Not at

secret, are already chaffering with the minister touching the price of blood. Does this present human nature under a loathsome aspect? Say, would it not be marvellous if the disloyal subject were the faithful friend?

Few, perhaps, would covet the position of Mr. Cockayne, the informer; few would envy him his appearance in the witness-box; few would pity him under the scathing cross-examination of Curran; few would compassionate the man who sold his confiding associate; who listened eagerly to all his plans, approved them, abetted them, and then rushed with breathless haste to the mansion of the minister, and bargained, with a huckster's eagerness, for the sum for which he covenanted to betray to the scaffold and the headsman's axe the being who confided in him.

It was a hard and close bargain. Mr. Cockayne took care to secure himself. The amount of money which poor Jackson was indebted to this faithful and conscientious ally, Mr. Pitt, the minister, pledged himself to pay.

But the transaction bears a moral. It shows that the curse of GOD tracks all such schemes. "The bloodthirsty man shall not live out half

his days." It proves that the traitor stands alone. He may have parasites, dependants, confidants, but no friend.

And the warning to the reckless and desperate of every grade-to those who eagerly preach sedition to the ignorant and the excitable-who would render the lower ranks discontented and rob the upper-who calculate fondly on national convulsion, careless of national suffering, is one and the same. the cost. RESPICE FINEM.

Count

CHAPTER X.

A DESPERATE STRATAGEM.

Campbell, the Banker's Clerk.

"It usually falls out that those who seek others' destruction find their own." ANDREW FULLER.

THERE are few who have been in or near the Clearing House, in London, on a busy afternoon, or a few hours previous to the making up of the foreign post-bags, but must have noticed in those who surround him an unnatural union instanced again and againthat of a slight, youthful form, with an anxious, haggard, care-worn face; a step light, agile, and buoyant; with an eye clouded with suspicion, and a glance darting hither and thither; wary, restless, and ill-assured. Slowly and stealthily the youth produces from a secret and invisible side-pocket a small dark morocco case, glossy, cabalistically lettered, and crammed with cheques and bank paper.

Not one word of explanation is necessary. You recognise his calling at once. Before you

is the banker's clerk. Few in the "battle of life" occupy a more responsible station; or in that weary struggle called existence have greater need of self-control and unwavering principle.

With views enlarged by education, and with cultivated tastes; on a salary punctually paid, but which must be carefully husbanded if it is to prove a maintenance; an inmate of a home saddened by the daily pressure of pinching poverty; surrounded (and this is no fancy picture) by a widowed mother and pale and anxious-looking sisters, wrung by the recollection of better days, and each struggling to hide from the other the want of common necessaries; constantly harassed by the wish. and desire to give, and tortured by the instant recollection that, if he is to remain honest, he must withhold: so circumstanced, gold by hundreds and by thousands-gold in heaps— is hourly before his eyes; part of his stated occupation is to hand it over to others; and he is daily trusted with sums, one-fiftieth part of which would relieve the necessities of those most dear to him, and would free from the

prospect of immediate or future privation every one of the inmates of his humble suburban home.

"Tis a trial almost too severe for poor human nature to brave scatheless; but it is identified with his position; and this position he holds simply by force of character.

An unfortunate accident-a misadventurea couple of hours' delay in returning to the banking-house-an oversight awkwardly explained the loss or mislaying of a cheque: each of these incidents has been known to cover with gloom a morning of bright promise.

The habits of the young man having been pronounced "unbusiness-like," and his method of keeping his appointments unpunctual, the unwelcome intimation is given that the firm has no further occasion for his services, and he quits it with the brand affixed to him of "a youth not to be trusted."

May one passing remark be pardoned?

Surely the salary of a being so heavily tried and so deeply trusted ought not to be a pittance! It should be commensurate with his responsibilities. Place him above temptation. Let something more than the bare necessaries