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the residence of the deceased. After they had | he tried to avoid meeting the members of his fambeen sworn they proceeded to view the body. On ily more than usual.' She did not know he pos entering the principal apartment on the first floor, sessed a pistol, and thought he might have pur(which was used as a painting room,) a dreadful chased it when he went out on Monday morning. sight presented itself. Stretched on the floor Two female servants were examined; but their immediately in front of a colossal picture, ("Alfred evidence was only confirmatory of that given by the Great and the First British Jury,") on which Miss Haydon. the unhappy artist appears to have been engaged The Reverend Orlando Hyman said he was a up to his death, lay the corpse of an aged man, stepson of deceased. He observed a great alterahis white hairs saturated with blood, in a pool of tion in Mr. Haydon's countenance on Saturday. which the whole upper portion of the body was He was eccentric from his youth; and had latterly lying. The head partially rested upon his right | become more so. He kept a diary of the principal arm; near to which were lying two razors, the occurrences of his life. The coroner here proone in a case, and the other smeared with blood, duced a large folio manuscript volume, the last half open, by its side. There was also near the diary of the deceased; and he requested Mr. Hysame spot a small pocket-pistol, which appeared man to mark such passages as might throw any to have been recently discharged, though it was on light upon the state of deceased's mind recentlyhalf-cock when discovered. The deceased ap-taking care not to disclose any family secrets; peared to have fallen in the exact position in which these passages Mr. Hyman would read to the he was seen by the jury. He was dressed with jury. After a short interval, Mr. Hyman said he great neatness, in the ordinary attire which he was prepared for the task. IIe had thought it wore while engaged in painting. His throat had better to go back to the month of April; at which a frightful wound extending to nearly seven inches period the failure of the exhibition of his picture in length; and there was also a perforated bullet-of the "Banishment of Aristides" had affected wound in the upper part of the skull over the deceased very much. He had built his hopes on parietal bone. Everything in the room had been that, and considered it the last thing he could do the subject of extraordinary and careful arrange- to extricate himself from his difficulties. He was ment. Mr. Haydon had placed a portrait of his much attached to his diary, and this was the twentywife on a small easel immediately facing his large sixth volume which he had filled. Mr. Hyman picture. On an adjoining table he had placed his proceeded to read from the diary. The first entry diary, which he kept with much care for many selected ran as followsyears past. It was open at the concluding page; March 27.-I had my little misgivings to-day and the last words he had entered were "God on my way to the Egyptian Hall. The horse forgive me; Amen!" Packets of letters ad-attached to the cab in which I rode fell. Would dressed to several persons, and another document, any man believe this annoyed me? Yet the same headed "The last thoughts of Haydon, at half- accident occurred before the Cartoon contest.” past ten o'clock, a. m., June 22, 1846," were This entry is succeeded by the following quotaalso placed upon the same table; with a watch, tion from Canning, in reference to Napoleonand a prayer-book, open at that portion of the gospel service appropriated to the sixth Sunday after the Epiphany.

The jury returned to the tavern. The first witness examined was Miss Mary Haydon, the daughter of the deceased; aged sixteen. Her father was sixty years of age in January last. She described the finding of his body on Monday morning, on her entering his studio. She had then just returned from accompanying her mother a short distance on her way to Brixton. She last saw her father alive at ten o'clock on Monday morning. He then looked agitated-more so than usual. She had never known him to make any attempt upon his life before. He was not under medical treatment. Mr. Coroner Wakley asked if he had complained of his head in any way of late? Witness- Yes; it was very unusual for him to do so, but on Sunday night last he did complain; and during the last two or three days I recollect to have seen him frequently put his hand up to his head." He had not slept well for the last three months. He did not seek medical advice; he did not seem to think it necessary. He was always in the habit of taking his own medicines. The coroner (to the jury) Bless me! how extraordiary it is that persons will so neglect themselves. The number of lives annually sacrificed through a neglect of symptoms of this sort is perfectly monstrous." Miss Haydon continued-Mr. Haydon was a man of very temperate habits. "I have noticed that he had a very different expression of countenance during the last three days.-He was very silent during the whole of that period, and apparently absent in his mind. I cannot say that

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All is still but folly: his final destruction can neither be averted nor delayed, and his unseasona ble mummeries will but serve to take away all dignity from the drama and render his fall at once terrible and ridiculous."

The next entries read were

"March 31.-April fool day to-morrow. In putting my letters of invitation to a private view into the post, I let 300 of them fall to the ground. Now for the truth of omens."

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April 4.-The first day of my exhibition being opened, it rained all day; and no one came, Jerrold, Bowring, Fox, Maule, and Hobhouse, excepted. How different would it have been twenty-six years ago-the rain would not have kept them away then.

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"In God I trust: Amen."

April 13.-17. 3s. 6d. An advertisement of a finer description could not have been written to catch the public; but not a shilling more was added to the receipts. They rush by thousands to see Tom Thumb. They push-they fightthey scream-they faint-they cry Help and Murder!' They see my bills and caravans, but do not read them: their eyes are on them, but their sense is gone. It is an insanity--a rabies furor-a dream-of which I would not have believed Englishmen could be guilty. My situation

is now one of peril, more so than when I began Solomon' thirty-three years ago. Involved in debt-mortified by the little sympathy which the public displayed towards my best pictures-with several private engagements yet to fulfil, I awoke, as usual, at four o'clock this morning. My mind was immediately filled with the next picture of my series. I felt immediately, 'Is it the whispering of an evil or good spirit?' but believing it to be for good, I called on my Creator, who has led me through the wilderness during forty years, not to desert me at the eleventh hour." Mr. Hyman explained that the series of pictures which the writer referred to were six large paintings which he intended for the Parliament Palace. Mr. Hyman further stated, in reference to the religious expressions interspersing the diary, that the deceased was a very pious inan; and in making his daily entries, generally commenced them with the following prayer-"Oh, God, bless me through the evils of this day!" or a somewhat similar aspiration.

A medical gentleman was now examined as to the cause of death. He said it was loss of blood, from the wound in the throat; which must have been inflicted by deceased himself.

Mr. Hyman resumed his extracts from the diary; commencing with an entry made on the 21st of April, in which the unfortunate man had noted down the number of visiters to his own exhibition during one week as 1334, while Tom Thumb's levee during the same period had been attended by 12,000 persons. The coroner inquired whether the deceased had not left a letter addressed to Mrs. Haydon? Mr. Hyman replied that he had, and also one to each of his children. He handed to the coroner a packet containing the letters in question. It was addressed, "To Mrs. Haydon, my dearest love," and sealed in red wax, with his own coat of arms. The coroner desired Mr. Mills, his deputy, to read the letters severally. The first read was addressed to Mrs. Haydon, as

follows

"London, Painting-room, June 22. "God bless thee, dearest love! Pardon this last pang! Many thou hast suffered from me! God bless thee in dear widowhood: I hope Sir

Robert Peel will consider that I have earned a
pension for thee. A thousand kisses.

“Thy dear husband and love to the last,
"B. R. HAYDON.

"Give dear Mary 101., and dear Frank 101. the rest for your dear self of the balance from

Robert's 501.

Mrs. Haydon."

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May 4.-I have just received a lawyer's letter, the first for a long time. I have called on the writer, who is an amiable man, and has promised to give me time. I came home under mingled feelings of sorrow, delight, anxiety, and anticipation, and sat down to my palette under an irritable influence. My brain became confused, as I foresaw ruin, misery, and a prison before me. I went on with my picture, and rejoiced inwardly at its effects; but my brain harassed and confused. Fell into a deep slumber, from which I did not awake for an hour: I awoke cold-the fire outand went again to my picture."

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May 14.-This day forty-two years I left my native Plymouth for London. I have closed my exhibition with a loss of 1117. No one can accuse me of showing less talent or energy than twenty years ago.

May 21.-Worked hard at my picture, and advanced immensely. Felt uneasy because I could not give my dear son money to go and see his college-friends."

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June 3.-Called on my dear friend Kemp, who advanced me some cash to get over my difficulties. By the time my pictures are finished they will be all mortgaged; but never mind, so that I get them done."

"June 13.-Picture much advanced; but my necessities are dreadful, owing to the failure of my exhibition at the hall. In God I trust. It is hard -this struggle of forty-two years' duration; but Thy will and not mine be done."

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June 14.-0 God! let it not be presumption in me to call for Thy blessing on my six works. Let no difficulty on earth stay their progress. Grant this week Thy divine aid. From sources invisible raise me up friends to save me from the embarrassments which want of money must bring upon me; and grant that this day week I may be able to thank Thee for my extrication."

June 15.-Passed in great anxiety, after harassing about for several hours in the heat of the

sun.

June 16.--Sat from two to five o'clock staring down by anxiety and the anxious looks of my famat my picture like an idiot; my brain pressed Sirily, whom I have been compelled to inform of my condition. We have raised money on all our silver to keep us from want in case of accident. I have written to Sir Robert Peel, to -, and to stating that I have a heavy sum to pay. I have offered The Duke's Study' to Who answered first? Tormented by Disraeli, harassed by public business, up came the following letter. "Whitehall, June 16.

The next letter was addressed to his son Frederick

God bless thee, Frederick, and render thee an honor to this country.

Thy affectionate father, B. R. HAYDON. To Mr. Frederick Haydon, R. N." The next was to his son Frank"God bless thee, dear Frank; continue in virtue and honest doing.

"God bless thee.

Thy affectionate father,
66 B. R. HAYDON.

"To Mr. Frank Haydon."

This was to his daughter

"God bless thee, my dearest daughter Mary; continue the dear good innocent girl thou hast

"SIR-I am sorry to hear of your continued embarrassments. From a limited fund which I have at my disposal, I send, as a contribution for your relief from these embarrassments, the sum of £50. I remain, sir, your obedient servant, "ROBERT PEEL.

"Be so good as to sign and return the accompanying receipt.'

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June 17.-My dearest wife wishes me to stop | spirit with which he preached the faith in them, the whole thing, and close payment: but I will were revelations of genius. His long blind strugnot! I will finish my six pictures, by the blessing of God!"

"June 18.-This morning, fearing I should be involved, I returned to a young bookseller some books for which I had not paid him. No reply from - or - And this Peel is the man

who has no heart!"

"June 21.-Slept horribly, prayed in sorrow, and got up in agitation."

The next was the last entry made, immediately before the world closed upon the unhappy man"June 22.-God forgive me: Amen.

"Finis. B. R. HAYDON. "Stretch me no longer on this rough world.' Lear.

gle, in which he too often mistook waywardness for independence and strange blindness to the defects of his own works, was nevertheless characterized by unflagging energy, and illumined by coruscations of intellect and imagination. There is poetry in his life; he lays hold on our sympathies. His death is felt to be an event even at the crisis of a nation's history; and the active sympathy for him evinced by Sir Robert Peel, while engrossed by fierce personal attacks and the direction of great political combinations, is the most pleasing episode in the minister's existence.

Haydon's life was one of unrelaxing industry. He might not be averse to luxuries-no artist or poet can be, from the temperament which is necessary to the development of his tastes and powers; but his tastes were simple and his indulgence not immoderate. Even his fierce controversial spirit when roused cannot be regarded as the source of his misfortunes. It is against men of taste and intellect, conscious of similar if less glaring weaknesses in their own minds, and irretentive of mere

"The end of the twenty-sixth volume." In summing up, Mr. Wakley said in leaving the case in the hands of the jury, he could not fail to remark on the munificent act of Sir Robert Peel towards the unfortunate deceased. He thought it must speak to the heart of a great many thousand persons, that whilst others were, so to speak, at-personal dislikes, that such escapades precipitate a tempting to destroy his own mind, amidst a pressure of public business almost unparalleled, Sir Robert Peel had not forgotten the sufferings of others.

man. In time they are sure to be forgotten and forgiven. It is among the mere drudges of life, absorbed in daily household trifles, that undying enmities are to be sought. The poverty and emThe Reverend Mr. Hyman here begged permis- barrassments of men like Haydon are caused partsion to state, that he had not yet said all that he ly by themselves, it is true, but partly also by incould in reference to the generosity of the right complete social arrangements. They who think honorable baronet. Subsequently to the deceased's the rugged incompliance of Haydon's nature suffideath, Sir Robert, addressing one of the executors, cient to account for his misfortunes, must be puzhad enclosed a check for £200 from the royal zled to account for those of Laman Blanchard, in bounty fund, in order, as he stated in his letter, whom unwearying industry and regular habits, that the family might not be molested before a pub-combined with unoffending, attractive, unvarying lic appeal could be made in their behalf: Sir Rob- gentleness, were proved equally incompetent to ert added, that when that was done, of course he the task of providing for a family. Sir Walter should be most ready to come forward so far as his Scott had his full share of the national taste for acprivate purse and personal influence were con-quisition; yet, wanting the talent, his " fairy cerned. gold" turned into withered leaves long before his death.

The coroner, after having again remarked on the munificence of the premier, inquired whether the jury were unanimous in their verdict?

The foreman replied in the affirmative. It was this-"We find that the deceased, Benjamin Robert Haydon, died from the effect of wounds inflicted by himself; and that the said Benjamin Robert Haydon was in an unsound state of mind when he committed the act."

WHAT CAN BE DONE FOR LITERARY MEN AND
ARTISTS?

The tragic close of Haydon's career is of a nature to command attention even amidst the intense contemporaneous public excitement. The long and terrible struggle of an individual mind that has terminated so shockingly, domineers over the imagination almost with more power than the gregarious enthusiasm evolved in the suicidal deathstruggle of shattered factions. In May, 1804, Haydon came to London for the first time, a sanguine, aspiring boy, bent upon reaching the loftiest height of art. In May, 1846, he closed his last losing exhibition, visited by a few cold spectators, while eager crowds were squeezing into the same building to wonder at a dwarf. The conviction was irresistible that his career as an artist had been a failure. Though wanting the faculty of the creative artist, his intuitive recognition of the value of the Elgin marbles, and the missionary

The Titian Haydon and his gentler fellows in misfortune were caught in the same toils. The artist and the thinker are not money-making or money-keeping animals. It is not the luxurious alone who are spendthrifts: easy natures-and such the whole artistical tribe are-can waste money without any apparent means or result. It is in vain that we seek to bend the laws of nature to our will: we must seek to adapt ourselves to these laws. It is of the utmost consequence to society that the race of thinkers and imaginative constructors be kept alive and vigorous. Pensions for poor poets and philosphers do more harm than good. They must be given according to the judgment of those intrusted with their distribution for the time being, and that is as likely to be wrong as right. To award literary pensions to every littérateur or artist in bad circumstances through no fault of his own, were to bring around the bestower a crowd of idle sturdy beggars literature as well as religion will be overstocked by false monks. Find work for them that they can do, and wages. Men of business are averse to employ men of a literary turn; as many a one, who in despair has sought to escape from the muse's bowers to the working-day world, has experienced. There is something of prejudice in this, but at the same time an instinctively correct sense. It is partly felt that the man of intellectual tastes might be more usefully employed some other way, partly

:

that these applicants are interlopers who would take bread out of the mouths of regularly-trained devotees of unimaginative toil. Every country in Europe has found useful, remunerative, and congenial employment for the literary and artistical class, except our own. It is in the organization and direction of national record-offices, public libraries, museums, and galleries of art-in professorships of art, science, and literature-in the construction and ornament of buildings for such institutions, and other public purposes-in effecting voyages of discovery, conducting scientific experiments on a scale too great for private finances, and preparing their results for publication-that men who have cultivated in preference the faculties of reason and imagination are to find the means of earning a not precarious subsistence by really serving society. With a timid, hesitating hand-desultorily and at intervals-experiments in this way have been made of late years. To be successful, the work should be undertaken at once, on a comprehensive scale, by the annually renewed vote of a liberal sum to supply the intellectual wants of society, placed at the disposal of a responsible minister for education, and the promotion of art, science, and literature. This is the expiation our legislature owes for leaving so much of English intellect and imagination to perish miserably in past years.

From the Spectator.

A CORN-LAW BALLAD:

ADDRESSED TO SIR ROBERT PEEL, BY AN ADMIRER. "He that withholdeth corn, the people shall curse him; but blessing shall be upon the head of him that selleth it."-Prov. xi. 26.

THE bigoted aristocrat,

The puppy, and the fool,

Who maunder o'er the crude conceits

Of an exploded school,

May taunt thee with apostasy,
And make a monstrous noise
About your cool abstraction
Of a bather's corduroys:

But like the bark of poodle dog
Or a parrot's empty cry,
Or thunderings theatrical,

Their slanders pass thee by;

While from the crowded city,
And from the lonely moor,
Come the blessings of the millions,
The blessings of the poor.

For e'en amid the thoughtlessness,
The sorrow, and the toil,

Which dog the pale mechanic

And the tiller of the soil,

A father's arm is strengthened,

And a mother dries her tear, When they think that in the time to come Bread will not be so dear.

And so at morn and eventide,

And every scanty meal,

They pray that God may bless the heart
And nerve the hand of Peel.

But not to minds gigantic,
To men who comprehend

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The wants of empires, and who look
Far onwards to the end,

Can the herd of common intellects,
The children of to-day,
Or grant a fitting recompence,
Ör slander it away.

No, He the Hero of an age,

The mighty one like thee,
Receives the guerdon of his deeds
From far posterity.

Then in the after ages,

When Albion is no more,
And London lies a desert waste
Upon a lonely shore,

Long as the kindly accents

Of the English tongue are known,
Or by the Mississippi,

Or in the torrid zone,
High o'er the Celtic warrior,

The carnage-loving Dane,
O'er the haughty Norman victor,
And the sturdy Saxon Thane,
The might of virtuous eloquence
Shall consecrate thy name,
Foremost upon the banner roll
Of everlasting fame:

And thus by statesmen and by bards
Thy glory shall be spread-
"He braved the mighty and the rich,
To give the starving bread."
King's College, Cambridge.

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E.

“LORD BROUGHAM,” by Mr. A. E. Chalon, R.A. We have never seen a more successful attempt at representing the face of this extraordinary man:the restlessness, the sleeplessness, the aggressiveness, and the conscience of power, are all depicted, without derogation from that peculiarity of eye which makes the original appear at once the most inquisitive and the most apathetic of men.

RELICS FOR THE SHAKSPERIAN LIBRARY. 1. Two of Caliban's sticks.

2. The bare bodkin with which we might make our quietus.

3. All Macduff's little chickens and their dam (stuffed.)

4. The bladders with which Wolsey swam in a sea of glory.

5. Button from the leathern coat the Jaques' stag stretched almost to bursting.

6. Title page (very old) of one of the books found in the running brooks.

7. Sheath of the dagger which Macbeth thought he saw before him.

8. Hair from the tail of the ass that Dogberry wished himself to be written down.-Punch.

AN EVIL OMEN.-It is stated to be a sign of the expected resignation of the present ministry, that Sir James Graham is about to be raised to the peerage, by the title of Lord Preston. We presume that the elevation of a cabinet minister is considered a sign of its being all up with the government. We know that throwing up an insignificant object will frequently show which way the wind blows.

Punch.

CHAPTER XXIX.

Does it live in the memory of the reader that Snipeton, only a chapter since, spoke of a handmaid on her way from Kent to make acquaintance with his fire-side divinities? That human flower, with a freshness of soul like the dews of Paradise upon her is, reader, at this very moment in Fleetstreet. Her face is beaming with happiness-her half-opened mouth is swallowing wonders-and her eyes twinkle, as though the London pavement she at length treads upon was really and truly the very best of gold, and dazzled her with its glorifying brightness. She looks upon the beauty and wealth about her gaily, innocently, as a little child would look upon a state coffin; the velvet is so rich, and the plates and nails so glittering. She has not the wit to read the true meaning of the splendor; cannot, for a moment, dream of what it covers. Indeed, she is so delighted, dazzled by what she sees, that she scarcely hears the praises of the exceeding beauty of her features, the wondrous symmetry of her form; praises vehemently, industriously uttered by a youthful swain who walks at her side, glancing at her fairness with the libertine's felonious look. He eyes her innocence, as any minor thief would eye a brooch or chain; or, to give the youth his due, he now and then ventures a bolder stare; for he has the fine intelligence to know that he may rob that country wench of herself, and no Bridewell-no Newgate will punish the larceny. Now, even the bow of sixpenny riband on her bonnet is protected by a statute. Besides, Master Ralph Gum knows the privileges of certain people in a certain condition of life. Young gentlemen born and bred in London, and serving the nobility, are born and educated the allowed protectors of rustic girls. The pretty country things-it was the bigoted belief of the young footman-might be worn, like bouquets on a birth-day. And the wench at his side is a nosegay expressly sent by fortune from the country for his passing felicity and adornment. True it is, that Master Ralph Gum is scarcely looming out of boyhood; but there is a sort of genius that soars far beyond the parish register. Ralph's age is not to be counted by the common counters, years; but by the rarer marks of precocious intelligence. He is a liveried prodigy; one of those terribly clever animals that, knowing everything, too often confound simple people with their fatal knowledge. Therefore was it specially unfortunate for the damsel that of all the crowd that streamed through Fleet street, she should have asked Ralph Gum to indicate her way to St. Mary Axe. At the time, she was setting due eastward; when the faithless vassal assured her that she was going clean wrong; and, as happily he himself had particular business towards her destination, it would give him a pleasure he could never have hoped for, to guide her virgin steps to St. Mary Axe. And she-poor maid!-believed and turned her all-unconscious face towards Temple Bar. The young man, though a little dark, had such bright black eyes-and such very large, and very white teeth-and wore so very fine a livery, that it would have been flying in the face of truth to doubt him. Often at the rustic fire-side had she listened to the narrated wickedness of London; again and again had she pre-armed her soul with sagacious strength to meet and confound the deception that in so many guises prowled the city streets, for the robbery and destruction of the Arca

dian stranger. She felt herself invincible until the very moment that Ralph gave smiling, courteous answer to her; and then, as at the look and voice of a charmer, the Amazonian breast-plate (forged over many teas) she had buckled on, melted like frost-work at the sun, and left her an unprotected, because believing woman.

"Why, and what 's them ?" cried the girl, suddenly fixed before St. Dunstan's church. At the moment the sun reached the meridian, and the two wooden giants, mechanically punctual, striking their clubs upon the bell, gave warning note of noon Those giants have passed away; those two great ligneous heroes of the good old times have been displaced and banished; and we have submitted to learn the hour from an ordinary dial. There was a grim dignity in their bearing—a might in their action-that enhanced the value of the time they noted: their clubs fell upon the senses of the parishioners and way-farers, with a power and impressiveness not compassable by a round, pale-faced clock. It was, we say, to give a worth and solemnity to time, to have time counted by such grave tellers. If the parishioners of St. Dunstan and the frequent passengers of Fleet street have, of late years, contributed more than their fair quota to the stock of national wickedness, may not the evil be philosophically traced to the deposition of their wooden monitors? This very valuable surmise of ours ought to be quoted in parliament-that is, if lawmakers properly prepared themselves for their solemn tasks, by duly conning histories like the present-quoted in opposition to the revolutionary movement of the time. For we have little doubt that a motion for the return of the number of felonies and misdemeanors-to say nothing of the social offences that may be the more grave because not named in the statutes-committed in the parish of St. Dunstan's, would show an alarming increase since the departure of St. Dunstan's wooden genii. A triumphant argument this-we modestly conceive-for the conservation of wooden things in high places. "La! and what's them?" again cried the girl, twelve o'clock being told by the strikers.

"Why, my tulup, them 's a couple of cruel churchwardens turned into wood hundreds of years ago, for their sins to the poor. But you are a beauty, that you are!" added Ralph, with burning gallantry.

"It can't be; and you never mean it," said the maiden, really forgetting her own loveliness in her wonder of the giants. Turned into wood? Unpossible! Who did it?"

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Why, Providence-or, something of the kind, you know," replied the audacious footman. "You've heard of Wittington, I should think, my marigold, eh? He made a fortin in the Indies, where he let out his cat to kill all the vermin in all the courts-and a nice job I should think puss must have had of it. Well, them giants was churchwardens in his time: men with flesh and blood in their hearts, though now they 'd bleed nothing but saw-dust."

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"You don't say so! Poor souls! And what did they do?" asked the innocent damsel. Mr. Ralph Gum scratched his head for inspiration; and then made answer: You see, there was a poor woman-a sailor's wife-with three twins in her arms. And she went to one churchwarden, and said as how she was a starving; and that her very babbies could n't cry for weakness. And he told her to come to-morrow, for it wasn't

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