Other faces, yellow and contorted, their
fingers to their lips, look on dismally.
Then it begins again; figures are stooping
forward to lay on; and so the wretched
formula goes on, repeated—for I made the
calculation—some seven hundred times that
day. But it never seems to flag, and every
time has the air of fresh, and fresher,
novelty. It begins to sicken me, and that
air of stern concentrated attention, of
sacrifice even, depresses me; and when I
think that if a return could be got of the
agitation, palpitations, hopes, fears, despair,
exultation, going on during these seven
hundred operations, it would represent a
total of human agony inconceivable. Then
I see how it can be again multiplied
through the twelve months of this wicked
year. Then I think of the prospective
miseries to others at a distance, to wives
and to children—lives wretched, lives unsettled
—miserable deaths. I say, I think
of all this, and ask, is it too much to call
these men special ministers of Mephistopheles
—a band under the decent respectable
name of a Bank, organised to destroy
souls by a machinery, the like of which for
completeness exists not on this earth? I
say, there is nothing on earth approaching
this company, whose men and emissaries
ought to wear cock's feathers and red and
black dresses, for their complete and successful
exertions for destruction and corruption.
They distil their poison over that
green board, and it is carried away to all
countries—to England, France, America,
Belgium, Germany, whence the victims return
again and again, bringing fresh ones,
like true decoys. They hang men; they
punish and imprison for far less crimes;
but on the heads of these wretches is the
ruin of thousands of bodies and souls, the
spiritual death, and the actual corporeal
death of thousands more, who have hung
themselves to the fair trees planted in sweet
bowers by the "administration," or stifled
themselves with charcoal in front of this
fatal palace, and who have actually dabbled
with their brains over the vile green table on
which they have lost all. A banking company!
all fair, give and take, and such
phrases! Satan says the same in his dealings.

And here is this functionary in the trim
suit—a pink-faced, hard, cat-eyed sinner,
who steals about, and watches everybody,
and his own agents also more than any one
else. A capital officer they tell me, skilful
and wary at the accounts. To him the
shareholders will one day present a piece
of plate, or hard cash, which he would
prefer, in acknowledgment of his exertions
in their interest. Oh, that some fitting
punishment could be devised for those
who thus fatten on the blood of the innocent!
I should not come here. I should
not breathe this tainted air—look on this
painted vice, and their wretched shabby
baits, to win the approbation of the decent
and the moral, like myself. Here are your
English newspapers of every kind and degree.
Pray read all day long in these
charming rooms, and sit on those soft
couches, or out here in these charming gardens
while our music plays for you. Do
understand, nothing is expected from you
in return. You, charming English ladies,
so fair and pretty, you can work with those
innocent fingers; and your nice high-
spirited brothers, they would like to get up
cricket, would they? Here is a nice field;
we shall have it mowed and got ready, and
to-morrow shall come from Frankfort the
finest bats, stumps, balls—everything complete.
Do you give the order; get them
from London, if you like. We shall pay.
There is shooting, too—quite of the best.
We shall be proud to find the guns and
dogs, and even the powder. It will do us
an honour. Get up a little fête; a dance
in the Salons des Princes. We shall light
it up for you, and find the servants. So
do these tricksters try to impose on us,
with their sham presents, for which our
Toms and Charleses—good-natured elder
brothers—must pay, and pay secretly, in
many a visit to these tables. They have
built us a superb theatre—one of the handsomest
of its size in Europe. How kind,
how considerate! yet they charge us a
napoleon for a stall, if there is any one
worth hearing. Presents, indeed! we
know the poor relative who comes with a
twopenny-halfpenny pot of jam, and expects
to get a handsome testimonial in return.
Everything about our " administration"
is in keeping; and I almost grieve that
I should have come to such a place. This
resolution, at least, I can make: never to
let the light of an honest man's face beam
on their evil doings.

I feel I am rather warm on this matter,
but it does seem to me that the whole has
been too gently dealt with hitherto, and
treated too indulgently. Even these conquerors,
who, we are told, have given them
notice fhat they are to be chasséd, have
shown too much respect. They talk of
equities—a lease. Do we hold to leases
with pirates? Do we make treaties with