390 The Golden City. [Ocx. 



When he had prevailed over all the difficulties of the toilette, and 

 taken the meal naturally succeeding to it, his thoughts turned towards 

 a subject of yet greater importance, the accomplishment of the first 

 step in creating his own fortune. And here he was surprised to dis- 

 cover how indefinite his ideas had hitherto been, and .how much they 

 wanted of any approach to practical application. In this perplexity, he 

 had recourse to the advice of a person slightly connected with him by 

 descent, and was fortunate enough to procure a situation as clerk in a 

 merchant's office. The salary, indeed, was exceedingly small, and the 

 labour required bore to it the usual inverse ratio : but it was precisely 

 the occupation he desired, as affording most room for the splendid results 

 he anticipated. 



The ostensible head of the mercantile concern to which Maurice was 

 recommended, was Mr. Merivale ; but he committed all its cares to one 

 or two accomplices, and took no active part, except that of spending 

 much the largest share of the profits. There once existed a decided 

 line of demarcation between commercial grandeur and the dignity of 

 nobility and hereditary wealth ; and the distinction, though founded in 

 pride, and often invidious, was not wholly mischievous in its tendency. 

 But, at the birth of Mr. Merivale, this boundary-line was fast fading 

 away ; and the city wall, weakened by the frequent irruptions of needy 

 nobles, and excursive exploits of ambitious traders, was tottering to its 

 foundation. 



In conformity with the prevailing idea, that a merchant not only 

 might be, but ought to be, a gentleman, the father of Mr. Merivale sent 

 him to the university, and educated him, in all respects, as a man of 

 hereditary and independent fortune. The natural consequence was, 

 that, at three-and-twenty, he felt no predilection for the city; was 

 irregular in his attendance at his office, and careless in his transactions ; 

 and in process of time, after the death of his father, surrendered the 

 whole management of his affairs to partners and clerks. Thenceforth 

 he regarded his merchandize in no other light than as a disgraceful 

 source of profit the secret profession of a thief, of which nothing must 

 be known or an Irish estate, an unseen spring of convenient wealth. 



As he totally evaded the labours of his business, he ought in fairness 

 to have been moderately indifferent to its returns ; but, in point of fact, 

 he was far more rapacious than the active partners ; and the mention of 

 storms, embargoes, blockades, or anything that tended to the diminu- 

 tion of his income, exasperated him to madness. Money, however, was 

 with him an evanescent good : he was habitually extravagant, and lest 

 any motive to profusion should be wanting, he selected for his wife the 

 worst of all possible economists a poor lady of rank. Her expenses 

 and his own frequently reduced the gentleman-merchant to some diffi- 

 culties ; but, on such occasions, he studied not how to reduce his expen- 

 diture, but how to increase his income. With this view, he effected at 

 one time a reduction in the salaries of the clerks, and at another, by 

 abolishing their vacations of a week annually, diminished their numbers 

 measures by which he saved sixty pounds towards the rent of an 

 opera-box. 



On an appointed day, Maurice set out for the counting-house of the 

 Russian merchants. It was situated in a lane leading out of Lombard- 

 street, so narrow that broad daylight could never be said to enter it, 

 and, in winter, sunrise and sunset could most easily be ascertained by 



