extent, understanding and gaining by, be party
feeling what it may. But these men are known
to the world as men of generous and exalted
natures. Guiding stars are these men, who, in
arguing questions of interest to the commonwealth,
have shown themselves the expounders
and interpreters of what thousands of others
have thought and would express. These men
have the voice of the people with them; these
men are  not merely Members of Parliament,
but Men of the People. When your M. P.-ship
learns that meaning with it, my honourable
friend, it will mean something and be something;
so long as it does not, it will be Mere
Pretence.

FATAL ZERO.
A DIARY KEPT AT HOMBURG: A SHORT SERIAL STORY.

CHAPTER VIII.

IT is a busy time indeed. There is
clatter, rattle, click-click, sudden pause,
almost awful, a low proclamation, and then
the setting in of chink and jingle; such
crowds—half a dozen deep about the table;
while outside promenade as thickly the
well-dressed girls and ladies; the stupid
men who are pouring into pretty ears their
insipid jests, but which they are not to be
blamed for thinking racy from the hearty
reception they meet; the eager and amused
first visitors, delighted and confounded
with everything, and chuckling with a
stupid complacency over the privilege of
being allowed to enjoy those lights and
gorgeous chambers, soft sofas, and amusement,
all for nothing! There are mean
minds to whom this element is a sort of
whet. (I hear my dear pet at home say,
as she reads, that I am getting a little
bitter; but this place does help to give one
a mean estimate of human nature.) But I
look round and try to make out Grainger.
I wander from one table to the other.
Certainly on this night of excitement there
can be no such study as these human faces
and expressions, especially at the moment
the cards are being dealt. Not at chapel or
church, if the Doctor Seraphicus himself were
preaching, could we find five seconds of such
absorbed expectancy and attention. The
heart, soul, all, are in the faces. Suddenly,
as the verdict sounds—light, positive light,
drifts over some, and a positive shadow
over others; shocking, shocking, yet so
interesting. Talk of a play! I could look
on here from morning to night. It has
endless variety, and I must be very straight-
laced if I could not do so with that object,
the study of human character, merely in
view. By the way, the doctor said I was
to relax, and amuse myself in every way.
I suppose he meant to gamble, but that
prescription, my good quack, won't do for
me. I have certainly been moping a little.
There I see a greater crowd—faces all
looking at one face, gutteral whispers—
"way"—so the Germans call " oui"—" zest
luay!" I can understand—a hero of the
night—a worn, lorn creature—a sad, high-
browed, bald, gentlemanly man, fighting
the desperate fight, standing up to the very
teeth of the bank. He was playing what
seems the forlorn hope—" le maximoom,"
twelve thousand francs,  every time; and a
fat, clean, snowy cushion of notes was
before him, delicately marked in faint blue,
and as thick as the leaves of a book. On
this night, Mephistopheles is playing one
of his most cruel freaks, and one which he
is very fond of. This votary has been winning
during the previous few days, and, it
is said, has carried off some six or eight
thousand pounds. The pinch-faced ecclesiastical
looking overseer walks about uneasily,
and has regarded him with dislike
all but openly expressed. But to-night I
can see the bale of notes shifting across
from one colour to the other, ruthlessly
seized on, counted over with an ostentatious
particularity, note after note laid out in
splendid piles, and the trifling balance
tossed back contemptuously. Then I see
him gathering up his dwindling notes, turn
them over with a pitiable irresolution, and
then lay them down on another colour.
Again is proclamation made; away they
flutter, drawn in by the merciless far-
stretching croupier's claw; and I see his
yellow fingers working nervously at his
forehead, which is as yellow. Then comes
the sudden scrape as the chair is pushed
back, and he is gone. No one cares for
the unsuccessful, and no eye of sympathy,
rather a look of impatient contempt, follows
him.

But Grainger! Then it was my eye fell
upon him, seated close by, a few gold pieces
before him, his face distorted with impatience,
fury, and hate. Indeed, it seemed another
Grainger, or that a new soul had entered
into him. It almost startled me; but still
I recollected what I had laid out for myself.
I went round softly and touched him: he
looked back savagely.

"Well?" he said.

"Come away, do; I want to speak to
you."

"Is that all? Then don't worry me now."

"Do listen to me, Grainger. Come, do."

"Confound it, leave me alone, will you.
What the devil do you mean?" Such demoniac
fury!

The clergyman was right after all. I had