AVARICE AND PRODIGALITY.

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sometimes observe combined in gamesters. Did we want a fearful lesson, we would go to the gaming table to behold the demon of avarice in his triumph-the haggard face-the feverish brow-the eager anxious eye-the nervous twitches of the mouth, and the clenching of the hands, are the outward signs of the fierce and deadly struggle within. The transition, indeed, from prodigality to avarice is so easy, that one would almost feel inclined to regard the spendthrift, greedy for sensual enjoyment and riotous pleasure, as only exhibiting another manifestation of avarice; it is a species of that same covetous feeling, longing to enjoy a greater portion of pleasure than usually falls to the lot of man: it is selfishness; and selfishness is next akin to avarice. A young man of vicious principles squandered in a few years a sumptuous fortune. His houses and his lands had one by one, and piece by piece, been forfeited to gamblers, or sold to gratify his profligacy. His fortune gone, and no longer possessing the means of dissipation, he found his companions desert him; he had treated them liberally during his mad career; they had feasted at his table, and drunk plenteously of his wine; but companions in sensual joys are seldom grateful or sincere in their friendship. Forsaken and alone, he began to despair, and formed a resolution, which when formed few, in the adversity of fortune, have the courage to resist-he resolved to terminate with his own hand, a

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ANECDOTE OF A SPENDTHRIFT.

life which he deemed no longer desirable, and in which he could see no further source of happiness. He left his home in this suicidal mind, and wandering about, he came almost unconsciously to the brow of an eminence, which looked down upon what were lately his estates. He threw himself upon the ground, and for the first time for many years began to meditate. It was a good spirit that was now struggling in the future miser, before which the demon of suicide fled. He sat for hours in that brown study, and he arose an altered and determined man. He had formed a resolution that all those fair lands should be his again. He walked hastily forward, determined to avail himself of the first opportunity of earning money that presented itself; and when he had obtained it, he resolved to use it with rigid parsimony. He had conquered during those few hours of reflection every feeling of pride, and his first attempt to earn money was a sufficient test of the sincerity of this triumph. He saw a heap of coals shot out of a cart, on the pavement before a house; he offered to shovel them into the cellar; his services were accepted, and remunerated with a trifling sum; yet trifling as it was, he resolved to save the greatest portion. He embraced every means of obtaining money, and did not allow himself to consider the meanness or servility of the occupation. Everything that could be applied to a use he hoarded up, and when accumulated sold. By

AVARICE IN THE GREAT.

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these means, step by step, and little by little, after years of patient labour, he saved enough to purchase a few cattle; these he improved, and after awhile sold at a profit. During all this time he practiced the strictest parsimony, and he was ultimately enabled, by his accumulations, to recover his lost estates. Parsimony such as this we should feel disposed to excuse, but the result in his case, it is said, was disastrous, for parsimony became, by long habit, confirmed into avarice, and the man died a scraping, grasping miser, with sixty thousand pounds in his money chests.

It is not always that avarice assumes the garb of wretchedness; it is not always that the miser appears to the public eye, a lank and half starved wretch, with loathsome rags upon his shoulders. The passion is sometimes associated with men, whose names have been renowned for great actions, and for vast achievements in the world. That great warrior, the Duke of Marlborough, allowed the promptings of avarice to tarnish a fame designed to live for centuries. Many and disreputable are the charges of peculation which have been advanced against him, and numerous are the anecdotes remembered by tradition, or recorded in books, of his pinching parsimony. When the clouds were gathering in the heavens, and infirmity had warned him of coming dissolution, he would walk from the public room in Bath to his lodgings, in a cold dark night, through wind and

rain, to save sixpence for coach hire. Yet that great general left at his death a fortune of more than a million and a half of money, which, as if to show to others the folly of such meanless parsimony, was inherited by a grandson of Lord Trevors, who had been one of his bitterest enemies. But we need not go back so far to find noble misers; some of the members of our proud nobility of to day, afford striking examples of parsimony and avarice in the great. We have known some whose riches are so great, that they may be compared with the riches of Croesus; grumble over their tradesmen's bills, and haggle for an hour to obtain the reduction of a shilling, did not interest prompt the tradesman sooner to submit, in hopes of future "patronage," from such distinguished and noble personages. If the reader will

take the trouble to enquire, he may glean some curious anecdotes of a "noble" miser, of the present day, whose parsimony is so great, that he deprives his domestics of their perquisites, and has been known to have sold the refuse fat from his own kitchen for the trifle which it produced. This descendant of a valiant race may be seen, in the locality of his own mansion, with a huge basket on his arm, wandering from shop to shop, and from stall to stall, to pick up bargains or thrifty provender for his household. He not only attends to the economy of his kitchen, but even to the most minute affairs of his farm; his dairy receives no small share of

AND A LITTLE RUSTIC.

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his attention, and he will sometimes condescend to measure out, and sell his milk in retail, to the neighbouring villagers. One morning, it is related, a little girl presented herself at the castle, and giving in her jug and penny, was served by his grace, who, pleased with her appearance, gave the little damsel a kiss, telling her at the same time that she would always now be able to say, that she had been kissed by a duke. "Yes," replied the little rustic, "but you took the penny, though!" We could point to many such instances of aristocratic penury, but we do not wish to draw our illustrations from contemporary characters.

The total absence of all ulterior motive in the parsimony of the miser is a convincing proof of how powerful are the cravings of acquisitiveness, when unduly excited. "If a miser be the owner of fifty acres," said Dr. Combe, "it will give him delight to acquire fifty more; if of one thousand, or one hundred thousand, he will still be gratified in adding to this number. His understanding may be convinced that he already possesses ample store for any enjoyment, and abundant to provide against every want; yet if this faculty be active, he will feel his joys impaired if he cease to amass." The ever famous Jemmy Wood, of Gloucester, who died worth nearly two millions of money, did not cease to go on accumulating wealth after he had obtained more than he or his family could spend in their lifetime, if

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