Jesus Christ, and who only regard religion in
its most fearful and terrible point of view." A
friend stated to me that many here are
devout-minded Flamands, who have been crossed in
love or thwarted in something which they
think necessary to their happiness, and who
then, in the bitterness of their wounded
feelings, cast themselves into the convent
for life. Others, who feel within themselves
something discordant with, and anomalistic
to, the every-day world. The problem is not
very easy to solve, and no one solution will
apply to all cases. So we will refrain from
discussing the difficult question propounded
by the youth:

   "What is life, and which the way?"

"To be, or not to be, a Trappist? " was of
course one of the grave interrogatories:

       "To which the hoary sage replied,
        'Come, my lad, and drink some beer.'"

A REFERENCE TO CHARACTER.

FIVE years ago my brother William and
myself started as wholesale merchants in
Honeysuckle-lane, City, with limited
warehouses, and still more limited capital. Had
our commercial prospects not been any more
cheering than the prospect from our little
cobwebbed counting-house, we should indeed
have had small encouragement. I remember
discussing with my brother, during the first
week of our career, the style of our domestic
establishment, and the extent of our personal
expenditure. We mutually agreed, in order
to throw as much capital into our business
as possible, to dispense with the services of a
cat on the premises; and, both of us being
about the same height and build, that one
best suit of clothes and one visiting best hat
should suffice for us both. It is true our hat
used frequently to slip rather suddenly over
William's eyes whilst nodding to a friend in
the street; and that the fit of the coat, on
him, was slightly baggy; but he bore it
cheerfully.

The first year of our little business went on
placidly enough. We felt our way gradually;
and found that in business, as in other things,
discretion is the better part of valour. We
became known at the end of the second year
amongst the trade; and, before the end of
our third year, we actually possessed two
real cats, and I'm afraid to say how many
hats and coats; besides being acknowledged
throughout the length of Honeysuckle-lane,
as rising, and safe young men.

I think it was about this time that we
started a small horse and a light cart; just
the patient, meek animal that would not
object to go in a gig on Sunday, if requested
to do so. But with the increase in our business
came a growth of vigorous cares and
anxieties that seemed to spring up like rank
weeds. Our first griefs came in with the
gooseberries, about June. William took it
philosophically. A few bad debts a customer or
two in the Gazette; but, on striking our
periodical balances, we became quite reconciled
to the frowns of fortune.

Gooseberries had gone out. Apples were
in. It was in one of the blandest months
of autumn that we were favoured with an
extensive order—considering our then status
—from a stylish person, verging on the
flashy, but still within the bounds of apparent
respectability. We were of course glad to
do business. The terms were agreed on: one
month's credit and no discount. The affair
seemed all but settled, when William hinted
that perhaps our new friend, being a perfect
stranger, would not object to give us a reference.
Certainly not—quite proper—not the
least objection—owed endless apologies for
not having been the first to suggest it. The
reference was given, and we parted, well
satisfied with each other. The reference was
a man who had purchased and paid cash
for several parcels of our goods; so that the
newly-ordered articles were sent to the
neighbourhood of Kensington with a feeling that
we had perhaps been a little too strait-laced
and particular in the transaction. A perfect
gentleman, really.

When the month's credit had expired, and
our customer called to settle the account with
a bag of bright shining sovereigns, I did feel
that we had been over nice. But when
—pleasant, gentlemanly person as he was—he
chatted about the weather, the hard times,
and the crops, throwing in here and there a
little flattery of our liberal and punctual mode
of doing business, and the excellence of our
goods, I suffered the remorse of the basest
ingrate. After our patron had dashed off a few
more pleasant remarks about the expansion
of the Colonial trade and the tightness of the
money market, he turned to business again,
and delighted us with a commission for treble
the amount of the previous transaction. The
goods were put in hand forthwith—delivery
having been promised within a day or two
—and our ware-rooms became quite exhilarated
with the warmth and bustle of that extensive
order.

I can hardly remember how it first occurred
to me; but, when the pangs of conscience for
our unjust suspicions had had time to subside,
the idea flashed across my mind that our
customer sported too many rings on his fingers,
and that there emanated from him too strong
and stale an odour of bad tobacco for him to be
a thorough man of business. Mere misgiving
arose at length to grave doubt. This I
mentioned as a matter of course to William;
who, though not quite thinking with me,
agreed that a little caution would be well
employed; for the amount of the order was
a serious consideration to us.

We were novices in the police of the
commercial world; and, being utterly at a loss
how to proceed, I stepped over the way to a