amiable girls they are!" he said to himself, as he threaded his way through the narrow streets to a more open thoroughfare. "And what a pity that one is so ill, and the other so dowdy-looking. How different Griselda looks to the ladies I saw yesterday!"

The sisters were more generous in their commendations of him. "He has a generous heart," said Griselda; "and perhaps he is going abroad with the hope that he may be able the sooner to assist us. You know, Milly, how often he has wished he was able to do so."

"You have closed the window, Griselda; open it a little now."

The window was opened, and some cool spring water was poured from the stone pitcher for the sinking girl to drink. Her sister bathed her temples too, and insisted on her taking a little sal volatile. The faintness passed off, but that night neither mentioned Florian's name.

"She thinks more of him than I do,' Griselda said to herself, with a suppressed sigh. "But that is no wonder, as she has so much more time for thinking. Perhaps he will not be gone so long, or perhaps what we hear to-morrow may change his mind.”

CHAPTER VI.

"Full little knowest thou that hast not tride
What hell it is in suing long to bide!

To lose good dayes that might be better spent

To wast long nights in pensive discontent;
To fret thy soule with crosses and with cares,
To eate thy heart through comfortless dispaires.
Unhappie wight, borne to disastrous end,

That doth his life in so long tendance spend."

SPENSER.

"Lasciat' ogni speranza, voi ch' entrate."-DAnte.

Ir is a popular error to suppose that all the lawyers in this great city are collected in the neighbourhood of the inns of court. They are, on the contrary, scattered thickly all over London. They are to be found in Belgravia and St. Giles's, and in all intermediate localities between those extremes of metropolitan life.

Mr. Rock was a respectable solicitor, in a small way, and resided in one of those little courts which we shall not describe more particularly than by saying, that they run be

tween Cornhill and the river. He had a convenient ground floor, with three clerks constantly scribbling in the front office; his own room, lit by a skylight, was at the back, and was ornamented by those most precious works of art in a lawyer's eyes, portly tin chests, lettered with the names of the clients whose title-deeds and securities purported to be therein safely deposited.

At eleven o'clock on the morning following the close of our last chapter, Mr. Rock sat at his table with a number of red-tapetied parcels, some large as a counsellor's fifty-guinea brief, some small as the quantum of sense contained in it, ranged in order before him. By his side was his watch, which he consulted in a fidgety manner, as the minutes stole on. It was evident from his manner that he expected some person on business, and that to him, Mr. Rock, that business was of no slight importance.

While he waits, we may take the liberty of sketching his portrait. He was about midway between fifty and sixty years of age. His face was very red and very full, and a little pimpled, but that did not show much from the ruddy glow of his whole countenance. He had a club nose, studded with

In

little nobs, which he rubbed vehemently when he was put out of his way, and in that harmless manner did he alone betray any symptom of impatience; for the bland tone of his voice never varied, nor did his eyes ever lose their good-humoured twinkling expression. his chair he appeared a good-sized man, but when he rose it was seen that he was shaped very much like the celebrated Mr. Punch; for his legs were singularly short and thin, though by their activity they seemed to answer his purpose extremely well. His hair was respectably white, and there was a highly respectable degree of baldness about the crown of his head, which alone would have recommended him to the office of churchwarden in any parish of the metropolis. He was remarkably neat and clean in his appearance, and wore the whitest of white neckcloths. But he was most distinguished for that quality on which he most prided himself, and that was his extreme suavity of demeanour. What with his smiling face, and the rubbing of his hands, and the bending of his body, and the soft tones of his voice, and the polite regard he expressed for every one who approached him, he might be thought eligible for Punch's model gallery, if Punch should

ever think of delineating a model solicitor; but his clerks, who knew him better, dreaded the rubbing of his nose by his hand as significant of inward wrath, of which they were sure in some way to experience the effects.

Mr. Rock belonged to the Wesleyan body. Having been told, when a young man, that there was an opening in that connexion for a sharp practitioner, he instantly availed himself of it, and became a Wesleyan, as he would have become a Jew or a Turk, if he had seen any chance of obtaining business by his conversion. But sometimes Mr. Rock doubted whether he had chosen the best persuasion for advancing his worldly interests. His practice was but scanty, and to increase it he was forced to take up cases out of the connection, which, from the poverty of the parties, he was accustomed to regard as his "no cure no pay cases. In managing these he did not conceive himself bound to pay exclusive regard to the interests of his clients; so that, when he saw any opportunity of getting his costs from his opponents—and frequently they were willing to compromise the matter in this way, to get rid of the annoyance he gave them-he would throw his unfortunate clients overboard altogether, and