Scrivener (upon whose testimony he could rely) had lately inspected, he began to think that the still further reduction he might squeeze out of the embarrassed proprietor would fully counterbalance any disadvantages arising from the want of ocular inspection. Indifferent as to localities, he merely required a beneficial inte rest for his money so that after a good deal of struggling between his habitual distrust and his desire of driving a good bargain, with no small portion of chaffering between the needy vender and the money-loving purchaser, he finally concluded his contract on very favourable terms, and proceeded immediately to sell a sufficient portion of his various stocks to complete the purchase-money.

Nothing could exceed the astonishment of the brokers and dealers upon 'Change, when they learnt his purpose, except the fervent expressions of their regret that the Baltic-walk should lose one of its wealthiest merchants, and unquestionably its brightest ornament. So pro

found was their sorrow,

that as a mere hedge

to their feelings they all became suddenly anxious

to carry in their pockets some memorial of so dear and valuable a friend. One therefore kindly offered to take his India Stock off his hands, a second his Exchequer tallies, a third his shares in the African Company, and others his flax, hemp, and tallow, at such depreciated prices as would give them some hundreds of sterling reasons for remembering him. But Isaac was much too old a bird to be so easily plucked. His sneering half-suppressed laugh, and the expression of his keen contemptuous eye, soon convinced them that, if they meant to deal with him at all, they must do it at honest market prices. He obtained the full value for his Stock, paid over the purchase-money, and received his title deeds. The conversion of his merchandize however into cash, and the collection of his outstanding debts, were not to be so rapidly accomplished. These were objects which occupied two or three months of unremitted application, at the expiration of which period he thought he might well stand acquitted of undue precipitation if he just ran down by

On

the coach to have a peep at the estate upon which he projected passing the remainder of his life. All that had recently occurred tended to confirm him in the wisdom of his proceedings, and two omens had more especially convinced him that times of public trouble and disaster were rapidly approaching. During the King's coronation, the crown, not being properly fitted to his head, tottered; when Henry Sidney, the Keeper of the Robes, kept it from falling offpleasantly observing that it was not the first time his family had supported the crown. the same day, a square of glass in one of the churches, whereon the King's arms were painted, suddenly fell out and broke to pieces, the rest remaining entire. Trifling as they were, these inauspicious auguries agitated the minds of the people, and upon few did they make a deeper impression than upon Isaac Goldingham, whom we may now no longer designate as "The Merchant." It was therefore with a complacent "hem!" of more than ordinary loudness, and an almost fire-striking stamp of his ferule upon the pave

ment, that, after having seen his luggage safely bestowed in the huge basket behind, he mounted the ponderous six-inside stage-coach which was to occupy many a weary hour of successive days in dragging him into Dorsetshire.

"

CHAPTER II.

"Why how now, Hecate? Thou look'st angerly.”

MACBETH

AROUND the Green that faced the entrance lodge to Goldingham Place was confusedly scattered a small hamlet, presenting the usual assemblage of cottages, barns, a wheelwright's and a blacksmith's sheds, and a numerous indiscriminate melée of sheep, geese, pigs, ducks, and ragged rosy children; in its centre was a shallow pond with dirty poached banks, wherein two or three cows were generally to be seen standing up to the knees in water, if it happened to be warm weather, staring very steadily upon nothing, and deliberately chewing the cud as they lazily whisked off the flies from their sides with a bedraggled tail. At one end of the Green