THE SIBYLLINE FLY-LEAF. 51 



The mystery is out ; yet the Poet stands aghast, fixed as in 

 a stupor of horror and dismay. He scarcely notices the 

 escaped offender; the buz of Blue-bottle now falls unheeded on 

 his ear ; the bouncings of Blue-bottle attract not his eye, for his 

 eye is strained on more appalling objects, on the printed 

 envelope of rancid butter, on the title-page of his first inde- 

 pendent and avowed production, on his own dishonoured name 

 conspicuous in the transparency of grease ! This, then, was the 

 publicity acquired by his first great work, and there, torn from 

 its very self, was the sibylline leaf, which had told in the warning 

 buz of that prophetic My, the coming fate of his second, his still 

 greater work, so laboured, so exquisitely finished. Finished ! 

 it is finished, indeed, with hope, with effort ! So spoke more 

 plainly than could words the deep drawn sigh with which poor 



H resumed his seat, not, we may be sure, to taste his 



ill-savoured bread and butter, but only to sip his cold tea, as 

 if to swallow down with it something of chagrin, or to sip in 

 something of consolation. 



o 



*#**** 



It was growing dusk, the time of day when poor II 



was accustomed, whenever he stole an hour from his toil, to 

 stroll countrywards, in the direction of green fields, which, as 

 they grew more and more remote, he rarely enough contrived 

 to reach. But this evening he had no heart to leave his garret, 

 and not a breath of air came over the heated house-tops to 



