been a panic in the Company, a panic which has been increased by Colonel Newcome's absurd swagger and folly. He says I am his enemy; enemy indeed! So I am in private life, but what has that to do with business? In business, begad, there are no friends and no enemies at all. I leave all my sentiment on the other side of Temple Bar."

So Thomas Newcome, and Clive the son of Thomas, had wrath in their hearts against Barnes, their kinsman, and desired to be revenged upon him, and were eager after his undoing, and longed for an opportunity when they might meet him and overcome him, and put him to shame.

When men are in this frame of mind, a certain personage is said always to be at hand to help them and give them occasion for indulging in their pretty little passion. What is sheer hate seems to the individual entertaining the sentiment so like indignant virtue, that he often indulges in the propensity to the full, nay, lauds himself for the exercise of it. I am sure if Thomas Newcome, in his present desire for retaliation against Barnes, had known the real nature of his sentiments towards that worthy, his conduct would have been different, and we should have heard of no such active hostilities as ensued.

IN

CHAPTER LXV.

IN WHICH MRS. CLIVE COMES INTO HER FORTUNE.

N speaking of the affairs of the B. B. C., Sir Barnes Newcome always took care to maintain his candid surprise relating to the proceedings of that Company. He set about evil reports against it !` He endeavour to do it a wrong-absurd! If a friend were to ask him (and it was quite curious what a number did manage to ask him) whether he thought the Company was an advantageous investment, of course he would give an answer. He could not say conscientiously he thought so-never once had said so—in the time of their connection, which had been formed solely with a view of obliging his amiable uncle. It was a quarrelsome Company; a dragoon Company; a Company of gentlemen accustomed to gunpowder, and fed on mulligatawny. He, forsooth, be hostile to it! There were some Companies that required no enemies at all, and would be pretty sure to go to the deuce their own way.

Thus, and with this amiable candour, spake Barnes, about a commercial speculation, the merits of which he had a right to canvass as well as any other citizen. As for Uncle Hobson, his conduct was characterized by a timidity which one would scarcely have expected from a gentleman of his florid, jolly countenance, active habits, and generally manly demeanour. He kept away from the cocoa-nut feast, as we have seen; he protested privily to the Colonel that his private good-will continued undiminished; but he was deeply grieved at the B. B. C. affair, which took place while he was on the Continent-confound the Continent, my wife would go-and which was entirely without his cognisance. The Colonel received his brother's excuses, first with awful bows and ceremony, and finally with laughter. "My good Hobson," said he, with the most insufferable kindness, " of course you intended to be friendly; of course the affair was done without your knowledge. We understand that sort of thing. London bankers have no hearts-for these last fifty years past that I have known you and your brother, and my amiable nephew, the present commanding officer, has there been anything in your conduct that has led me to suppose you had?" and herewith Colonel Newcome burst out into a laugh. It was not a pleasant laugh to hear. Worthy Hobson took his hat, and

walked away, brushing it round and round, and looking very confused. The Colonel strode after him downstairs, and made him an awful bow at the hall-door. Never again did Hobson Newcome set foot in that Tyburnian mansion.

During the whole of that season of the testimonial the cocoa-nut figured in an extraordinary number of banquets. The Colonel's hospitalities were more profuse than ever, and Mrs. Clive's toilettes more brilliant. Clive, in his confidential conversations with his friends, was very dismal and gloomy. When I asked City news of our well-informed friend F. B., I am sorry to say, his countenance became funereal. The B. B. C. shares, which had been at an immense premium twelve months since, were now slowly falling, falling.

"I wish," said Mr. Sherrick to me, "the Colonel would realize, even now, like that Mr. Ratray who has just come out of the ship, and brought a hundred thousand pounds with him."

"Come out of the ship! You little know the Colonel, Mr. Sherrick, if you think he will ever do that."

Mr. Ratray, though he had returned to Europe, gave the most cheering accounts of the B. B. C. It was in the most flourishing state. Shares sure to get up again. He had sold out entirely on account of his liver. Must come home-the doctor said so.

Some months afterwards, another director, Mr. Hedges, came home. Both of these gentlemen, as we know, entertained the fashionable world, got seats in Parliament, purchased places in the country, and were greatly respected. Mr. Hedges came out, but his wealthy partner, Mr. McGaspey, entered into the B. B. C. The entry of Mr. McGaspey into the affairs of the Company did not seem to produce very great excitement in England. The shares slowly fell. However, there was a prodigious indigo crop. The London manager was in perfect good-humour. In spite of this and that, of defections, of unpleasantries, of unfavourable whispers, and doubtful friends-Thomas Newcome kept his head high, and his face was always kind and smiling, except when certain family enemies were mentioned, and he frowned like Jove in anger.

We have seen how very fond little Rosey was of her mamma, of her uncle, James Binnie, and now of her papa, as she affectionately styled Thomas Newcome. This affection, I am sure, the two gentlemen returned with all their hearts, and but that they were much too generous and simple-minded to entertain such a feeling, it may be wondered that the two good old boys were not a little jealous of one another. Howbeit it does not appear that they entertained such a feeling; at least it never interrupted the kindly friendship between them, and Clive was regarded in the light of a son by both of them, and each contented himself with his moiety of the smiling little girl's affection.

As long as they were with her, the truth is, little Mrs. Clive was very fond of people, very docile, obedient, easily pleased, brisk, kind, and good-humoured. She charmed her two old friends with little songs, little smiles, little kind offices, little caresses; and having administered Thomas Newcome's cigar to him in the daintiest, prettiest way, she would trip off to drive with James Binnie, or sit at his dinner, if he was indisposed, and be as gay, neat-handed, watchful, and attentive a child as any old gentleman could desire.

She did not seem to be very sorry to part with mamma, a want of feeling which that lady bitterly deplored in her subsequent conversation with her friends about Mrs. Clive Newcome. Possibly there were reasons why Rosey should not be very much vexed at quitting mamma; but surely she might have dropped a little tear, as she took leave of kind, good old James Binnie. Not she. The gentleman's voice faltered, but hers did not in the least. She kissed him on the face, all smiles, blushes, and happiness, and tripped into the railway-carriage with her husband and father-in-law at Brussels, leaving the poor old uncle very sad. Our women said, I know not why, that little Rosey had no heart at all. Women are accustomed to give such opinions respecting the wives of their newly married friends. I am bound to add (and I do so during Mr. Clive Newcome's absence from England, otherwise I should not like to venture upon the statement), that some men concur with the ladies' opinion of Mrs. Clive. For instance, Captains Goby and Hoby declare that her treatment of the latter, her encouragement and desertion of him when Clive made his proposals, were shameful.

At this time Rosey was in a pupillary state. A good, obedient little girl, her duty was to obey the wishes of her dear mamma. How show her sense of virtue and obedience better than by promptly and cheerfully obeying mamma, and at the orders of that experienced Campaigner, giving up Bobby Hoby, and going to England to a fine house, to be presented at Court, to have all sorts of pleasure with a handsome young husband and a kind father-in-law by her side? No wonder Rosey was not in a very active state of grief at parting from Uncle James. He strove to console himself with these considerations when he had returned to the empty house, where she had danced, and smiled, and warbled; and he looked at the chair she sat in; and at the great mirror which had so often reflected her fresh pretty face;—the great callous mirror, which now only framed upon its shining sheet the 'turban, and the ringlets, and the plump person, and the resolute smile of the old Campaigner.

After that parting with her uncle at the Brussels railway, Rosey never again beheld him. He passed into the Campaigner's keeping, from which alone he was rescued by the summons of pallid death...

He met that summons like a philosopher; rejected rather testily all the mortuary consolations which his nephew-in-law, Josey's husband, thought proper to bring to his bedside; and uttered opinions which scandalized that divine. But as he left Mrs. M'Craw only 500l., thrice that sum to his sister, and the remainder of his property to his beloved niece, Rosa Mackenzie, now Rosa Newcome, let us trust that Dr. M'Craw, hurt and angry at the ill-favour shown to his wife, his third young wife, his best beloved Josey, at the impatience with which the deceased had always received his, Dr. M'Craw's, own sermons :-let us hope, I say, that the reverend gentleman was mistaken in his views respecting the present position of Mr. James Binnie's soul; and that Heaven may have some regions yet accessible to James, which Dr. M'Craw's intellect has not yet explored. Look, gentlemen! Does a week pass without the announcement of the discovery of a new comet in the sky, a new star in the heaven, twinkling dimly out of a yet farther distance, and only now becoming visible to human ken though existent for ever and ever? So let us hope divine truths may be shining, and regions of light and love extant, which Geneva glasses cannot yet perceive, and are beyond the focus of Roman telescopes.

I think Clive and the Colonel were more affected by the news of James's death than Rosey, concerning whose wonderful strength of mind good Thomas Newcome discoursed to my Laura and me, when, fancying that my friend's wife needed comfort and consolation, Mrs. Pendennis went to visit her. "Of course we shall have no more parties this year," sighed Rosey. She looked very pretty in her black dress. Clive, in his hearty way, said a hundred kind feeling things about the departed friend. Thomas Newcome's recollections of him, and regret, were no less tender and sincere. "See," says he, how that dear child's sense of duty makes her hide her feelings! Her grief is most deep, but she wears a calm countenance. I see her looking sad in private, but I no sooner speak than she smiles. "I think," said Laura, as we came away, "that Colonel Newcome performs all the courtship part of the marriage, and Clive, poor Clive, though he spoke very nobly and generously about Mr. Binnie, I am sure it is not his old friend's death merely, which makes him so unhappy."

Poor Clive, by right of his wife, was now rich Clive; the little lady having inherited from her kind relative no inconsiderable sum of money. In a very early part of this story, mention has been made of a small sum producing one hundred pounds a year, which Clive's father had made over to the lad when he sent him from India. This little sum Mr. Clive had settled upon his wife before marriage, being indeed all he had of his own; for the famous bank shares which his