that I am avoided because I am shabby; for
I am not at all shabby, having always a very
good suit of black on (or rather Oxford
mixture, which has the appearance of black
and wears much better); but I have got into
a habit of speaking low, and being rather
silent, and my spirits are not high, and I am
sensible that I am not an attractive
companion.

The only exception to this general rule is
the child of my first cousin, Little Frank. I
have a particular affection for that child, and
he takes very kindly to me. He is a diffident
boy by nature; and in a crowd he is
soon run over, as I may say, and forgotten.
He and I, however, get on exceedingly well.
I have a fancy that the poor child will in time
succeed to my peculiar position in the family.
We talk but little; still, we understand each
other. We walk about, hand in hand; and
without much speaking he knows what I
mean, and I know what he means. When he
was very little indeed, I used to take him to
the windows of the toy-shops, and show him
the toys inside. It is surprising how soon he
found out that I would have made him a
great many presents if I had been in
circumstances to do it.

Little Frank and I go and look at the outside
of the Monument— he is very fond of the
Monument—and at the Bridges, and at all
the sights that are free. On two of my birthdays
we have dined on a-la-mode beef, and
gone at half-price to the play, and been
deeply interested. I was once walking with
him in Lombard Street, which we often visit
on account of my having mentioned to him
that there are great riches there— he is very
fond of Lombard Street— when a gentleman
said to me as he passed by, "Sir, your little
son has dropped his glove." I assure you, if
you will excuse my remarking on so trivial a
circumstance, this accidental mention of the
child as mine, quite touched my heart and
brought the foolish tears into my eyes.

When little Frank is sent to school in the
country, I shall be very much at a loss what
to do with myself, but I have the intention of
walking down there once a month and seeing
him on a half holiday. I am told he will then
be at play upon the Heath; and if my visits
should be objected to, as unsettling the child,
I can see him from a distance without his
seeing me, and walk back again. His mother
comes of a highly genteel family, and rather
disapproves, I am aware, of our being too
much together. I know that I am not calculated
to improve his retiring disposition; but
I think he would miss me beyond the feeling
of the moment, if we were wholly separated.

When I die in the Clapham Road, I shall
not leave much more in this world than I
shall take out of it ; but, I happen to have
a miniature of a bright-faced boy, -with a
curling head, and an open shirt-frill waving
down his bosom (my mother had it taken for
me, but I can't believe that it was ever like),
which will be worth nothing to sell, and
which I shall beg may be given to Frank. I
have written my dear boy a little letter with
it, in which I have told him that I felt very
sorry to part from him, though bound to
confess that I knew no reason why I should
remain here. I have given him some short
advice, the best in my power, to take warning
of the consequences of being nobody's enemy
but his own; and I have endeavoured to
comfort him for what I fear he will consider
a bereavement, by pointing out to him that
I was only a superfluous something to every
one but him, and that having by some means
failed to find a place in this great assembly,
I am better out of it.

Such (said the poor relation, clearing his
throat and beginning to speak a little louder)
is the general impression about me. Now,
it is a remarkable circumstance which forms
the aim and purpose of my story, that this is
all wrong. This is not my life, and these are
not my habits. I do not even live in the
Clapham Road. Comparatively speaking, I
am very seldom there. I reside, mostly, in a
— I am almost ashamed to say the word, it
sounds so full of pretension— in a Castle. I
do not mean that it is an old baronial habitation,
but still it is a building always known
to every one by the name of a Castle. In it,
I preserve the particulars of my history;
they run thus:

It was when I first took John Spatter (who
had been my clerk) into partnership, and when
I was still a young man of not more than five-
and-twenty, residing in the house of my uncle
Chill from whom I had considerable expectations,
that I ventured to propose to Christiana.
I had loved Christiana, a long time. She was
very beautiful, and very winning in all
respects. I rather mistrusted her widowed
mother, who I feared was of a plotting and
mercenary turn of mind; but, I thought as
well of her as I could, for Christiana's sake.
I never had loved any one but Christiana, and
she had been all the world, and O far more
than all the world, to me, from our childhood!

Christiana accepted me with her mother's
consent, and I was rendered very happy
indeed. My life at my Uncle Chill's was of
a spare dull kind, and my garret chamber
was as dull, and bare, and cold, as an
upper prison room in some stern northern
fortress. But, having Christiana's love, I
wanted nothing upon earth. I would not
have changed my lot with any human being.

Avarice was, unhappily, my Uncle Chill's
master-vice. Though he was rich, he pinched,
and scraped, and clutched, and lived miserably.
As Christiana had no fortune, I was for some
time a little fearful of confessing our engagement
to him; but, at length I wrote him a
letter, saying how it all truly was. I put it
into his hand one night,on going to bed.

As I came down stairs next morning,
shivering in the cold December air; colder
in my uncle's unwarmed house than in