"These first, these first, you rascal," he exclaimed to one of his leading men; "give a hand here, give a hand, and on to your heads with them."

"No! no! for goodness sake," said Jacob, who had some knowledge of printing, "you will destroy them."

"Stand aside, young prater; I'm master here."

"Fair words, Gripps," said Jacob, clenching his teeth and his fist at the same time, "or I'll finish the work which Mr. Williams began."

66

Braggart! puppy! son of a bankrupt !" exclaimed Gripps in reply, anxious to have a clear case of assault in the presence of the police.

Jacob had suffered too much already to put up with this open insult. His eyes blazed with fury and indignation; his right arm struck out, followed by his left, with pugilistic vigour; and never was man more completely "floored" than Zebidee Gripps, who lay as quietly after it as if it were pleasant to be knocked down. A constable raised him up, and by signs and gasps Gripps endeavoured to impress everybody with the information that he was very badly hurt, as no doubt he was, taking into consideration all he had undergone during the morning. His first words were a request that the policeman would take Jacob into custody.

The officer said he was sorry to decline, but he must nevertheless -it was a case for a summons; at the same time, he advised Mr. Gripps not to call names.

Come, then, on to your heads with that stuff," said Gripps to the two men who had each raised a page of the Middleton Star which was to have been printed that afternoon. Jacob found that it was useless to remonstrate, and the two men putting their heads beneath the locked-up type, immediately had it all breaking and falling over their shoulders, leaving the iron frames round their necks. that moment the Middleton Star was defunct.

CHAPTER XXI.

HOMELESS, HOPELESS, PENNILESS.

THE passing-bell swung to and fro in the church steeple. It was evening. The wind had gone down the river and had travelled miles and miles away out to sea. Middleton was calm and still. People paused at their suppers to ask who was dead. The bell knocked at Jacob Martyn's heart. He had only one consolation.

His father had died utterly oblivious of the humiliating scene which had been enacted on the previous day.

Jacob could not rest in the house. The silence appalled him. He could hardly breathe. He went into the garden. The factory was a blaze of light. Half a dozen voices were droning forth the

old hymn

There is a happy land,
Far, far away.

It was like a dirge-it wailed. The voices seemed tired. The girls had been at work all day. They had begun with the early morning. They sang the words "Far, far away" like a complaint, a protest, a cry, a regret, as if there were no hope in it, but only a mockery, a delusion, and a snare. The wheels and straps and shafts and spindles seemed to catch up the words and whirl them round and round, hurling them finally among the great plunging machines to be crushed and ground out of all shape. The whirling and spinning seemed to get into Jacob's head; his thoughts went round and round with the flying and flashing wheels. A reminiscence of a certain calm evening with a miller smoking his pipe got mixed up in the general confusion, and he hurried back again into the house of the dead, finding no consolation, no relief, out in the world among the living.

"This is for you," said Mrs. Titsy, handing him a letter and wiping away her tears.

"Did it come by the post ?" Jacob asked.

"No, and the boy said that it was very important."

It was a brief note. It simply stated that Squire Northcotes had important business with Jacob Martyn, whom he would expect at his residence at eleven o'clock the next day.

Squire Northcotes was one of the notabilities of Middleton. He was a short gentleman, with a red face, bushy grey hair and whiskers. He usually wore a brown dress-coat with brass buttons, a canarycoloured waistcoat, and grey trousers. Out-of-doors, he generally carried a riding whip. When he went without this emblem of the stable he carried his hands in his pockets, in a swaggering manner. He was always cleanly shaven, and his boots were bright and creaky. He wore a ponderous hunting watch, indicated by a large gold seal, which drew particular attention to the owner's rotundity of person. Meeting him in the High Street of Middleton-in-the-Water, a stranger might easily have imagined that the Squire had inherited the entire town from a long line of distinguished ancestors. In his magisterial

capacity he was a terror to evil-doers; in his private capacity he had been one of Mr. Martyn's fiercest opponents.

"You're a fine young fellow to assault a gentleman, are you not? a very fine fellow," said the Squire, addressing Jacob on the day appointed for the interview. "What have you to say for yourself?" The little magistrate put his double glasses over his nose, and leaned back in his chair to obtain a full view of the delinquent.

"Am I on my trial, then?" inquired Jacob, a slight blush tinging his otherwise pale cheeks.

"On your trial, sir! I should think you are on your trial.”

"I hope you will not trifle with me," said Jacob, thinking he detected something in Squire Northcotes' manner less earnest than a magistrate would be when fulfilling any portion of a justice's duties. "Trifle with you! trifle! not at all," said the magistrate, rising and ringing a bell.

"When did Mr. Gripps say he would call again about those warrants?" he inquired, when his summons was answered.

"At half-past eleven," said an apoplectic flunkey.

"Very well; when he comes, let him wait."

"And why am I called here, sir? Pray do not keep me in suspense, whatever the business may be," said Jacob, as the man disappeared.

"Suspense-it will be suspension for you (the Squire chuckled at his own joke) if you go on attacking gentlemen in the performance of their duty. Suspense indeed," and then the Squire put his hands into his pockets, and rattled his gold and silver until it seemed to repeat as plainly as possible, "Suspense indeed!"

"Gentlemen!" repeated Jacob, contemptuously. "But I do not wish to have any discussion. If you cannot inform me, at once. what your business is with me I must go home."

Jacob spoke with a sad, hopeless expression, that touched the Squire despite his brusque nature.

"Well then, be seated, Mr. Valiant," said the magistrate. "I have an application from Mr. Zebidee Gripps for warrants against yourself and others for assaults."

"Yes, sir," said Jacob, waiting for further information.

"Well, does not that make you feel frightened? doesn't it alarm you-eh?" said the Squire, evidently surprised at Jacob's coolness. "No," said Jacob, in desperation; "is it to frighten me that you have been good enough to send for me here?"

'Why, what a fierce young fellow you are! think I shall do wrong to-Dear me! dear me!

Really I begin to why, you might be

a poacher, or a burglar, instead of what you appear to be, with your curt answers and defiant bearing," said Squire Northcotes, annoyed that he had not succeeded in awing Jacob into a terrible fright.

"I always had reason to entertain a poor opinion of you, sir,” said Jacob, rising and taking up his hat, "but now you sink lower than ever in my estimation."

"Sir!" exclaimed the Squire. "You impudent rascal! I simply meant to frighten you; but, by Jove! I don't know but what Gripps is right after all!"

"A brave thing," continued Jacob, without noticing the Squire's remarks, "is it not, to take part with scoundrels in the wreck and destruction of an honest man's home, and then to triumph over his son, and try to frighten him while his father lies dead?"

"Stop! Stop! Dear, dear me ! dear me! poor fellow! there, there, sit down." The Squire seized Jacob by the arm, and thrust him into the chair which he had just vacated.

"You wrong me; you do, indeed. Dear me ! what a sad thing! Dead, do you say? How is it I did not know? As if it were not enough to have the bailiffs in the place, let alone Dear me ! Why, what an infernal hard-hearted devil!-ahem!—I must be, to torture the lad in this manner. Dear, dear! why, it's cruelty to animals. Damme! I deserve a month on the treadwheel." With which emphatic comment upon his own conduct, the Squire walked about the room, and rattled his gold and silver, which repeated his last pungent remark as plainly as gold and silver could possibly do. Jacob looked up in astonishment, and when there was a slight pause in the Squire's movements, he essayed to speak.

"Don't speak, sir; not a word, not a word. I'm a homicide, sir, a homicide a murderer of the innocents; I'm a wretch," went on the Squire, twitching at his coat collar, and throwing his little head about in the wildest state of excitement.

Indeed, there is no knowing to what extent his contempt for himself might not have gone had not the corpulent individual before mentioned knocked at the door, thrust his head inside, and ejaculated "Gripps."

The Squire caught at the word with the eagerness with which it is said drowning men desire to seize upon straws. "Gripps, Gripps!" The magistrate darted out of the room; and immediately afterwards, Jacob heard a great deal of talking in the hall. The conversation was very noisy, and all on one side. There were few words, however, that he could detect, save dearme" and "damme;" and the Squire made such frequent use of both, that it would have puzzled

a much cleverer fellow than Jacob to decide when the Squire's exclamation was "dearme" and when it was something else, the words were so singularly blended, and were used so frequently.

By-and-by the Squire returned, somewhat consoled by his interview with Gripps, to whom he had transferred all the epithets and reproaches which he had hitherto applied to himself.

"Dear me, I flattered myself I knew something; I thought I was rather a man of the world."

The discovery that he had somehow or other made a mistake in this was a blow to the Squire's vanity, which fretted him almost as much as it did to think that he had been acting cruelly towards one who had so much right to find sympathy and kindness.

"Well, sir," he said at length, "you need fear no trouble from Gripps I'll see that you are safe at any rate."

"Thank you, sir," said Jacob.

"Don't thank me; no words about that; but tell me what you ar going to do! what are your prospects in life?"

"I do not know," said Jacob.

"No, no-of course not; cannot think about it until the funeral over that's the feeling of a good son; well, well-I know, I kne But look here, now" (the gold and silver rattled, and then seve gold pieces came forth). "Look here, now, you may have use this; there, take it; it isn't a gift; I'll lend it to you; I've no use it; I shall only throw it away-come, come."

But Jacob declined. "I do not need it at present, sir; 1 greatly obliged to you," said Jacob.

The Squire was hurt at the refusal, but nothing would in Jacob to take the money.

"Very well, I regard it as false pride; but never mind," sai Squire; "perhaps you are right; this, however, you must doknow when you do require it, that's all."

Jacob thanked the Squire, and was shown to the door magistrate himself.

"Humph! he's a proud young fellow-like his father," Squire, ringing the bell for his sherry and biscuits. "As it ha it turned out well for a time, but I've been sorry ever since row I had with poor Martyn: dear me, it's a pity he red."

Dear me, it's a pity he wasn't a red," said the agi silver. There was no mistake about it. Whenever to be very emphatic he shook up sundry coins of two old guineas which were always domiciled