on my wife, on my boy-I am a doomed man. Ah, that the inno

cent should suffer for me! " And our friend looks askance in the glass, at the blue chin and hollow eyes which make his guilt look the more haggard.

"I never had my lines," the Little Sister continued; "I never

knew there were papers, or writings, or anything but a ring and a clergyman, when you married me. But I've heard tell that people in Scotland don't want a clergyman at all; and if they call themselves man and wife, they are man and wife. Now, sir, Mr. and Mrs. Brandon certainly did travel together in Scotland-witness that man whom you were going to throw into the lake for being rude to your wife-and . . . La! don't fly out so! It wasn't me, a poor girl of sixteen, who did wrong. world, who was years and years older."

It was you, a man of the

When Brandon carried off his poor little victim and wife, there had been a journey to Scotland, where Lord Cinqbars, then alive, had sporting quarters. His Lordship's chaplain, Mr. Hunt, had been of the party, which fate very soon afterwards separated. Death seized on Cinqbars at Naples. Debt caused FirminBrandon, as he called himself then-to fly the country. The chaplain wandered from gaol to gaol. And as for poor little Caroline Brandon, I suppose the husband who had married her under a false name thought that to escape her, leave her, and disown her altogether was an easier and less dangerous plan than to continue relations with her. So one day, four months after their marriage, the young couple being then at Dover, Caroline's husband happened to go out for a walk. But he sent away a portmanteau by the back-door when he went out for the walk, and as Caroline was waiting for her little dinner some hours after, the porter who carried the luggage came with a little note from her dearest G. B. ; and it was full of little fond expressions of regard and affection, such as gentlemen put into little notes; but dearest G. B. said the bailiffs were upon him, and one of them had arrived that morning, and he must fly and he took half the money he had, and left half for his little Carry. And he would be back soon, and arrange matters; or tell her where to write and follow him. And she was to take care of her little health, and to write a great deal to her Georgy. And she did not know how to write very well then; but she did her best, and improved a great deal; for, indeed, she wrote a great deal, poor thing! Sheets and sheets of paper she blotted with ink and tears. And then the money was spent; and the next money; and no more came, and no more letters. And she was alone at sea, sinking, sinking, when it pleased Heaven to send that friend who rescued her. It is such a sad, sad little story, that in fact I don't like dwelling on it; not caring to look upon poor innocent trusting creatures in pain.

:

Well, then, when Caroline exclaimed, "La! don't fly out so, Dr. Firmin!" I suppose the Doctor had been crying out, and swearing fiercely, at the recollections of his friend Mr. Brandon and

at the danger which possibly hung over that gentleman. Marriage ceremonies are dangerous risks in jest or in earnest. You can't pretend to marry even a poor old bankrupt lodging-house keeper's daughter without some risk of being brought subsequently to book. If you have a vulgar wife alive, and afterwards choose to leave her and marry an earl's niece, you will come to trouble, however well connected you are and highly placed in society. If you have had thirty thousand pounds with Wife No. 2, and have to pay it back on a sudden, the payment may be inconvenient. You may be tried for bigamy, and sentenced goodness knows to what punishment. At any rate, if the matter is made public, and you are a most respectable man, moving in the highest scientific and social circles, those circles may be disposed to request you to walk out of their circumference. A novelist, I know, ought to have no likes, dislikes, pity, partiality for his characters; but I declare I cannot help feeling a respectful compassion for a gentleman who, in consequence of a youthful, and, I am sure, sincerely regretted folly, may be liable to lose his fortune, his place in society, and his considerable practice. Punishment hasn't a right to come with such a pede claudo. There ought to be limitations; and it is shabby and revengeful of Justice to present her little bill when it has been more than twenty years owing. .. Having had his talk out with the Little Sister, having a long past crime suddenly taken down from the shelf; having a remorse long since supposed to be dead and buried, suddenly starting up in the most blustering, boisterous, inconvenient manner; having a rage and terror tearing him within; I can fancy this most respectable physician going about his day's work, and most sincerely sympathise with him. Who is to heal the physician? Is he not more sick at heart than most of his patients that day? He has to listen to Lady Megrim cackling for half-an-hour at least, and describing her little ailments. He has to listen, and never once to dare to say, "Confound you, old chatterbox! What are you

...

prating about your ailments to me, who am suffering real torture whilst I am smirking in your face?" He has to wear the inspiriting smile, to breathe the gentle joke, to console, to whisper hope, to administer remedy; and all day, perhaps, he sees no one so utterly sick, so sad, so despairing as himself.

The first person on whom he had to practise hypocrisy that day was his own son, who chose to come to breakfast- -a meal of which son and father seldom now partook in company. "What does he

know, and what does he suspect?" are the father's thoughts; but a louring gloom is on Philip's face, and the father's eyes look into the son's but cannot penetrate their darkness.

"Did you stay late last night, Philip?" says papa.

བཱ།རདམམ།

"No, sir, stupid. Your friend Mr. Hunt wanted to come in. He was drunk, and rude to Mrs. Brandon, and I was obliged to put him out of the door. He was dreadfully violent and abusive." "Swore a good deal, I suppose?"

I daresay Philip's heart beat so when he said these last words, that they were inaudible: at all events, Philip's father did not appear to pay much attention to the words, for he was busy reading the Morning Post, and behind that sheet of fashionable news hid whatever expression of agony there might be on his face. Philip afterwards told his present biographer of this breakfast meeting and dreary tête-à-tête. "I burned to ask what was the meaning of that scoundrel's words of the past night," Philip said to his biographer; "but I did not dare, somehow. You see, Pendennis, it is not pleasant to say point-blank to your father, 'Sir, are you a confirmed scoundrel, or are you not? Is it possible that you have made a double marriage, as yonder other rascal hinted; and that my own legitimacy and my mother's fair fame, as well as poor harmless Caroline's honour and happiness, have been destroyed by your crime?' But I had lain awake all night thinking about that scoundrel Hunt's words, and whether there was any meaning beyond drunken malice in what he said." So we find that three people had passed a bad night in consequence of Mr. Firmin's evil behaviour of five-and-twenty years back, which surely was a most unreasonable punishment for a sin of such old date. I wish, dearly beloved brother sinners, we could take all the punishment for our individual crimes on our individual shoulders: but we drag them all down with us--that is the fact; and when Macheath is condemned to hang, it is Polly and Lucy who have to weep and suffer and wear piteous mourning in their hearts long after the dare-devil rogue has jumped off the Tyburn ladder.

66

Well, sir, he did not say a word," said Philip, recounting the meeting to his friend; "not a word, at least, regarding the matter both of us had on our hearts. But about fashion, parties, politics he discoursed much more freely than was usual with him. He said I might have had Lord Ringwood's seat for Whipham but for my unfortunate politics. What made a Radical of me, he asked, who was naturally one of the most haughty of men? ("and that, I think, perhaps I am," says Phil, "and a good many Liberal fellows are"). I should calm down, he was sure-I should calm down, and be of the politics des hommes du monde."

Philip could not say to his father, "Sir, it is seeing you cringe

before great ones that has set my own back up." There were countless points about which father and son could not speak; and an invisible, unexpressed, perfectly unintelligible mistrust, always was present when those two were tête-à-tête.

Their meal was scarce ended when entered to them Mr. Hunt, with his hat on. I was not present at the time, and cannot speak as a certainty; but I should think at his ominous appearance Philip may have turned red and his father pale. "Now is the time," both, I daresay, thought; and the Doctor remembered his stormy young days of foreign gambling, intrigue, and duel, when he was put on his ground before his adversary, and bidden, at a given signal, to fire. One, two, three! Each man's hand was armed with malice and murder. Philip had plenty of pluck for his part, but I should think on such an occasion might be a little nervous and fluttered, whereas his father's eye was keen, and his aim rapid and steady.

"You and Philip had a difference last night, Philip tells me," said the Doctor.

"Yes, and I promised he should pay me," said the clergyman. "And I said I should desire no better," says Mr. Phil. "He struck his senior, his father's frienda sick man,

clergyman," gasped Hunt.

a

"Were you to repeat what you did last night, I should repeat what I did," said Phil. "You insulted a good woman."

"It's a lie, sir,” cries the other.

"You insulted a good woman, a lady in her own house, and I turned you out of it," said Phil.

"I say again, it is a lie, sir!" screams Hunt, with a stamp on the table.

"That you should give me the lie, or otherwise, is perfectly immaterial to me. But whenever you insult Mrs. Brandon, or any harmless woman in my presence, I shall do my best to chastise you,” cries Philip of the red moustaches, curling them with much dignity. "You hear him, Firmin?" says the parson.

'Faith, I do, Hunt!" says the physician; "and I think he means what he says, too."

"Oh! you take that line, do you?" cries Hunt of the dirty hands, the dirty teeth, the dirty neckcloth.

"I take what you call that line; and whenever a rudeness is offered to that admirable woman in my son's hearing, I shall be astonished if he does not resent it," says the Doctor. "Thank you, Philip!"

The father's resolute speech and behaviour gave Philip great momentary comfort. Hunt's words of the night before had been