more. Debts, difficulties, surround me on every side; and yet I cannot force myself to that employment which would soon release me from them.
"The iron has entered into my soul, and it weighs me down to earth. I cannot bear staying here, the office of Sir George's secretary is too degrading. To what use am I turning the talents once destined to achieve such lofty purposes! I am applying them to the meanest deceits,—to gratify the miserable vanity of a man, as much my inferior by nature as he is my superior by fortune. I cannot continue to live with Sir George: I despise him too thoroughly. Every day I decide on leaving him. I act against every sense I have of right in staying; and yet I lack the resolution to leave."
Walter leant his head upon his arm, and remained lost in thought. He did not take into consideration his shattered health; consumption had already begun its work, and he drooped beneath its fever—that fever whose reaction is languor. But he referred his dis-
