502 THINGS THAT HAPPEN EVERY DAY. NO. I. 



and knowing " whips/' passed with triumphant vigour outward bound 

 to many a distant province of the land. The draggled watchmen home- 

 ward reeled with lightless lanthorns, and in their stead, the Hebrew 

 connoisseur in clothes with hoarse and husky cry, disturbed the dreary 

 silence. of the morn. Then cantered by the gaitered grooms on pam- 

 pered steeds, the favourites of his lordships stud to snuff the freshening 

 morning in the misty park. The coffee woman at her stall dealt out her 

 smoking drink and snow-white bread, and many a hungry son of toil 

 seemed really feasting on the frugal pittance of her board. The 

 hackney-coachmen lingering on the stand, with straw-bands twisted 

 round their hats, eked out their morning sleep beneath a dozen dirty 

 capes, and the jaded steeds with drooping necks, forgot awhile in 

 slumber's ease, the whip, the spavin, and the raw. The coach stopped 

 at the Green Man and Still, or, as the French ingeniously translate it, 

 L'home vert et tranquil. A dozen filthy cads offered their services to call 

 a " jarvey," but in mercy to his frozen veins, Dacre resolved to walk to 



his destination. He reached street, but as it was yet early, no 



inmate was stirring, and his repeated knocks were only answered by 

 the echos of the empty street. At length wearied with rapping and 

 ringing, he tried to open the door, and to his surprise it yielded to his 

 hand, and he entered the house. He stole softly up stairs to the room 

 his wife used to occupy : but his heart beat loud, he breathed quick and 

 trembled with prophetic fear. He entered the chamber. The shutters 

 were closed, and a lamp burning by the bed-side cast a glimmering 

 light on a human countenance. The face was dark, darker than a 

 woman's face, and a moment's inspection, served to show that it was the 

 face of a man. Dacre, supposing he had mistaken the room, was on the 

 point of withdrawing, when a sigh recalled his steps. He passed to the 

 opposite side of the bed where the curtain was drawn back, and in the 

 face of the sighing sleeper, he recognized, or thought he recognized, the 

 features of the woman he had espoused. Could he be mistaken ? He 

 approached closer. The convulsive shudder of dismay shook his soul, 

 the vigour of existence died within his heart, and tottering with the 

 weight of life, he bent his trembling footsteps from the house. 



Years have passed away. The green mind of youth has ripened into 

 manhood, the ineffaceable lines of thought are drawn across the brow, 

 and Edward Dacre is no longer the ardent creature of a buoyant soul. 

 The tears of many nights have dimmed the lustre of his liquid eye ; his 

 his heart that quivered like the aspen, beats with a measured pace, and his 

 deliberate step and compressed lip, appear the outward signs of sub- 

 jugated emotion. 



