STREET SCENE IN APIA. 237 



royal, but of railway, despotism. No doubt, however, by 

 the tAventieth century, all similar crushings of people in the 

 way, will be numbered amongst the barbarisms of a by- 

 gone age. 



From the little low-born Apians thus carelessly sacrificed, 

 several were selected, in case of accidents, to become recipients 

 of the royal elixir, and tenants of the palace nurseries. We 

 shall now visit a quarter of the Apian city, where, under the 

 hands of workwomen, both diligent and numerous, the new 

 erections were rising, as if by magic, on the ruins of the late 

 humble habitations. Not far from, and within view of the 

 busy scene, stood a group of idlers, chiefly composed, you may 

 be sure, of some of those idlers by profession the four hundred 

 gentlemen hangers-on of royalty deceased. With these, how- 

 ever, were seen intermingled on the present occasion, two or 

 three aged and decrepit females of the working-class, of 

 those permitted to hold for awhile, on sufferance, their doomed 

 and joyless lives. They were strange companions, those young 

 lazy lordlings and those work-worn crazy crones ; but times of 

 public excitement are wont to bring together strange gossips, 

 and there was at least one thing in common (the common fate 

 which usually awaited them) between the opposite individuals 

 now met. "Well, really," drawled one of the young nobles 

 to a brother idler, as he looked up listlessly at the building 

 operations, " if they're not getting on famously. The manu- 

 factory will be built in no time ; and then they'll presently 



VOL. i. P 



