mizzle." And with that lent him a contemptuous
kick behind, which owing to his position sent him
off his balance flat on the tray; a glass broke
under him; poor young Mr. Beverley uttered
a cry of dismay, for he knew Hayes would not
own himself the cause; Hayes cursed him for an
awkward idiot, and the oath went off into a
howl, for Alfred ran out at him brimful of Moses,
and with a savage kick in the back and blow
on the neck administered simultaneously hurled
him headforemost down the stairs. Alighting
on the seventh step, he turned a somersault, and
bounded like a ball on to the landing below, and
there lay stupified. He picked himself up by
slow degrees, and glared round with speechless
awe and amazement up at the human thunderbolt,
that had shot out on him and sent him flying
like a feather. He shook his fist, and
limped silently away all bruises and curses, to tell
Rooke, and concert vengeance. Alfred, trembling
still with ire, took Beverley to his room (the
boy was as white as a sheet), and encouraged him,
and made him wash properly, brushed his hair,
dressed him in a decent tweed suit he had
outgrown, and taking him under his arm, and
walking with his own nose haughtily in the air,
paraded him up and down the asylum, to show
them all the best man in the house respected the
poor soft gentleman. Ah what a grand thing it is
to be young! Beverley clung to his protector
too much like a girl, but walked gracefully and kept
step, and every now and then looked up at Alfred
with a loving adoration, that was sweet yet sad to
see. Alfred marched him to Mrs. Archbold, and
told his tale; for he knew Hayes would misrepresent
it, and get him into trouble. She smiled on the
pair; gently deplored her favourite's impetuosity,
entreated him not to go fighting with that great
monster Rooke, and charmed him by saying,
"Well, and Frank is a gentleman, when he is
dressed like one."

"Isn't he," said Alfred eagerly. "And whose
fault is it he is not always dressed like one?
Whose fault that here's an earl's nephew Boots
in Hell?"

"Not yours, Alfred, nor mine," was the
honeyed reply.

In vain did Mr. Hayes prefer his complaint to
Dr. Wolf. The Archbold had been before him,
and the answer was, "Served you right."

These and many other good deeds did Alfred
Hardie in Drayton House. But, as the days
rolled on, and no answer came from the
Commissioners, his own anxiety, grief, and dismay, left
him less and less able to sympathise with the
material but smaller wrongs around him. He
became silent, dejected.

At last he came to Mrs. Archbold, and said
sternly his letters to the Commissioners were
intercepted.

"I can't believe that," said she. "It is against
the law."

So it was: but law and custom are two."

"I am sure of it," said he; "and may the
eternal curse of Heaven light on the cowardly
traitor and miscreant who has done it". And he
stalked gloomily away.

When he left her, she sighed at this imprecation
from his lips; but did not repent. "I can't
part with him," she said despairingly; "and, if
I did not stop his poor dear letters, Wolf would:"
and the amorous crocodile shed a tear, and
persisted in her double-faced course.

By-and-by, when she saw him getting thinner
and paler, and his bright face downcast and
inexpressibly sad, she shared his misery; ay, shed
scalding tears for him; yet could not give him
up; for her will was as strong as the rest of her
was supple: and hers was hot love, but not
true love like Julia's.

Perhaps a very subtle observer seeing this man
and woman wax pale and spiritless together in
one house, might have divined her secret. Dr.
Wolf then was no such observer, for she made
him believe she had a rising penchant for him.
He really had a strong one for her.

While Alfred's visible misery pulled at her
heart-strings, and sometimes irritated, sometimes
melted her, came curious complications; one of
which requires preface.

Mrs. Dodd then was not the wife to trust
blindly where her poor husband was concerned;
she bribed so well that a keeperess in David's
first asylum told her David had been harshly
used by an attendant. She instantly got Eve
Dodd to take him away: and transfer him to a
small asylum nearer London, and kept by a
Mrs. Ellis. "Women are not cruel to men,"
said the sagacious Lucy Dodd.

But, alas! if women are not cruel where sex
comes in and mimics that wider sentiment
Humanity, women are deadly economical.
Largely gifted with that household virtue, Mrs.
Ellis kept too few servants, and, sure
consequence in a madhouse, too many strait-jackets,
hobbles, muffs, leg-locks, body-belts, &c. &c.
Hence half her patients were frequently kept out
of harm's way by cruel restraints administered
not out of hearty cruelty, but female parsimony.
Mrs. and Miss Dodd invaded the house one day
when the fair economist was out, and found seven
patients out of the twelve kept out of mischief
thus: one in a restraint chair, two hobbled like
asses, two chained like dogs, and two in strait-
waistcoats, and fastened to beds by webbing and
straps; amongst the latter David, though quiet
as a lamb.

Mrs. Dodd cried over him as if her heart would
break, and made Miss Dodd shift him to a large
asylum, where I believe he was very well used.
But here those dreadful newspapers interfered;
a prying into sweet secluded spots. They
diversified Mrs. Dodd's breakfast by informing her
that the doctor of this asylum had just killed a
patient; the mode of execution bloodless and
sure, as became fair science. It was a man
between sixty and seventy; an age at which the
heart can seldom stand very much shocking, or
lowering, especially where the brain is diseased.
So they placed him in a shower-bath, narrow