08 THR RUINED MERCHANT. 



CHAPTER III. 



" His poor self, 



With his disease of all-shun'd poverty, 

 Walks, like contempt, alone." 



SHAKSPEARE. 



As soon as Monson was capable of making active exertions he set 

 himself to work, determined to rescue his parents from their state of de- 

 gradation and destitution. Sickness had to some extent overpowered his 

 moral sensibilities, and he felt less pain than even he had anticipated 

 in again fronting the world. The loss of Amy appeared indeed to have 

 robbed him of much of that susceptibility which had driven him 

 almost to desperation, when his misfortunes were recent. She was 

 gone who had been his pride and his delight ; and with her had fled 

 that conscious pride of self, which had been at once his stay and 

 his torment : but now hopeless, debilitated, and sick at heart, he went 

 abroad as one utterly indifferent to all about him. He had one 

 object, and one object only, in view a burning desire to obtain the 

 means of support for his aged parents. This desire now came in 

 place of every other consideration, and steeled him against harshness 

 or still more cutting indifference. Day after day, with pallid cheek 

 and anxious step, he revisited the scenes of his prosperity, and 

 wearied himself with vain solicitations : he sought no gratuitous aid, 

 he asked only for employment, and in doing this he was made to 

 feel the full force of the world's bitterness. 



In a commercial country, and in a commercial district, poverty, 

 open and acknowledged poverty, is the one grand curse, the one in- 

 surmountable barrier separating man from his fellows. It is painful, 

 it is worse than painful, to witness the struggles of fallen inde- 

 pendence; and well was it for Monson, that the shield of despair 

 was thrown over his hopes and his pride. If now and then a 

 startling consciousness came upon his mind, of the indignity which 

 was thrown upon him, it was met by the knowledge that his suffer- 

 ing parents had no resource but in his efforts; and this bore him 

 through the conflict. Week after week he thus toiled on ; every 

 day sinking him lower and lower in the abyss of despair, till his 

 very heart became hardened, and his harassed and disturbed ima- 

 gination began to paint mankind as unfeeling wretches, who were 

 pouring their malice upon his devoted head. A slight relapse of 

 illness added frightfully to their sorrows ; and they soon reached a 

 depth of destitution, which well nigh overcame the passive endurance 

 of his mother, and utterly broke down the remnant of fortitude which 

 had hitherto sustained his father. 



Again, with wasted frame and poverty-stricken aspect, he resumed 

 his search for employment, cursing the hour of his birth and execrating 

 all and every thing around him. The remains of pride, which still clung 

 to his harassed spirit, had made him sedulously avoid coming into colli- 

 sion with those who had been the friends and sharers of his prosperity. 



