His decayed habiliment indicated, from its formation and texture, that he had seen better days, and his voluntary seclusion confirmed the idea that he had not been accustomed to his present humiliating intercourse.

His intenseness of thought precluded the knowledge of approximation on his privacy, until our two friends stood before him; he immediately rose, made his obeisance, and was about to retire, when Mr.Dashall, with his characteristic benevolence, begged the favour of a few moments conversation.
"I am gratified," he observed, "in perceiving one exception to the general torpitude of feeling which seems to pervade this place; and I trust that your case of distress is not of a nature to preclude the influence of hope in sustaining your mind against the pressure of despondency." "The cause of my confinement," answered the prisoner, "is originally that of debt, although perverted into crime by an unprincipled, relentless creditor.

Destined to the misery of losing a beloved wife and child, and subsequently assailed by the minor calamity of pecuniary embarrassment, I inevitably contracted a few weeks arrears of rent to the rigid occupant of the house wherein I held my humble apartment, when, returned one night to my cheerless domicil, my irascible landlord, in the plenitude of ignorance and malevolence, gave me in charge of a sapient guardian of the night, who, without any enquiry into the nature of my offence, conducted me to the watch-house, where I was presently confronted with my creditor, who accused me of the heinous crime of getting into his debt.

The constable very properly refused to take cognizance of a charge so ridiculous; but unluckily observing, that had I been brought there on complaint of an assault, he would in that case have felt warranted in my detention, my persecutor seized on the idea with avidity, and made a declaration to that effect, although evidently no such thought had in the first instance occurred to him, well knowing the accusation to be grossly unfounded.

This happened on a Saturday night, and I remained in duresse and without sustenance until the following Monday, when I was held before a Magistrate; the alleged assault was positively sworn to, and, maugre my statement of the suspicious, inconsistent conduct of my prosecutor, I was immured in the lock-up house for the remainder of the day, on the affidavit of ~22~~ perjury, and in the evening placed under the friendly care of the Governor of Tothill-fields Bridewell, to abide the issue at the next Westminster sessions." "This is a most extraordinary affair," said the Squire; "and what do you conjecture may be the result ?" "The pertinacity of my respectable prosecutor," said the Captive, "might probably induce him to procure the aid of some of his conscientious Israelitish brethren, whom 1 never saw, towards substantiating the aforesaid assault, by manfully swearing to the fact; but as I have no desire of exhibiting myself through the streets, linked to a chain of felons on our way to the Sessions House, I believe I shall contrive to pay the debt due to the perjured scoundrel, which will ensure my enlargement, and let the devil in due season take his own!" "May we enquire," said Dashall, "without the imputation of impertinent inquisitiveness, what has been the nature of your pursuits in life ?" "Multitudinous," replied the other; "my life has been so replete with adventure and adversity in all its varieties, and in its future prospects so unpropitious of happiness, that existence has long ceased to be desirable; and had I not possessed a more than common portion of philosophic resignation, I must have yielded to despair; but, "When all the blandishments of life are gone, The coward sneaks to death,--the brave live on!" "Thirty years ago I came to London, buoyant of youth and hope, to realize a competency, although I knew not by what means the grand object was to be attained; yet it occurred to me that I might be equally successful with others of my country, who, unaided by recommendation and ungifted with the means of speculation, had accumulated fortunes in this fruitful Metropolis, and of whom, fifteen years ago, one eminently fortunate adventurer from the north filled the civic chair with commensurate political zeal and ability.
"Some are born great; others achieve greatness, And some have greatness thrust upon them!" "Well, Sir, what can be said of it?
I was without the pale of fortune, although several of my school-mates, who had established themselves in London, acquired, by dint of perseverance, parsimony and servility, affluent ~23~~circumstances; convinced, however, that I was not destined to acquire wealth and honour, and being unsolaced even with the necessaries of life, I abandoned in London all hope of success, and emigrated to Ireland, where I held for several years the situation of clerk to a respectable Justice of the Quorum.