"I am in temporary need of a little money, and wish to borrow some upon my jewels," began Mrs. Dalrymple, in a hoarse whisper; and she was really so agitated as scarcely to know what she said.

"Are they of value ?" he inquired.

:

"Some hundreds of pounds. I have them with me."

He requested her to walk into a private room, and placed a chair. She sat down and laid the jewels on the table. He examined them in silence, one after another, not speaking till he had gone through the whole. "What did you wish to borrow on them?"

"As much as I can," replied Mrs. Dalrymple. "I thought about four hundred pounds."

"Four hundred pounds!" echoed the pawnbroker. "Ma'am, they are not worth, for this purpose, more than a quarter of the money.' She stared at him in astonishment. 66

They are real."

"Oh yes. Otherwise they would not be worth so many pence." "Many of them are new within twelve months," urged Mrs. Dalrymple. "Altogether they cost more than five hundred pounds."

"To buy. But they are not worth much to pledge. The fashion of these ornaments is changing with every season: and that, for one thing, diminishes their value."

"What could you lend me on them ?" "One hundred pounds."

"Absurd!" returned Mrs. Dalrymple, her cheeks flushing.

"Why,

that one set of amethysts alone cost more. I could not let them go at that.

It would be of no use to me."

"Ma'am, it is entirely at your own option, and I assure you I do not press it," he answered, with courteous respect. "We care little about taking these things in, for so many are brought to us now, that our sales are glutted with them."

"You will not be called upon to sell these. I shall redeem them."

The jeweller did not answer. He could have answered that never an article, from a service of gold plate to a pair of boy's boots, was pledged to him yet, but it was quite sure to be redeemed-in intention.

"Are you aware that a great many ladies, even of high degree, now wear false jewellery ?" he resumed.

"No, indeed," returned Mrs. Dalrymple. "Neither should I believe it."

"Nevertheless it is so. And the chief reason is the one I have just mentioned: that in the present day the rage for ornaments is so great, and the fashion of them so continually changing, that to be in the fashion, a lady must spend a fortune in ornaments alone. I give you my word, ma'am, that in the fashionable world a great deal of the jewellery now worn is false; though it may pass, there, unsuspected. And this fact deteriorates from the value of real, especially for the purpose of pledging."

He began, as he spoke, to put the articles into their boxes again, as if the negotiation were at an end.

66 Can you lend me two hundred upon after a blank pause.

them ?" asked Mrs. Dalrymple,

He shook his head. "I can advance you what I have stated if you

VOL. XLIII.

P

please; not a pound more. And I am quite sure you will be able to obtain no more on them anywhere, ma'am, take them where you will." "But what am I to do ?" returned Mrs. Dalrymple, betraying some excitement. Very uselessly: but that room was no stranger to it.

The jeweller was firm, and Mrs. Dalrymple gathered up her ornaments, her first feeling of despair merging into anger. She was leaving the room with her parcel, when it occurred to her to ask herself WHAT she was to do-how she was to procure the remainder of the sum necessary for Madame Damereau. She turned back, and finally left the shop without her jewels but with a hundred pounds in her pocket, and her understanding considerably enlightened as to the relative value of a jewel to buy and a jewel to pledge.

Now it happened that if Mrs. Dalrymple had repented of showing her temper to Madame Damereau, that renowned artiste had equally repented of showing hers to Mrs. Dalrymple. She feared it might tell against her with her customers, if it came to be known: for she knew how popular Selina had been. She came to the determination of paying Mrs. Dalrymple a visit, not exactly to apologise, but to soothe her down. And to qualify the pressing for some money, which she meant to do (whether she got it or not), she intended to announce that the articles ordered for the wedding festivities would be supplied. "It's only ninety pounds more or less," thought madame, "and I suppose I shall get the money some time."

She reached Mrs. Dalrymple's soon after that lady had departed on her secret expedition. Their London lodgings were confined. The dining-room had Mr. Dalrymple in it, so Madame Damereau was shown to the drawing-room, and the maid went hunting about the house for

her mistress.

Whilst she was on her useless search, Mr. Dalrymple entered the drawing-room, expecting to find it tenanted by his wife. Instead of which, some strange lady sat there, who rose at his entrance, made him a swimming curtsey, the like of which he had never seen in a ballroom, and threw off some rapid sentences in an unknown tongue.

His perplexed look stopped her. "Ah," she said, changing her language, "Monsieur, I fear, does not speak the French. I have the honour, I believe, of addressing Mr. Dalreemp. I am covered with contrition at intruding at this evening hour, but I know that Mrs. Dalreemp is much out in the day."

"Do you wish to see her? Have you seen her?" asked he. "I wait now to see her," replied madame.

"Another of these milliner people, I suppose," thought Mr. Dalrymple to himself, with not at all a polite word in connexion with the supposition. "Selina's mad, to have the house beset with them like a swarm of flies. If she comes to town next year may I be—” He did not say what, but went to the door and raised his voice.

"Ann! tell your mistress she is wanted."

"I can't find my mistress, sir," said the servant, coming down stairs. "I thought she must be in her room, but she is not. I am sure she is not gone out, because she said she meant to have a quiet evening at home to-night, and she is not dressed."

"She is somewhere about," said Mr. Dalrymple. her."

"Go and look for

Madame Damereau had been coming to the rapid conclusion that this was an opportunity she should do injustice to herself to omit using. And as Mr. Dalrymple was about to leave her to herself, she stopped him.

"Sir-pardon me-but now that I have the happiness to see you, I may ask if you will not use your influence with Mrs. Dalreemp to think of my account. She does promise so often, and I get nothing. I have my heavy payments to make, and sometimes I do not know where to find the money though, if you saw my books, your head would bristle, sir, at the sums owing to me."

"You are- ?"

"I am Madame Damereau. If Mrs. Dalreemp would but give me a few hundreds off her bill, it would be something."

A few hundreds! Oscar Dalrymple wondered what she meant. He looked at her for some moments before he spoke.

"What is the amount of my wife's debt to you?"

“Ah, it is—But I cannot tell it you quite exactly. The last bill that went in to her was four thousand and twenty-two pounds."

He had an impassible face, rarely showing emotion. It had probably not been moved to it half a dozen times in the course of his life. But now his lips gradually drew away from his teeth, leaving the gums exposed, and a red spot appeared upon each cheek. "WHAT did you say? How much ?"

"Four thousand and twenty-two pounds," equably answered madame, who was not familiar with his countenance. "And there have been a few trifles since, and her last order this week will come to ninety pounds. If you wish for it exactly, sir," added madame, catching at an idea of hope, "I will have it sent in to you when I go home. Mrs. Dalreemp has the details up to very recently."

"Four thousand pounds!" uttered Mr. Dalrymple, in a sort of paralysed manner. “When could she have contracted it?"

"Last season, sir. A little in the winter, she had, and a little this spring: not much."

He did not say more, save a mutter which madame could not catch. She understood it to be that he would speak to Mrs. Dalrymple. The maid returned, protesting that her mistress was not in the house, and must have changed her mind and gone out: and Madame Damereau, thinking she might be gone out for the evening, and that it was of no use waiting, made her adieu to Mr. Dalrymple with the remarkable curtsey several times repeated.

He was sitting there still, in the same position, when his wife appeared. She had entered the house stealthily, as she had left it, had taken off her things, and now came into the room ready for tea, as if she had only been up-stairs to wash her hands. Scarcely had she reached the middle of the room, when he rose and laid his hand heavily on her shoulder. His face, as she turned to him in alarm, with its drawn aspect, its glistening eyes, its mingled pallor and hectic, was so changed that she could hardly recognise it for his. A fear crossed her that he had gone mad. "Oscar, you terrify me!" she shrieked out.

"What debts are these that you owe?" he hissed, from between his parted lips.

Was the dreaded moment come, then! She shook in his a low moan escaped her.

grasp, and

"Four thousand pounds to Damereau the milliner! How much more to others ?"

"Oh, Oscar, if you look and speak like that, you will kill me," she uttered. "Forgive me this, and my life's repentance shall atone for it."

"I ask how much more," he repeated, passing by her entreaty as the idle wind. "Tell me the truth, or I will thrust you from my home and advertise you."

She strove to sink down to hide her face on the ground; she would certainly have sunk there but for his powerful grasp. He shook her roughly by the arm, and repeated the question, "How much?"

"Six thousand pounds-in all-about that. Not more, I think." He flung her arm from him with a jerk, and she sank down on the carpet with her face on the sofa, and sobbed and moaned.

"Are you prepared to go out and work for your living, as I must do ?" he panted. "I have nothing to keep you on, and shall not have for years. If they throw me into a debtors' prison to-morrow, to languish there, I cannot help it."

"Do not reproach me," she moaned, "I have suffered much. You have told me I was restless, as one who had committed a crime: you know now what the crime has been."

"You suffer!" he scornfully ejaculated. "When, up to this time, this very week, you have been augmenting your debt recklessly! Stop your display of tears: crocodiles can shed them."

She only sobbed the more.

"I was a fool to marry into your branch of the family," he went on, stamping his foot, "for a mania attends it. Your uncle gambled his means away and then took his own life; your father hampered himself with his debts and remained poor; your brother followed in his uncle's wake; and now, madam, the mania is upon you!"

Mr. Dalrymple stopped, for the servant appeared at the door with the tea-urn. Mr. Dalrymple motioned him away. "No tea to-night," he authoritatively exclaimed; we do not require it." And he flung the door to, after the man.

Mrs. Dalrymple did not move. But every now and then she sobbed out entreaties to her husband for forgiveness. It was just as though he heard her not. His first explosion of passion over, he smothered it in silence and never spoke, but he paced the room with angry strides.

After a while Mrs. Dalrymple gathered herself up, and left it. Some time after, she heard the drawing-room bell ring, and then hermaid came up to her, tossing and indignant.

"Ma'am! I must say this is very sudden."

Mrs. Dalrymple bent her face over a drawer, which she pretended to be looking in, and strove to command her voice to indifference.

"What is sudden ?"

"Master has ordered me to come and pack up. He says you must be off to the Grange with morning light. I asked him how I was to pack up to-night, with you and him in the room asleep, and he said I might settle that with you, but that he should not be in it."

Mrs. Dalrymple, conscience-stricken, had nothing to answer.

"He says, too, you will not want me beyond the month, ma'am.

And that if I like to leave at once, and stop in town and look out for a place, he'll give me a month's board wages. It's the first time as I ever was dismissed in a summonary way, like this," added the damsel, shaking with her wrongs.

"I am very sorry, Ann. Circumstances oblige us to make this sudden change. It shall not affect your testimonials for any fresh place."

"No, I should hope it wouldn't, ma'am. I've always served gentlefolks as didn't make sudden changes. What's to be done about this packing up? Am I to be kept out of my bed to do it? And is it to be done by candlelight?"

"Yes, if Mr. Dalrymple said so. I did not know," she added, recollecting herself, "that he meant to go so early."

"The boxes will get full of candle-grease, and consequently the dresses, even should no sparks get in and burn 'em up, if that will be any consolation to him," said the indignant Abigail, in a tone which implied that it would be a very great consolation to her.

Mr. Dalrymple did not go to rest that night. When the servants at length went to bed they left him in the dining-room, writing, and surrounded with papers. In the morning he and his wife started for their home, the Grange, there to live in obscurity, upon a small pittance, and struggle with their debts; perhaps to live a life of miserable estrangement, of bickering, one with the other.

Thus, as a wreathing cloud suddenly appears in the sky and as suddenly fades away, had Mrs. Dalrymple, like a bright vision, appeared to the admiring eyes of the London world; and she might have continued to enjoy its smiles and its sunshine, but for the insane rage for dress which attacked her in its worst features and lured her on to her ruin. It is luring many now.

New-Book Notes by Monkshood.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF BÉRANGER.*

To the letters of Béranger it is that we are, it seems, to be referred, after all, for a complete picture of his life. His Autobiography closes with the date, Tours, January, 1840. But 1830 is the real date at which its narrative comes to an end. At that period, cordially attached to the men of different parties who came into collision after the establishment of the Orleans dynasty, grieved by the multiplied errors of them all, and weary of preaching a truce such as the country so greatly needed, Béranger, at fifty years of age, describes himself as withdrawing in distress from the sight of this sad party strife. Passy, Fontainebleau, Tours, have seen me in quest of seclusion and silence, and it is from this last town that I write this notice, to be perhaps completed elsewhere."

66

Ma Biographie. Ouvrage posthume. Par P. J. de Béranger. Avec un Appendice, &c. Paris: Perrotin. 1857.