own lodgings. His labours in this way were, I perceived, notwithstand ing my injunctions and his promises, of the most intense and unremitting, and, I feared, ill-requited description. But with what heart could I continue my remonstrances, when I felt convinced that thus he must toil, or starve? She also was forced to contribute her efforts towards their support, as I often saw her eagerly and rapidly engaged upon dresses and other articles too splendid to be for her own use. I could not help, one day, in the fulness of my heart, seeing her thus engaged, telling her that I had many a time since my marriage seen my wife similarly engaged. She looked at me with surprise for a few moments, and burst into tears. She forced off her rising emotions; but she was from that moment aware that I fully saw and appreciated her situation. It was on a somewhat similar occasion that she and her husband were at length induced to tell me their little history; and before giving the reader an account of what fell under my own personal observation, I shall lay before him, in my own way, the substance of several painfully interesting conversations with this most unfortunate couple. Let not the ordinary reader spurn details of everyday life, such as will here follow: “Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor!" Owing to a terrible domestic calamity, it became necessary that Henry Elliott, an only son, educating at Oxford, and destined for the army, should suddenly quit the University, and seek a livelihood by his own exertions in London. The event which occasioned this sudden blight to his prospects, was the suicide of his father, Major Elliott; whose addiction to gambling, having for a long time seriously embarrassed his affairs, and nearly broken the heart of his wife, at length led him to commit the fatal act above spoken of. His widow survived the shock scarce a twelvemonth, and her unfortunate son was then left alone in the world, and almost entirely destitute. The trifling sum of ready money which remained in his possession after burying his mother was exhausted, and the scanty pittance afforded by relatives, withdrawn, on the ground that he ought now to support himself, when his occasional enquiries after a situation at length led to the information that there was a vacancy for an outer-clerk in the great house of Hillary, Hungate, and Company, Mincing Lane, in the city. He suc ceeded in satisfying the junior partner, after submitting to sundry humiliating enquiries of his respectability and trust-worthiness; and he was forthwith received into the establishment, at a salary of L.60 per annum. It was a sad day for poor Elliott when he sold off almost all his college books, and a few other remnants of gay and happy days, gone by probably for ever, for the purpose of equipping himself becomingly for his new and humble functions. He wrote an excellent hand; and being of a decided mathematical turn, the arithmetic of the countinghouse was easily mastered. What dismal drudgery had he henceforth daily to undergo! The tyranny of the upper clerks reminded him, with a pang, of the petty tyranny he had both experienced and inflicted at the public school, where he had been educated. How infinitely more galling and intolerable was his present bondage! Two-thirds of the day he was kept constantly on foot, hurrying from place to place, with rands; and-especially on the fobills, letters, &c., and on other erreign post nights-he was detained slaving sometimes till nine or ten o'clock at night, copying letters, and assisting in making entries and balancing accounts, till his pen almost dropped from his wearied fingers. He was allowed an hour in the middle of the day for dinner-and even this little interval was often broken in upon to such an extent as proved seriously prejudicial to his health. After all the labours of the day, he had to trudge from Mincing Lane, along the odious City Road up to almost the extremity of Islington, where were situated his lodgings, i. e., a little back bed-room, on the third floor, serving at once for his sitting and sleeping room, and for the use of which he paid at the rate of seven shillings a-week, exclusive tive propensities of a mean and coarse mind, he became as tyrannical and insolent in success, as in adversity he had been supple and cringing. No spark of generous or worthy feeling had ever been struck from the flinty heart of Jacob Hillary, of the firm of Hillary, Hungate, and Company. He was the idol of a constant throng of wealth worshippers; to every body else, he was an object either of contempt or terror. He had married the widow of a deceased partner, by whom he had had several children, of whom one only lived beyond infancy; a generous, highspirited, enthusiastic girl, whom her purse-proud father had destined, in his own weak and vain ambition, to become the wearer of a coronet. On this dazzling object were Mr Hillary's eyes fixed with unwavering earnestness; he desired and longed to pour the tide of his gold through the channel of a peerage. In person, Mr Hillary was of the middle size, but gross and corpulent. There was no intellect in his shining bald head, fringed with bristling white hairnor was there any expression in his harsh and coarse features but such as faithfully adumbrated his character as above described. of extras. Still he conformed to his aggrandisement. With the instinccheerless lot, calmly and resolutely -with a true practical stoicism that did him honour. His regular and frugal habits enabled him to subsist upon his scanty salary with decency, if not comfort, and without running into debt-that infallible destructive of all peace of mind and self-respect! His sole enjoyment was an occasional hour in the evening, spent in reading, and retracing some of his faded acquisitions in mathematics. Though a few of his associates were piqued at what they considered his sullen and inhospitable disposition, yet his obliging manners, his easy but melancholy deportment, his punctuality and exactitude in all his engagements, soon gained him the good-will of his brethren in the office, and occasionally an indication of satisfaction on the part of some one of his august employers. Thus, at length, Elliott overcame the numerous disagremens of his altered situation, seeking in constant employment to forget both the gloom and gaieties of the past. Two or three years passed over, Elliott continuing thus steadily in his course; and his salary, as a proof of the approbation of his employers, had been annually increased by L.10 till he was placed in comparative affluence by the receipt of a salary of L.90. His severe exertions, however, insensibly impaired a constitution, never very vigorous, and he bore with many a fit of indisposition, rather than incur the expense of medical attendance. It may be added, that Elliott was a man of gentlemanly exterior, and engaging deportment and then let us pass to a very different person. Mr Hillary, the head of the firm, a man of very great wealth, had risen from being a mere errand-boy, to his present eminence in the mercantile world, through a rare combination of good fortune with personal merit -merit, as far as concerns a talent for business, joined with prudence and enterprise. If ever there came a man within the terms of Burke's famous philippic, it was Mr Hillary. His only object was money-making; no knew nothing, cared for nothing ond it; till the constant contemion of his splendid gains, led his ires uto the train of personal This was the individual, who, in stepping one morning rather hastily from his carriage, at his countinghouse door in Mincing Lane, fell from the carriage step, most severely injuring his right aukle and shoulder. The injuries he received upon this occasion kept him confined for a long period to his bed, and for a still longer to an easy chair in the back drawing-room of his spacious mansion near Highbury. As soon as he was able to attend to business, he issued orders that as Elliott was the clerk whose residence was nearest to Bullion House, he should attend him every morning for an hour or two on matters of business, carrying Mr Hillary's orders to the City, and especially bringing him, day by day, in a sealed envelope, his banker's book! A harassing post this proved for poor Elliott. Severe discipline had trained his temper to bear more than most men; and on these occasions it was tried to the uttermost. Mr Hillary's active and energetic mind, kept thus in comparative and com pulsive seclusion from the only concerns he cared for, or that could occupy it-always excepting the one great matter already alluded to-his imperious and irritable temper became almost intolerable. Elliott would certainly have thrown up his employment under Mr Hillary in disgust and despair, had it not been for one circumstance-the presence of Miss Hillary-whose sweet appealing looks day after day melted away the resolution with which Elliott every morning came before her choleric and overbearing father, although they could not mitigate that father's evil temper, or prevent its manifestations. He insisted on her spending the greater part of every day in his presence, nor would allow her to quit it even at the periods when Elliott made his appearance. The first casual and hasty glance that he directed towards her, satisfied him that he bad, in earlier and happy days, been many times in general society with her-her partner even in the dance. Now, however, he dared not venture to exhibit the slightest indication of recognition; and she, if struck by similar recollections, thought fit to conceal them, and behave precisely as though she then saw and heard of Mr Elliott for the first time in her life. He could not, of course, find fault with her for this; but he felt it deeply and bitterly. He little knew how much he wronged her! She instantly recollected him-and it was only the dread of her father that restrained her from a friendly greeting. Having once adopted such a line of conduct, it became necessary to adhere to it and she did. But could she prevent her heart going out in sympathy towards the poor, friendless, unoffending clerk whom her father treated more like a mere menial, than a respectable and confidential servant-him whom she knew to be "Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen, Fallen from his high estate?" Every day that she saw him, her woman's heart throbbed with pity towards him; and pity is indeed akin to love. How favourably for him did his temper and demeanour contrast with those of her father!And she saw him placed daily in a situation calculated to exhibit his real character-his disposition, whether for good or evil. The fact was, that he had become an object of deep interest-even of love-to her, long before the thought had ever occurred to him that she viewed him, from day to day, with feelings different from those with which she would look at the servant that stood at her father's side board, at dinner. His mind was kept constantly occupied by his impetuous employer, and his hundred questions about every thing that had or had not happened every day in the City. Thus for nearly three months had these unconscious lovers been brought daily for an hour or two into each other's presence. He had little idea of the exquisite pain occasioned Miss Hillary by her father's harsh and unfeeling treatment of him, nor of the many timid attempts she made, in his absence, to prevent the recurrence of such treatment; and as for the great man, Mr Hillary, it never crossed his mind as being possible that two young hearts could by any means, when in different stations of society, one rich, the other poor, be warmed into a feeling of regard, and even love for one another. One afternoon Elliott was obliged to come a second time that day from the City, bearing important despatches from Mincing Lane to Mr Hillary, who was sitting in his invalid chair, flanked on one hand by his daughter, and on the other by a little table, on which stood wine and fruit. Poor Elliott looked, as well he might, exhausted with his long and rapid walk through the fervid sunshine. "Well, sir-what now?" said ber father quickly and peremptorily, at the same time eagerly stretching forth his haud to receive a letter which Elliott presented to him. "Humph! Sit down there, sir, for a few minutes!" Elliott obeyed. Miss Hillary, who had been reading, touched with Elliott's pale and wea ried look, whispered to her father"Papa-Mr Elliott looks dreadfully tired-may I offer him a glass of wine?” "Yes, yes," replied Mr Hillary, hastily, without removing his eyes from the letter he had that instant opened. Miss Hillary instantly poured out a glass of wine; and as Elliott approached to take it from the table, with a respectful bow, his eye encountered hers, which was instantly withdrawn-but not before it had east a glance upon him, that electrified him; that fell suddenly like a spark of fire amid the combustible feelings of a most susceptible but subdued heart. It fixed the fate of their lives. The train so long laid had been at length unexpectedly ignited, and the confounded clerk returned, or rather staggered towards his chair, fancying that every thing in the room was whirling around him. It was well for both of them that Mr Hillary was at that eventful moment absorbingly engaged with a letter announcing the sudden arrival of three ships with large cargoes of an article of which he had been attempting a monopoly, and in doing so had sunk a very large sum of ready money. In vain did the conscious and confused girl confused as Elliott move her chair to the window, with her back turned towards him, and attempt to proceed with the book she had been reading. Her head seemed in a whirlpool." - re "Get me my desk, Mary, immediately," said her father, suddenly. "No, indeed, papa, you didn't," replied Miss Hillary, as suddenly, for her father's voice had recalled her from a strange reverie. "My desk, Mary-my desk, dy'e hear?" repeated her father, in a peremptory manner, still conning over the letter which told him, in effect, that he would return to bed that night four or five thousand pounds poorer than he rose from it -ignorant that within the last few moments, in his very presence, had happened that which was to put an end for ever to all his dreams of a coronet glittering upon his daugh ter's brow! Miss Hillary obeyed her father's second orders, carefully looking in every direction but that in which she would have encountered Elliott; and whispering a word or two into her father's ear, quitted the room. Elliott's heart was beating quickly when the harsh tones of Mr Hillary, who had worked himself into a very violent humour, fell upon his ear, directing him to return immediately to the City, and say he had no answer to send till the morning, when he was to be in attendance at an early hour. Scarce knowing whether he stood on his head or his heels, Elliott hurriedly bowed, and withdrew. Borne along on the current of his tumultuous emotions, he seemed to fly down the swarming City Road; and when he reached the dull dingy little back counting-house where he was to be occupied till a late hour of the night, he found himself not in the fittest humour in the world for his task. Could he possibly be mistaken in interpreting Miss Hillary's look? Was it not corroborated by her subsequent conduct? And-by the way -now that he came to glance backwards into the two or three months during which he had been almost daily in her presence,-divers little incidents started up into his recollection, all tending the same way. "Heigh-ho!" exclaimed Elliott, laying down his yet unused pen, after a long and bewildering reverie-" I wonder what Miss Hillary is thinking about! Surely I have had a kind of day-dream! It can't have really happened! And yet-how could there have been a mistake? Heaven knows I had taken nothing to excite or disorder me-except, perhaps, my long walk! Here's a coup de soleil, by the way, with a witness! But only to think of itMiss Hillary-daughter of Jacob Hillary, Esq.-in love with an under-clerk of her father-pho! it will never do! I'll think of it to-morrow morning." Thus communed Elliott with himself, by turns writing, pausing, and soliloquizing, till the lateness of the hour compelled him to apply to his task in good earnest. He did not quit his desk till it had struck ten; from which period till that at which he tumbled into his little bed, he fancied that scarcely five minutes had elapsed. He made his appearance at Bullion House the next morning with a sad fluttering about the heart, but it soon subsided, for Miss Hillary was not present to prolong his agitation. He had not been seated for many minutes, however, before he observed her in a distant part of the gardens, apparently tending some flowers. As his eye followed the movements of her graceful figure, he could not avoid a faint sigh of re gret at his own absurdity in raising such a superstructure of splendid possibilities upon so slight a foundation. His attention was at that instant arrested by Mr Hillary's multifarious commands for the City: and, in short, Miss Hillary's absence from town for about a week, added to a great increase of business at the counting-house, owing to an extensive failure of a foreign correspondent, gradually restored Elliott to his senses, and banished the intrusive image of his lovely tormentor. Her unequivocal exhibition of feeling, however unequivocal at least to him-on the occasion of the next meeting, instantly revived all his former excitement, and plunged him afresh into the soft tumult of doubts, hopes, and fears, from which he had so lately emerged. Every day that he returned to Mr Hillary brought him fresh evidence of the extent to which he had encroached upon Miss Hillary's affections: and strange, indeed, must be that heart which, feeling itself alone and despised in the world, can suddenly find itself the object of a most enthusiastic and disinterested attachment without kindling into a flame of grateful affection. Was there any thing won. derful or improbable in the conduct attributed to Miss Hillary? No. A girl of frank and generous feeling, she saw in one, whom undeserved misfortune had placed in a very painful and trying position, the constant exhibition of high qualities; a patient and dignified submission to her father's cruel and oppressive treatment, a submission on her account; she beheld his high feeling conquering misfortune; she saw in his eye -his every look-his whole demeanour, susceptibilities of an exalted description:-and beyond all this-last, though not least, as Elliott acted the gentleman, so he looked it-and a handsome gentleman, too!-So it came to pass, then, that these two hearts became acquainted with each other, despite the obstacles of circumstance and situation. A kind of telegraphing courtship was carried on between them daily, which must have been observed by Mr Hillary, but for the engrossing interest with which he regarded the communications of which Elliott was always the bearer. Mr Hillary began, however, at length, to recover the use of his limbs, and rapidly to gain general strength. He consequently announced one morning to Elliott, that he should not require him to call after the morrow. At this time the lovers had never interchanged a syllable together, either verbal or written, that could savour of love; and yet each was as confident of the state of the other's feelings, as though a hundred closely written, and closercrossed letters had been passing between them. On the dreaded morrow he was pale and somewhat confused, nor was she far otherwisebut she had a sufficient reason in the indisposition of her mother, who had for many months been a bedridden invalid. As for Elliott, he was safe. He might have appeared at death's door without attracting the notice, or exciting the enquiries of his callous employer. As he rose to leave the room, Elliott bowed to Mr Hillary-but his last glance was directed towards Miss Hillary-who, however, at that moment was, or appeared to be, too busily occupied with pouring out her excellent father's coffee, to pay any attention to her retiring lover, who consequently retired from her presence not a little piqued and alarmed. They had no opportunity of seeing one another till nearly a month after the occasion just alluded to; when they met under circumstances very favourable for the expression of such feelings as either of them dared to acknowledge-and the opportunity was not thrown away. Mr Hillary had quitted town for the north, on urgent business, which was expect ed to detain him for nearly a fortnight; and Elliott failed not, on the following Sunday, to be at the post he had constantly occupied for some months-namely, a seat in the gallery of the church attended by Mr Hillary and his family, commanding a distant view of the great central pew-matted, hassocked, and velvet-cushioned, with a rich array of splendid implements of devotion, in the shape of Bibles and prayer-books, great and small, with gilt edges, and in blue and red morocco, being the favoured spot occupied by the great merchant-where he was pleased by his presence to assure the admiring vicar of his respect for him and the |