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 OF THE 
 UNIVER.5ITY 
 or ILLl NOI5 
 
 823 
 
 C6Sm 
 
 V.I
 
 THE 
 
 MAN IN CHAINS 
 
 BY 
 
 C. J. COLLINS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "SACKVII.LE CHASE," "SINGED MOTHS,' 
 ETC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES 
 
 VOL. I 
 
 LONDON 
 JOHN MAXWELL AND COMPANY 
 
 122, FLEET STREET 
 M DCCC LXIV 
 
 [^All rights reserved}
 
 1^ 
 
 -J 
 
 ^ 
 
 rA3 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 OP 
 
 THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. gray's inn and its new member . . 1 
 
 II. MISERRIMUS 24 
 
 III. A CRY OF MURDER IN THE CITY ... 52 
 IV. " THERE IS THAT CREATURE AGAIN, PAPA. 
 
 LET US GO home" 78 
 
 V. VISCOUNT MONTALEAN AND HIS DAUGHTER 
 
 AT HOME 100 
 
 VI. SILVESTER LANGDALE'S FIRST BRIEF . . 12G 
 
 VII. A BOUDOIR NEAR TO KENSINGTON GARDENS 14G 
 VIII. SILVESTER LANGDALE's FIRST APPEARANCE 
 
 IN COURT 166 
 
 ^ 
 
 IX. THE TRIAL OF ABEL BARNES . . . .189 
 :^ X. SILVESTER LANGDALe's NEW CLERK . .211 
 XI. SILVESTER LANGDALE DINES WITH VIS- 
 ^ COUNT MONTALBAN 234
 
 IV CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 XII. MISS MONTALB.\N AND SILVESTER LANG- 
 DALE 254: 
 
 XIII. SILVESTER LANGDALE FORGES HIS FIRST 
 
 CHAIN 274 
 
 XIV. THE YOUNG BARRISTER TAKES ABEL 
 
 BARNES INTO HIS CONFIDENCE AND 
 
 HIS SERVICE. SEVERN BARNES IS 
 
 HEARD A LITTLE MORE CONSPICUOUSLY 
 
 IN THIS HISTORY 293
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 gray's inn and its new member. 
 
 Gratis Inn Lane is not in appearance 
 suggestive of hedgerows and wild flowers, 
 the creeping convolvulus or the prickly 
 briar. It is wretched and miserable in 
 winter, it is like an oven in summer. It 
 can never put forth a green leaf, even if 
 it had any trees along its course, which it 
 has not; and it is not probable that it 
 will be ever anything else than w^hat it is, 
 — a leading thoroughfare, narrow, squalid, 
 and dirty. On each side are the dusty 
 and dilapidated remnants of a past age — 
 an age which succeeded that in which, 
 
 VOL. I. 1
 
 2 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 before Grray's Inn Lane became a street, 
 a sylvan nook, a real country green lane 
 existed, running through verdant fields, 
 redolent in the spring-time of the perfume 
 of the cowslip, and shining in the fresh- 
 ness of a brilliant verdure. But that, of 
 course, was long before the vast metro- 
 polis of the British empire began, like 
 some huge reptile, to stretch its feelers 
 out, and to remorselessly devour the 
 country all around it. 
 
 But although Grray's Inn Lane is not 
 only not attractive, but is actually repul- 
 sive — although its houses on either side 
 seem to threaten each other with a gloomy 
 defiance, which is strangely blended with 
 a kind of drowsy indifference as to whe- 
 ther they should fall together into the 
 thoroughfare, and so block it up, and thus 
 be each self-destro^dng in their neigh- 
 bourly hatred ; or gradually, by torpid 
 and almost imperceptible advances, form
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 6 
 
 an intimate junction with their frowning 
 roofs, and thus completely shut out the 
 light of heaven, which now but struggles 
 to find an entrance there ; — although such 
 be the existing condition of Grray's Inn 
 Lane, yet may we, by the simple exertion 
 of making but a few strides, effect a change 
 around us as effectual as that which a 
 wizard might have produced when wizards 
 were in the plenitude of their power, and 
 roamed about this earth seeking whom 
 they might transform, — a change as 
 marked and striking, and as pleasing, as 
 that which is effected by the aid of the 
 ubiquitous harlequin at Christmas-time ; 
 a change from the debased reality of the 
 back slum of a great city, to a glorious 
 picture fresh from nature's fairest scenes. 
 As we walk down Gray's Inn Lane, 
 with its frowning grimness on either side 
 — more frowning, more grim, more repul- 
 sive on one side than the other — we 
 
 1—2
 
 4 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 might, by the agency of a transforming 
 wand in the shape of some stout pickaxe, 
 break through into a sylvan scene, where 
 flowers flourish, where the grass grows 
 thickly and luxuriantly green, and where 
 great trees stretch out their giant arms as 
 glorifying the heavens above them, even 
 as though they were high towering above 
 some rural glade where smoke and dust 
 and noxious vapours have not penetrated. 
 
 Yes, spite of its evil fumes and reeking 
 kennels, its pent-up fever haunts, its filth, 
 its misery, the degradation of its cabined 
 toilers, there are green spots in the very 
 midst of this great London, which prove 
 that heaven had blessed the spot before 
 the hand of man defaced the scene, and 
 that still the blessing lingers even above 
 the place where the spirit of miasma 
 reigns. 
 
 A ding}' room, up three flights of 
 ancient stairs, scantily furnished, the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 5 
 
 walls wainscoted and bare, looks out upon 
 the tops of the tall trees that flourish in 
 Gray's Inn Square. This room has been 
 but recently tenanted by its present occu- 
 pant, a young man of three- and-twenty, 
 who is a barrister-at-law of the Honour- 
 able Society of Grray's Inn, by whom he 
 has just been called to that distinction. 
 It is a summer evening, and the two 
 windows of the chamber are open, and 
 through them comes a strange admixture 
 of incongruous sounds. The roar of that 
 mighty stream that rolls for ever up and 
 down High Holborn is heard above the 
 rest, like the beating of the breaking surf 
 upon the sea-shore when equinoctial gales 
 are prevalent, and ships go down at sea. 
 It is a roar that is unlike that upon the 
 sea-shore in this respect, that while the 
 sea is sometimes calm, the tide that 
 simultaneously flows both ways in the 
 great gulf-streams that run from east to
 
 O THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 west of London is unceasing, and for ever 
 thundering. Its roar comes in at the 
 open windows of the room in Gray's Inn 
 Square, and it is blended with the prattle 
 of light-hearted children, who are gam- 
 bolHng beneath the great trees that make 
 the sj^ot anomalous, and shrill cries are 
 heard from neighbouring offshoots of the 
 mighty stream ; and if we listen at the 
 window now on this calm summer even- 
 ing, distinct from the- rolling roar, the 
 merry laughter, and the shrill cries, we 
 hear, like the faint echo of a fairy's 
 revelry, the soothing hum of the plodding 
 bee ; for on the next window-sill are 
 flowers trained, flowers that are rich in 
 sweet aroma which has attracted — whence? 
 — that solitary bee, wliose hum makes 
 the whole scene a strange anomaly indeed. 
 We have to commence our stor}^ in the 
 room that looks out upon the tops of the 
 great trees that are in Gray's Inn Square,
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 7 
 
 for the occupant thereof is to be our hero. 
 It is he who is to be our Man in Chains 
 • — those chains that no man can ever see, 
 but which are clanking in every thorough- 
 fare and in every crowd ; clanking with a 
 sound that none can hear, although it can 
 be felt ; clanking in the senate, on the 
 judgment-seat, amidst the scenes of revehy 
 and mirth, beneath the surplice of the 
 high ecclesiastic, and the coronet of the 
 great patrician; clanking amidst the 
 jingle of tinselled fashion ; everywhere 
 clanking with a sound that none can 
 hear, and yet which vibrates to the very 
 heart, and sometimes blights it. 
 
 Our representative Man in Chains is 
 Silvester Langdale. He is, as we have 
 already said, twenty-three years of age; 
 he has just been called to the bar ; he is 
 utterly Avithout patronage ; he knows no- 
 body in London ; and his stock of money 
 is almost as limited as the circle of his
 
 8 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 friends. He has resources within himself, 
 which, however, can scarcely he said to 
 be all within himself, because they are 
 not wholly dependent upon himself If 
 they were, he might with truth aver that 
 he was rich in resources. The gem in 
 " the dark unfathomed caves of ocean" is 
 of as much intrinsic worth as when it 
 shines upon the bosom of an emjDress, for 
 its light and glory are unchanged and 
 unchangeable. We can see that light 
 and glory when the jewel shines upon the 
 imperial breast, but we do not know of 
 its existence even, when the green waves 
 roll over it and hide it from mortal eyes. 
 
 So in the ocean of society. Down in 
 its dark unfathomed caves are gems of 
 thought within the human mind, and which 
 extraneous circumstances have shut out 
 from the surrounding intellect of all the 
 world. Such gems had Silvester Langdale 
 discovered in his own mind before he had
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. \) 
 
 ventured into London. He had passed 
 them through the alembic of his brain, 
 and they had issued brilliantly, but they 
 were not shining upon the world as yet. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had been for some 
 years an usher in a school in which he 
 had previously been a pupil. It was in a 
 quaint old city that is historically re- 
 nowned in close connexion with England's 
 greatness from the earliest times. Its 
 cathedral is one of the grand memorials 
 of an ancient day, when poetry would 
 seem to have been blended with material 
 architecture, and when the genius of the 
 few shone like a solitary star amid the 
 dark ignorance of the many. 
 
 The city in 'which Silvester Langdale 
 had passed his youth contained one of 
 those noble monuments of the forgotten 
 past. In regal troubles that city had 
 been conspicuous, and it has the bones of 
 kings enshrined within its sanctuary.
 
 10 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Lingering in its byways, in quaint pre- 
 servation, are houses in wliicli subject 
 citizens of Queen Elizabeth were born, 
 lived, and died ; and the strangely 
 fashioned roofs of those old edifices 
 suggest with silent eloquence strange 
 scenes historical that have often been 
 enacted in the streets below. Old men 
 and women who were born in the quaint 
 old city, and who have never left it, 
 although the potent scatterer — the crea- 
 tion of modern days — has carried its 
 magic wheels in all directions from the 
 old city, still hand down traditions that 
 they received from their grandsires, of 
 how, in CromwelFs time, the streets ran 
 red with blood when tlie great fight 
 occurred ; and they will point out where 
 the exact spot is in which the fugitive 
 Charles made his last stand, and com- 
 menced his last flight ; and so, from age 
 to age, imagination doubtless has em-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 11 
 
 bellislied facts wliicli sound like romance 
 now. 
 
 The school in which Silvester Langdale 
 bad passed his youth was situated in one 
 of the by-streets in the old city, — the 
 oldest street in that old city, — and it was 
 in the oldest house in that ancient street. 
 And that old house was in itself an archae- 
 ological curiosity. It was surmounted by 
 a great roof of black timber, with heavy 
 eaves deep enough to shelter big artillery, 
 if it could be placed there, and having at 
 each end a great towering gable. But 
 the roof was not the only portion of the 
 house that was overhanging, for every 
 story overhung the one beneath it, so that 
 the big old house completely overshadowed 
 the narrow street. Across each story, 
 stretching the whole length of the house, 
 was a range of windows diamond-paned, 
 and above them in the walls were massive 
 black beams standing vertically in the
 
 12 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 white plaster of whicli the walls were 
 composed. Nor was the interior of the 
 house less quaint and striking. The chief 
 entrance was at the side, a massive hlack, 
 frowning gateway, with two ponderous 
 wooden doors, like the portals of a 
 cathedral, in one of which was a smaller 
 door which was used as the entrance to 
 the court-3^ard of the house, for the great 
 doors of the vast gateway were never 
 opened. The door leading from the court- 
 yard into the house itself had a great 
 porch with stone seats on each side, and 
 there was a knocker on the door that 
 looked more like a huge hammer than 
 anything else, and which, when used, 
 made the old house reverberate with 
 ghostly echoes. The grand staircase 
 within the house was something wonderful 
 to look upon. It extended nearly the 
 whole depth of the house, and was wide 
 enough for a company of soldiers to march
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 13 
 
 up the shallow stairs, six abreast. Indeed, 
 amongst the traditions of the old place 
 there was one concerning a troop of 
 Eoyalists who did once flock up those 
 great stairs and down again, just before 
 the royal Charles took his way through 
 the eastern gate of the city, and was no 
 more a king. The great schoolroom was 
 panelled with ancient oak, and about that 
 old room there was a charm for every 
 student in it, for therein the mighty 
 Cromwell once held a council, and dictated 
 orders that for a time extinguished Boyalty 
 in all these realms. 
 
 Such was the establishment in which 
 Silvester Langdale had passed his youth. 
 As a child he had been sent to the school, 
 but the principal of the school never knew 
 whence the boy came, or with whom he 
 was connected. A mysterious person had 
 left the child in his care, and the necessary 
 honorarium was agreed upon ; the stipend
 
 14 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 for a year or two was regularly kept up, 
 and then it suddenly ceased. But tlie 
 old pedagogue liad come to love the boy, 
 '■ — the old man had married in his youth, 
 but his wife and child were snatched away 
 from him 3^ears and years ago, — and he 
 had adopted Silvester Langdale as his 
 own son, and he had carefully trained 
 that child to manhood ; and that little 
 old man — he is very short and very round, 
 and his face is very plump, and he has a 
 glorious double chin, and his venerable 
 old head is entirely bald — is with Silvester 
 Langdale in the poorlj' furnished room 
 that looks out upon tlie tops of the great 
 trees that are in Grray's Inn Square. 
 
 There is no consanguinity between 
 that venerable man and Silvester Lang- 
 dale, and yet, from the scene that is taking 
 place, one might fancy that the nearest 
 ties of blood bound them indissolubly 
 
 to£:ether. The old man has fallen 
 
 '& 
 
 upon
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS* 15 
 
 Langdale's breast, and is weeping like a 
 child. 
 
 "It is tlie first time," lie says, "that 
 we have been separated. Henceforth the 
 course of our two lives must be asunder. 
 May yours, my boy, be onward towards a 
 brilliant future." 
 
 " And your own ?" inquired the young 
 man, the big tears glistening in his eyes 
 as he spoke ; — ^they would have their 
 way, and so they coursed rapidly down 
 his cheeks. 
 
 " And mine 1" cried the old man ; "what 
 matters it of mine ? My course is nearly 
 run. 
 
 " You will always let me call the old 
 house my home ?" said Silvester Langdale, 
 taking his friend's hand in both his own. 
 
 The schoolmaster could only press 
 Langdale to his heart, but the action was 
 more eloquent than words. 
 
 It was that afternoon that Silvester
 
 16 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Langdale had for the first time been made 
 acquainted with the history of his child- 
 hood. His old guardian and instructor, 
 whom he had looked upon hitherto as a 
 father, had informed him that evening 
 what their actual relative positions were, 
 and Silvester Langdale had in that revela- 
 tion been almost overwhelmed with a 
 feeling somewhat akin to that a person 
 might experience in the loss of a fond and 
 attached parent. And yet Silvester had 
 always known that Nicholas Darvill, the 
 old schoolmaster in whose house he had 
 lived, was not his father ; but until the 
 evening of which we speak he had 
 never known what their actual connexion 
 was. Silvester Langdale had always 
 spoken of and addressed the old man as 
 Mr. Darvill simply. It is true that in 
 the ancient city — for scandal is always 
 rife in ancient cities — there were those 
 who sometimes talked of old Mr. Darvill
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 17 
 
 and his pupil usher, and they would smile 
 as they did so, and make disparaging 
 allusions, and remark that it was no un- 
 common thing for rackety young fellows, 
 who had been wild in their youth — not to 
 say reprobates and unprincipled deceivers, 
 when they were young, — to turn out, as 
 they advanced in life, sedate and steady 
 citizens, and estimable characters. It 
 was true that nobody could remember 
 even any suspicions of years long passed 
 away against old Nicholas Darvill, but 
 then the captious scandalmongers would 
 argue amongst themselves that folks did 
 not trouble to remember current scandals 
 of half a century ago ; and after such 
 deprecatory inuendoes they would in- 
 variably come to the conclusion, that 
 whatever had been the errors of his youth 
 — thus assuming that they had been 
 conclusively proved, — Nicholas Darvill 
 had been an estimable citizen, a strictly 
 
 VOL. I. 2
 
 18 THE MAX IN CHAINS. 
 
 moral character, and an inoffensive neigh- 
 bour. 
 
 Nicholas Darvill had always been proud 
 of liis protege, and he had watched his 
 expanding abilities as they had developed 
 themselves, with a satisfaction which 
 filled his heart and soul. "When Silvester 
 first expressed a desire to follow the legal 
 profession, Nicholas Darvill had warmly 
 supported the choice; albeit he did so 
 with many misgivings, seeing that the 
 bar, as he knew, was a profession that 
 is near akin in its nature to a lottery. 
 There are brilliant prizes in its magic 
 wheel, and there are many of them ; but 
 how many hundreds of aspirants are there 
 who sink before their prime into hopeless 
 obli\don, without ever having had the 
 opportunity of even trying one chance in 
 the magic wheel, or one grasp at fortune 
 thi'ough its agency ! All this did Nicholas 
 Darvill feel and know, and once he
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 19 
 
 ventured to hint his doubts and fears to 
 Silvester, but the young man was so 
 ardent, and so hopeful, and so enthusiastic 
 about the bright future that liis imagina- 
 tion drew, that the old man joyfully 
 allowed those pleasing hopes to have their 
 fullest play, — not the less so, perhaps, that 
 he himself felt that he was gradually 
 becoming their willing slave too. 
 
 And so the means were saved by 
 Silvester Langdale's own exertions — oh, 
 how proudly did old Nicholas Darvill 
 proclaim that fact to all who might be 
 interested in the declaration ! — for him to 
 become a member of the Honourable 
 Society of Grray's Inn, and in due course 
 his '*call" had taken place, and it was 
 to see him installed in his new profession 
 -^it was well that both the old man and 
 the young one were very sanguine in their 
 hopes — that Nicholas Darvill had come 
 up to London. 
 
 2—2
 
 20 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " My boy, the time is almost at hand 
 when I must take my course back to my 
 solitary home in the old house," says the 
 old man, with a very palpable nervous 
 affection about the region of the throat. 
 
 Silvester Langdale presses the old 
 man's hand again, and turns to prepare 
 himself to accompany him to the railway- 
 station not far off. Nicholas Darvill 
 knows that this is the intention of the 
 young barrister, and he hastily exclaims — 
 
 "No, no, Silvester, you shall not 
 accompany me. I can and will go alone." 
 
 Silvester Langdale is about to offer 
 some emphatic remonstrance, but the old 
 man continues — 
 
 " I am determined to go alone, Silvester. 
 Indulge an old man's whim," and the 
 tears come into his eyes as he speaks. 
 " I am a poor old man, weak and foolish, 
 perhaps ;" and he tried to speak cheerily, 
 but the effort only partially succeeded.
 
 THE MAN IN' CHAINS. 21 
 
 "I would rather go alone, and for this 
 reason, Silvester — if I leave you in this 
 room I shall remember the separation all 
 the more vividly. I could not bear to 
 see you on the railway platform, amongst 
 a crowd, as the train carried me off into 
 the darkness of the night and the solitude 
 of my own thoughts. Farewell, my boy. 
 Yield me this little boon, and let me 
 leave you now. Grod bless you, and may 
 His blessing and fortune smile upon you." 
 And the old man was gone, leaving 
 Silvester Langdale standing in the centre 
 of the chamber as one that was partially 
 stupefied. He had yielded to the old 
 man's desire, but his loving guardian had 
 scarcely quitted the room when a sudden 
 impulse seized upon the young man. He 
 would follow Nicholas Darvill unobserved 
 to the railway- station, and watch him to 
 the last. Acting upon this impulse, he 
 snatched up his hat, and had opened the
 
 22 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 door to -proceed down the staircase, when 
 lie was met by a fair-liaired, handsome 
 boy of about fourteen, who was the bearer 
 of a note addressed to Silvester Langdale, 
 Esq., Barrister-at-Law. It was written 
 upon coarse and soiled paper, but in the 
 corner Silvester recognised a well-known 
 autograph. He hastily read the contents 
 of the note, which were brief, for a 
 trembling hand had scrawled the fol- 
 lowing — 
 
 " I have but just ascertained where you 
 are to be found, and there may be time 
 yet. You have never witnessed a death- 
 bed scene ; it will be some relief to my 
 closing anguish if you will come and 
 witness mine. I am upon m}^ death-bed. 
 Privation has done its worst, and I see 
 a pauper's grave yawning by my side. 
 For Heaven's sake, come to me before I 
 sink. I am conscious that these are the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 23 
 
 last lines my hand will ever trace. For 
 God's sake, come to me, and relieve the 
 anguish of one who signs himself truly, 
 
 " MiSERRIMUS." 
 
 The autograph, as we have said, was on 
 the superscription of the note, and Sil- 
 vester Langdale told the bearer of the 
 letter that he would follow him imme- 
 diately. 
 
 He did so.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MISERRIMUS. 
 
 Silvester Langdale intimated to the fair- 
 haired messenger that he would at once 
 accompany him to the abode of the writer 
 of the note that he liad just delivered, and 
 he followed the hoy down the stairs into 
 the public thoroughfare in front of Gray's 
 Inn Buildings. It was now deepening 
 twilight, but Silvester Langdale had a 
 better oppoiiunity of observing the ap- 
 pearance of the boy than when he was on 
 the darkened landing outside the chamber 
 in Gray's Inn. He was a bright, fresli- 
 coloured, intelligent-looking boy, with fair, 
 curly locks and bright blue eyes, and he
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 25 
 
 spoke with a remarkably pleasing voice. 
 The general character of his attire was 
 altogether out of keeping with his fair, 
 round fjice ; for while his flowing hair had 
 evidently been well tended, and his face 
 was clean, his clothes were ragged and 
 patched, and they looked as though they 
 were much soiled, although in reality such 
 was not the case ; but they had been so 
 much brushed, that all the vestiges of 
 anything like nap had been worn off the 
 cloth of which his jacket was composed, 
 and so it looked brown and dusty, al- 
 though its original hue had been black. 
 His trousers were patched at the bottom 
 of the legs with pieces which formed a 
 very bad match to the original material ; 
 and his boots were fearfully down at heel ; 
 indeed, they might be truthfully described 
 as being out at heel, even as his scanty 
 jacket was out at elbows. On his head he 
 wore a covering which had once been a
 
 26 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 cap, but which now, from its limpness, 
 looked much like a loose black bag that 
 had been discarded by some gatherer of 
 trifles. It was that cap which seemed to 
 complete the general ragged appearance of 
 the boy; and the cap alone, to say 
 nothing of his poor boots, would have 
 been sufficient to have ensured him a bad 
 character in any part of the great world 
 of London. Spite, however, of his ragged 
 appearance — spite of the unmistakable 
 poverty in which he must have lived and 
 was then living, there was something in 
 his countenance which strongly attracted 
 Silvester Langdale. 
 
 In another minute they were in Hol- 
 born, and the boy said they had not far to 
 go; they would soon be there, where 
 Miserrimus — he did not use that word, 
 but — where his uncle was ill and dying. 
 
 "How long has he been ill?'* Silvester 
 Langdale inquired.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS, 27 
 
 " " Ever since lie came to mother's, sir," 
 answered the boy; " that is three months 
 ago. 
 
 '' Has he been attended by any medical 
 man i^ 
 
 " The doctor of the parish has been two 
 or three times, and said my uncle must 
 have nourishing things ; but how can we 
 get nourishing things for him, sir ?" 
 the boy inquired, piteously. "It is as 
 much as mother can do to send me to 
 school." 
 
 "Oh, she sends you to school, does 
 she ?" said Silvester Langdale, in a tone 
 that seemed to be one of relief to him ; 
 indeed, he felt an undefinable satisfaction 
 in the discovery that the boy did go to 
 school. 
 
 " But I've learnt a good deal more from 
 uncle than I have at school," continued 
 the boy. "Oh, sir, doesnt he know a 
 lot !"
 
 28 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 "Yes, lie is very accomplished," said 
 Silvester Langdale, in an abstracted tone. 
 
 " I think there's nothing he doesn't 
 know, sir." 
 
 "What has he been teaching you?" 
 Silvester inquired. 
 
 " Why, I haven't had time to learn 
 much from him, because three months 
 isn't long, sir, is it ? And then when 
 uncle was taken so very ill, he could only 
 talk lessons to me, and not teach me with 
 books. He's told me all about mathe- 
 matics, and Eoman history, and the 
 history of Greece ; and when he first came 
 he taught me to fence and to draw, but 
 that was only on a slate, because we 
 couldn't get any pencils and books; for 
 we can't buy anything but something to 
 eat, sir, and not always that." 
 
 The boy spoke earnestly and sorrow- 
 fuUy. 
 
 " Many a time have I woke up in the
 
 THE 3IAN IN CHAINS. 29 
 
 middle of the night, and seen mother 
 a-crying, and I know what it's for." 
 
 "Have you a father?" inquired Silvester 
 Langdale. 
 
 " Oh yes, but he finds it veiy hard to 
 get any work since he lost his last fight." 
 
 "Lost his last fight!" exclaimed Silvester 
 Langdale, in a tone of astonishment. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; he used to be a fighter by 
 profession, and then take benefits ; but 
 he can get nothing to do now any way. 
 After his last fight he tried a walking 
 match, but because he sprained his ankle, 
 the people said he'd sold them; but I 
 know that he never did, and he would do 
 any work, I am sure, that he could get to 
 do." 
 
 By this time they had reached a narrow, 
 miserable alley leading out of Farringdon 
 Street, a thoroughfare which was thick 
 with stifling vapour in the summer-time, — 
 thick and hot, a strange admixture that
 
 30 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 made tlie skin feel clammy, and induced 
 incipient nausea in those who were un- 
 acclimatized to the locality, — and the boy 
 stopped at the door of a miserable-looking 
 house, about halfway up this small artery 
 of the great metropolis, and said that was 
 his "home." 
 
 Poverty — abject, crushing, demoralizing, 
 hideous poverty — had set its seal even 
 upon the very threshold. The staircase 
 of the wretched house was close to the 
 door, — so close, that you might step from 
 the narrow pavement of the street at once 
 upon it. 
 
 "Please to follow me, sir," said the 
 boy ; and he led the way up the winding, 
 narrow staircase, which was in utter dark- 
 ness half a dozen steps up. So dark was 
 it, and Langdale so frequently stumbled, 
 that the boy said, " Will you please to take 
 my hand, sir ? I know all the stairs well 
 enough;" and Silvester Lan^xlale did so.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 31 
 
 There was a faint glimmer of a thick, 
 heavy light when they came to the first 
 landing, and Langdale felt a kind of relief 
 when he had reached the spot, for the 
 staircase was evidently of such a peculiar 
 construction, that a false step must in- 
 evitably precipitate an uninitiated stranger 
 to the very bottom, without a chance of 
 saving himself. It was with anything 
 but gratification, therefore, that he re- 
 ceived from his youthful guide the inti- 
 mation that they had yet another flight 
 of stairs to mount precisely similar to 
 those up which he had with so much 
 difficulty ascended. By the same process, 
 and with the same difficulty, he succeeded 
 in reaching the second landing, and the 
 boy noiselessly opened a room door, and 
 thus presented a scene to the eyes of Sil- 
 vester Langdale which instantly stamped 
 itself upon his mind, never to be efikced 
 therefrom. There was a dim yellow light
 
 32 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 in the room, proceeding from an attenuated 
 candle that was inserted in an old iron 
 candlestick, that might have been re- 
 claimed from a dust-heap, but which, 
 nevertheless, was clean withal. In the 
 light that proceeded therefrom, Silvester 
 Lanofdale was enabled to see a wretched 
 bed upon the floor, upon which was lying 
 a human form that Langdale instinctively 
 felt, rather than saw with his eyes, w^as 
 almost as fleshless as a skeleton in a 
 charnel-house. The Avretched bedclothes 
 were evidently so thin that the outline of 
 the person who w^as sleeping in the bed 
 was painfully traceable and terribly sug- 
 irestive. There %vas no furniture in the 
 room save an old chair and a large dilapi- 
 dated trunk, which was made to serve the 
 purpose alternately of a washstand, a 
 table, and a desk. On the chair a w^oman 
 was seated, watching the sleeper upon the 
 wretched bed. The moment the door
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 33 
 
 opened, she rose and put lier finger to 
 lier lips ; and when she saw Silvester 
 Langdale, she bowed to him with a natural 
 grace that really almost seemed like a 
 mockery in that dismal room. This was 
 the thought of Silvester Langdale as the 
 woman advanced noiselessly towards him. 
 
 " Mr. Langdale, I presume," she said, 
 in a whisper. " He has been talking of 
 you, sir, the whole day, and I fear me 
 that what he has said is really prophetic." 
 And the woman wept bitterly. 
 
 "What has he said?" inquired Silvester. 
 
 "He says he has but to see you, and 
 to die in the misery that he has inherited ; 
 but in peace," she replied. "Oh, my 
 poor lost brother of a miserable sister." 
 
 " You are his sister, then ?" said Lang- 
 dale ; " I never knew he had any relations 
 until this boy spoke of him to-night as 
 his uncle." 
 
 The sleeper moved upon the bed ; the 
 
 VOL. I. 3
 
 34 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 involuntary effort was evidently painful, 
 for he groaned. Langdale went to tlie 
 side of the bed, and seated himself on the 
 box, and waited in silence for the sleeper 
 to awake, the woman resuming her seat 
 in the chair on the opposite side. He 
 looked round the miserable room, and 
 observed it more attentively than he had 
 been able to do when he first entered. 
 '''And has it come to this?" he mused; 
 ■" a brilliant intellect, so highly cultivated, 
 too, to find a home at last like this. 
 God ! the contemplation seems to scorch 
 my brain !" And he put his hand up to 
 his forehead as he thought this ; and 
 musing still amidst that awful Avretched- 
 ness that was so palpable around him, he 
 remembered those happy days of his youth 
 when the miserable creature who was now 
 lying upon that Avi'etched bed was a 
 thoughtless, gay, and brilliant man — 
 reckless, it is true — careless of his great
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 35 
 
 mental acquirements, and ambitious only 
 for the applause of pothouse companions, 
 and recking not of what the future might 
 produce. He was the idol of the school- 
 boys whom he taught in Nicholas Darvill's 
 school. They caught up readily the in- 
 struction that he was so well able to 
 impart, and his tuition was no drudgery 
 to them. If he had been endowed with 
 energy and with ambition, an intellect 
 such as his, stored as it was with most 
 precious gifts, might have carried him to 
 a splendid eminence, glorious to himself 
 and beneficial to the world. But his am- 
 bition, as we have said, was limited to the 
 miserable sphere of a small pothouse, and 
 he gradually clouded his great intellect in 
 those fumes that leave their blight upon 
 the mind. To him it was facile to gather 
 the treasures of ancient and modern lite- 
 rature, for Greece and Eome and Germany 
 had no arcana amongst their intellectual 
 
 3—2
 
 36 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 treasures that he could not with ease 
 explore. And yet he wasted such great 
 gifts as these upon the narrow intellects 
 of those whose temple was a puhlic-house, 
 and whose enjoyments were material. 
 He was content with the celebrity which 
 such a circle could give, and with the 
 material pleasures which tobacco and malt 
 beverages could yield. With these twin 
 agents would he cloud his brain until he 
 verged upon lunacy, and became indifferent 
 to all around. In consideration of his 
 great intellect and wide acquirements, 
 Nicholas Darvill had tolerated his usher's 
 self-neglect, and something worse, until 
 his patrons, the parents and guardians of 
 his pupils, became loud and menacing in 
 their remonstrances ; and so, reluctantly, 
 after repeated efforts to produce a salutary 
 change in his course of life, the old man 
 was at length compelled, with his eyes 
 clouded by tears that welled up from his
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 87 
 
 generous heart, to send the man who has 
 just so truly signed himself " Miserrimus" 
 out upon that world of which he knew 
 hut little and cared for less. From that 
 moment Silvester Lang^dale had heard 
 nothing of his instructor, save that he 
 had made his wav to London, and had 
 there been lost as it were in its over- 
 whelming vortex. It is not surprising, 
 then, that the young man should feel 
 something like anguish as he looks down 
 upon the wretched bed beside which he is 
 sitting; it is no matter for wonder that 
 his heart should beat against his breast 
 convulsively as he sees the wasted form 
 upon the bed turn slowly round towards 
 him, and gaze upon him with eyes that 
 seem to glisten from a dead man's skull. 
 Those eyes have recognised their visitor, 
 for a feeble voice — so feeble that its utter- 
 ance sounds like the hoarse echo of a sigh 
 — cries —
 
 38 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " Langdale, this is kind." 
 
 And Silvester Langdale is made con- 
 scious that an attenuated hand is held 
 out towards him. He takes it in liis 
 own, and as he does so, a manifest 
 shudder runs through the young man's 
 frame, for it is like a grasp from the 
 fingers of a skeleton. 
 
 " Stoop down to me, Langdale." 
 
 Silvester did so. 
 
 " My sand is almost run out — you 
 would not have known me — say that you 
 would not have known me." 
 
 Silvester Langdale could with truth, 
 indeed, have declared that he would not 
 have known his former tutor. How should 
 he, indeed? — that sunken cheek, so hol- 
 low that the jaws stood out prominently 
 — the mouth covered with matted hair — 
 the forehead wrinkled with deep furrows 
 that privation had carved out — the whole 
 face, indeed, suggestive rather of that
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 39 
 
 dread change that comes on after death 
 and in the grave, than of that once beam- 
 ing face that, when he knew it in his 
 youth, was ever lighted up with the joy- 
 ousness which is characteristic of the 
 heart that takes no heed of what the 
 morrow may produce. Know him ! oh, 
 how should he have known him beneath 
 such a change ? 
 
 " Langdale," said the dying man,, 
 clutching at Silvester's hand, " I shall 
 soon be gone, and I shall have died by 
 slow degrees." 
 
 The truth of this declaration was too 
 painfully manifest to the young man as 
 he held that attenuated hand, and he felt 
 that he was unable to make any reply to 
 it, even in the shape of commiseration,, 
 which might have sounded something like 
 a mockery, even if he had been equal to 
 the task of offering it. After a short 
 pause, the wretched recumbent on the
 
 40 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 bed continued in the same tone as 
 before — 
 
 " You recollect, Langdale, how we used 
 to read of the refined cruelty that was 
 practised in the Middle Ages, and liow 
 ingenuity was tasked to find out means 
 of slow, but sure and lingering death. I 
 have been sufiering that torture. My 
 soul has ebbed away, and I have known 
 no consolation," and then he turned round 
 and gazing full into the face of Langdale, 
 he added, with deep earnestness — " Lang- 
 dale, for two long months I have been 
 without tobacco/' 
 
 The declaration had a strange jarring 
 efiect upon the mind of the young man. 
 There was an admixture of the ludicrous 
 and the solemn, the grotesque and the 
 awful, in the whispered avowal of the 
 man who, there could be no doubt, was 
 dying then. 
 
 " They have sent me from the parish
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 41 
 
 medical advice ; but it is too late : tlie 
 doctor has ordered me port wine, and 
 Abel bas gone out with the order upon 
 the overseer to get it. Port wine !" and 
 a faint smile broke upon the lips of the 
 wretched man. " Port wine for me, 
 when what I have needed has been porter 
 and tobacco !" 
 
 Strange infatuation ! strong, even in 
 death. 
 
 " What can I do for you ?" faintly in- 
 quired Silvester Langdale. 
 
 "Nothing, my good friend — my old 
 pupil." And as he said this, he again 
 seized the hand of Silvester with his own 
 bony fingers. " Nothing, unless you will 
 smoke a pipe with me." 
 
 There was a kind of fearful grotesque- 
 ness about the invitation which thrilled 
 to the heart of the young man, and he 
 knew not how to answer the appeal that 
 was thus made to him. The least consi-
 
 42 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 deration made the realization of the sug- 
 gestion of the wretched man a sort of 
 horror in the mind of Silvester. The 
 picture that was presented to his mind 
 was something like that of a corpse in 
 revelry. But independently of this hi- 
 deous consideration the young man felt 
 embarrassed about the invitation that had 
 been offered to him, because even if he 
 were to accede to it it was doubtful in his 
 mind what effect it might have upon the 
 being who was prostrated beside him. 
 After a moment's earnest and rather 
 anxious thought, Silvester Langdale beck- 
 oned to the woman on the other side of 
 the bed, and, in a whisper, asked lier if 
 the medical man resided in the neigh- 
 bourhood. 
 
 " In the next street only," she answered. 
 Langdale took a card from his case, and 
 hastily writing with a pencil thereon, 
 directed the woman at once to proceed to
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 43 
 
 the doctor, and give liim that card. Taking 
 the boy with her, slie instantly proceeded 
 on her errand. 
 
 " Bless you ! bless you !" sighed the 
 dying man. " I knew I might depend 
 upon you for solace." Evidently mis- 
 taking the errand upon which the woman 
 had been despatched. 
 
 The woman had scarcely left the miser- 
 able apartment when Langdale felt a 
 creeping horror come over him. What if 
 the man should die while his relations 
 should be away ? The thought caused 
 him to break into a profuse perspiration, 
 and it was quite a relief to him to hear 
 the voice again of his old associate. 
 
 " My sister is a good soul," said 
 Nicholas Darvill's usher, "yet she mar- 
 ried a pugilist ; but Abel is a decent 
 fellow notwithstanding. We have all 
 been starving; they are starving now, 
 but they have never complained of the
 
 44 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 burden that I have been to them. Abel 
 is a good fellow, although he is a prize- 
 fighter and a professional pedestrian. I 
 have been with him to tlie Hash houses, 
 and we have picked up money together 
 there, but the hand of misfortune has 
 been heavy upon us both. But I 
 have taught their boy as once I taught 
 3^ou, and he has been apt as you were. 
 And he too has worked. Stoop down 
 nearer to me," he said, as his voice seemed 
 to become weaker. " He too has worked, 
 and we have both been upon the stage, — 
 ay, the stage !" he repeated, as he ob- 
 served the expression of surprise that was 
 upon Langdale's countenance. " That 
 boy has been our chief support of late. 
 He is a chorister boy, and has a wonder- 
 ful voice." 
 
 "But yourself — how were you upon 
 the stage ?" inquired Silvester Langdale. 
 
 "I became a dramatist," and the de-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 45 
 
 crepit man would have laughed at the 
 declaration, but his strength would not 
 permit the ebullition. 
 
 "A dramatist !" echoed Langrdale. 
 
 *' Ay, a veritable dramatist." 
 
 " Not in your own name, then, or I 
 should have recoo-nised it," suc^orested 
 Silvester. 
 
 " No ; I was Mortimer Montmorency." 
 
 For an instant the old laughing ex- 
 pression which Silvester Langdale re- 
 membered so well, lighted up and ani- 
 mated the eyes that had looked so fearful 
 when he first belield them on that 
 wretched bed. But the expression was 
 less than momentary; it was gone even 
 on the instant that it was p8rcej)tible to 
 Langdale. 
 
 " Yes, I wrote a play in five acts," 
 feebly continued the almost exhausted 
 man. " The boy was engaged at one of 
 the theatres to take part in a chorus, and
 
 46 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 I went witli liim of an evening, and so 
 "became acquainted with the manager. 
 Oh, Langdale !" continued the shadow on 
 the bed, after a pause, during which he 
 had closed his eyes from sheer exhaustion 
 — " oh, Langdale, you can have no idea 
 of the solace that play was to me in my 
 poverty and privation ! So abject was 
 my poverty — but why need I dwell on 
 that? — circumspice 1 — that I had to beg 
 the paper upon which my drama was 
 written, beg it of the manager whom I 
 had informed of my scheme and plot. 
 He encouraged me, Langdale. Bright 
 dreams of halcyon days floated before my 
 soul. I felt myself sublimed, and when 
 I had placed my drama in the manager's 
 hands, and he had informed me that he 
 would produce it, I thought that my 
 golden dream was out, that I could enter 
 into the garden of the Hesperides. But 
 from that dream I was rudely, crushingly
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 47 
 
 aroused; for, listen to me, Langdale — 
 listen to the golden guerdon I received 
 for all my toil, and thought, and fondlj- 
 cherished hopes." 
 
 The flickering energy with which he 
 spoke was too much for him, and he sank 
 back upon his pillow with a groan which 
 seemed to shake his emaciated frame. 
 Silvester Langdale was almost afraid to 
 draw his breath ; and it was a grateful 
 relief to him when he saw the skeleton 
 hand again move towards him. He could 
 see that it was seeking his own, and so 
 he put out his own to meet it, and the 
 bony Angers grasped his hand again. 
 Slowly the large eyes reopened, but they 
 were not so bright as they had been when 
 Silvester Langdale first encountered them 
 in that room. 
 
 " How dark it is becoming !" said the 
 dying man, scarcely above a faint whisper. 
 
 The same light was in the room that
 
 48 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 there had been previously ; and so the 
 declaration of Nicholas Darvill's usher 
 appeared strange to Silvester Langdale, 
 but he did not express his surprise in 
 words ; and the usher continued — 
 
 " They gave me ffty sUllwgs for my 
 drama in five acts, and then I felt tliat 
 my soul was crushed — ay, even though 
 the play by ' Mortimer Montmorency, 
 Esq.,' as they styled me in the bills, drew 
 large houses, and had a lengthened run. 
 We could not live on fame and fifty 
 shillings for three months' labour." 
 
 The woman has returned with the 
 doctor, a pompous little man, who would 
 not have attended to the summons which 
 had been sent to him if Silvester Lang- 
 dale's card had not borne the inscription 
 of " Barrister-at-Law" beneath his name. 
 With the woman, and the doctor, and the 
 boy, came the husband of the woman, the 
 father of the boy. He was a big, burly
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 49 
 
 fellow, athletic and muscular; but his 
 countenance was not repulsive, as is the 
 case with many of his calling, although it 
 was scarred by the traces of conflicts 
 which he had passed through. 
 
 " What can be done for this wretched 
 man?" Silvester Langdale inquired of 
 the doctor in a whisper, and pointing to 
 the breathing skeleton on the bed. 
 
 "Nothing,'' replied the doctor ; "he is 
 beyond human aid, and has been for days. 
 It has only been a question of time." 
 
 The callous way in which the medical 
 ad\dser of the paupers of that densely 
 peopled district spoke of the dying man 
 sounded like a horror on Silvester Lang- 
 dale's ears. * 
 " Are you there, Langdale ?" 
 The voice was distinct, but it was so 
 fearful in Langdale's ears that he started 
 back in terror; but instantly recovering 
 himself, he said — 
 
 VOL. I. 4
 
 50 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " Yes, I am here." 
 
 "You are not alone. Why has the 
 room been darkened ?" 
 
 The room had not been darkened. 
 
 '' A sure sign that dissolution is at 
 hand/' whispered the doctor to Silvester 
 Langdale. "All will be over in a few 
 minutes." 
 
 " Bring your ear close to my mouth," 
 said the dying man to Silvester. 
 
 He did so. 
 
 " In the box by the bedside is a manu- 
 script. Ask for it." 
 
 Silvester beckoned the woman to him, 
 and told her what her brother had said. 
 
 "Yes, sir; it is the sketch of a plot 
 that my poor brother intended to work 
 out," and she opened the box, and gave 
 the papers to Langdale. 
 
 What awful sound is that which seems 
 to strike into the very hearts of those 
 who are grouped around that bed of
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 51 
 
 misery, destitution, death? It is the 
 fearful summons, the indicating knell, 
 the last dread effort that the animated 
 clay can make before the spirit frees itself 
 from its abode on earth. It sounds like 
 what indeed it is, a summons from beyond 
 the world, a summons from the unseen 
 but not unknown, the final call from the 
 everlasting. 
 
 No motion now ; no sound from those 
 parting lips, that are powerless to close, 
 and which will never close again by the 
 volition that has hitherto governed them. 
 
 Yes, the doctor, the pugilist, the woman, 
 the boy, and Silvester Langdale feel that 
 they are in the chamber of death. No 
 earthly trouble can again depress the soul 
 of him who once was the gay, light- 
 hearted companion, full of wit and joy- 
 ousness ; but who is now an emaciated 
 corpse. 
 
 4- 
 
 LIBIiARY 
 
 UMiyfiRSiTY OF ILUNOI^
 
 52 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 A CRY OF MURDER IN THE CITY. 
 
 There is a motley crowd in tlie space that 
 is ill the front of the old Guildhall in the 
 City. It is mostly a ragged crowd, and 
 there are many ill-favonred and slatternly 
 women, and a good many children 
 amongst it. The children are mostly 
 female children too, and every one, for the 
 most part, may be counted as a couple, 
 or at all events one and a half, for nearly 
 every female child carries an infant in her 
 arms ; and there are burly labouring men 
 with pipes in their mouths, and the 
 majority of those labouring men are 
 Irishmen, whose occupation, when they
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 53 
 
 work, is in tlie region of the docks, or 
 along the shores of the river. It is a 
 noisy crowd, for the grown-up portions of 
 it are in knots or clusters, who are loud in 
 their vociferations, and demonstrative in 
 their gesticulations. It is a kind of crowd 
 that is frequently seen thronging about 
 the entrances of the metropolitan police 
 courts — a crowd that seems instinctively 
 to gather on the spot where any startling 
 crime has been committed, and the perpe- 
 trator thereof has to be brought up in due 
 course of law to answer thereto. It is a 
 crowd that appears to scent the odour 
 of a great crime from afar, and to gather 
 round its centre as the vultures swai'm 
 round carrion. And the feeling that 
 prevails in such a crowd is usually one of 
 mere curiosity, tinged, it may be said, 
 with a morbid sympathy for the criminal, 
 if the crime be specially heinous ; and if 
 it be secret murder — murder in which
 
 54 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 there is fearful mystery, murder sur- 
 rounded by appalling atrocity — then the 
 crowd is dense indeed, but still composed 
 of the same elements, and drawn from the 
 same sources. It is on the first dawn of 
 the crime, as it were, that this crowd con- 
 gregates in front of our police offices — 
 even before the rumour has gone forth — 
 as soon it does — to every quarter of the 
 great City's round, and through all the 
 country too. And so that crowd at every 
 stage of the terrible inquiry goes on 
 accumulating, until it has swollen to a 
 human sea that is hideous to look upon — 
 a sea that surges in its fearful tide in 
 front of that frowning fortress of crime 
 which lies over against St. Sepulchre's ; 
 a turbid sea that is all murky with crime 
 and immorality, which flourish with 
 peculiar rankness even in the presence of 
 the dread example that swings like a 
 mockery from the gallows-tree.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 55 
 
 The crowd is noisy and vociferating in 
 front of the justice chamber of Guildhall ; 
 for in the wretched alleys and the loath- 
 some streets that lie about the City's 
 heart the cry has that morning gone forth 
 of murder. Close under the very spot 
 where murders and assassinations of 
 every grade of turpitude and horror have 
 so frequently been expiated, the cry has 
 been the loudest; for almost under the 
 very gallows door — at all events in close 
 proximity to it, so close, that when the 
 gallows is erected, the wretched dwellers 
 near the place can hear the sound of the 
 builder's hammers on the Sunday night — 
 a murder — so the rumour goes — has been 
 that morning committed, and the wretched 
 culprit is in the hands of the police, and 
 is to be brought up before the aldermen — 
 astute and learned on the bench, as that 
 discriminating crowd all know full well 
 they are.
 
 56 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 And as the hour approaches for the 
 commeiicement of the judicial business 
 of the day, the motley crowd of the 
 morning draws to itself new elements 
 from the surrounding streets ; for the cry 
 of murder, even though it be whispered, 
 has a fearful influence. 
 
 The two aldermen whose turn it is 
 to-day to take their places on the judg- 
 ment-seat, and with great acumen ad- 
 minister — for they can do so intuitively, 
 or ex officio — that law — which, in other 
 men, requires the study of a life, in order 
 duly to expound it — have arrived; and 
 with them, from the neighbouring council 
 chambers, have flocked others of their 
 body ; for murder is attractive even to an 
 alderman. The doors are thrown open to 
 the public, and there is a rush from tlie 
 crowd outside; but only those who are 
 close against the outside door have any 
 chance of gaining admission, for the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 57 
 
 justice-room is of very limited dimensions, 
 and the portion appropriated to tlie 
 curiosity of the general public and wit- 
 nesses, is of about the extent of the 
 corridor of a small house. 
 
 The great charge of the day is the first 
 upon the list, and as soon as the august 
 representatives of the majesty of the law 
 have taken their seats, it is called on ; 
 and immediately afterwards, as from a 
 trap-door in the centre of the crowd that 
 has been forced into the room, the form of 
 a man is seen to emerge, with two atten- 
 dant policemen to guard him. He is a 
 big man of six feet high — fully, — broad 
 and muscular in proportion, and is mani- 
 festly possessed of more than ordinary 
 physical strength. He has a muscular 
 face, too, and a big, massive forehead, and 
 the general expression of the countenance 
 is that which classic painters and sculptors 
 have handed down to us as the ruling
 
 58 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 type of the Eonian gladiator. As he 
 stands against the iron bar which forms 
 the dock for prisoners in this incongruous 
 chamber of justice, he looks haggard and 
 wild — an expression that is the more ap- 
 parent from his shirt being open, and his 
 stalwart neck exposed ; and he grasps the 
 iron bar in front of him with both his 
 hands. 
 
 The prisoner was charged with killing 
 and slaying one Ephraim Griasher, in 
 whose house he rented a couple of rooms. 
 The chief witness against the accused was 
 the wife of the deceased, and the nature 
 of the charge having been stated by the 
 inspector of police, who had it at hand, 
 this woman was called from a chamber 
 that appeared to be situated in a dark 
 corner of the justice-room ; and the 
 moment she came into the presence of the 
 prisoner, she burst into a paroxysm of ex- 
 citement, and was with difficulty withheld
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 59 
 
 from making a dash at tlie man at the 
 bar. She was a woman of great stature, 
 bony and angular, and with a countenance 
 of a most forbidding expression. She was 
 between fifty and sixty years of age, but 
 she evidently possessed the vigour of 
 youth still. Her attire was tawdry, but 
 faded, and she had the general appearance 
 of a flaunting gaiety that had lost its 
 brightness, or from which the glaring 
 colom-s had been subdued by age; the 
 probabihty being that the several portions 
 of her attire had separately flourished in a 
 diflerent sphere from that in which they 
 now were utilized. The moment this 
 woman made her appearance in the court, 
 she stretched her brawny arms towards the 
 prisoner, and cried at the top of her voice — 
 *' There stands the villain ; there is the 
 murderer of my husband. The villain 
 shall be * strung up if there is law in 
 England."
 
 <30 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 *'You must give your evidence, my 
 good woman, in proper form, and in the 
 usual way," said tlie senior alderman, with 
 a profound shake of the head. 
 
 " Yes ; I'll give my evidence against 
 the devil, and I should like to tear liis 
 heart out !" shouted the Avoman, and she 
 looked indeed as though she would like to 
 perform that operation upon the accused. 
 
 " You must be sworn in due form," 
 said the alderman, with a scared look. 
 
 " Oh, I'll be sworn ; I'll kiss the book. 
 Where is it ?" 
 
 The book was handed to her, and she 
 grasped it eagerly, and exclaimed, '' So 
 help me, God," and then emphatically 
 kissed the book. 
 
 The clerk informed her that she must 
 be sworn in the usual form, and that she 
 had not gone through that form. 
 
 *' In twenty thousand forms, if you 
 like," shrieked the woman.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 61 
 
 " Please to take off your glove," saicS 
 the magistrates' clerk. 
 
 " What for ?" demanded the woman, in 
 great excitement. 
 
 " Because you must be sworn on the 
 hook with your hare hand." 
 
 "With both hands, if you like, an(3 
 bare headed too, if tliat will bring him to 
 the gallows quicker," shouted the woman, 
 Tind glaring at the prisoner as he stood in 
 the dock, still grasping the iron bar. 
 
 The woman hastily tore off her glove, 
 and, clutching the book again, cried 
 fiercely — 
 
 *'Now what am I to do ?" 
 
 The oath was then administered to the 
 witness in tlie usual form, and with the 
 usual grammatical accuracy, and in answer 
 to leading questions, she deposed that the 
 prisoner at the bar had attacked her 
 husband in a most ferocious manner, and 
 with his herculean strength had struck
 
 62 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 him dead upon the spot. In reply to 
 further questions, she deposed that a 
 dispute had arisen between the prisoner 
 and her husband respecting certain arrears 
 of rent that had accrued ; and because 
 the decease had demanded simply that 
 which was due to him, the prisoner had 
 fallen upon him, and in his own room 
 had struck him dead. 
 
 She was required by the astute clerk to 
 the magistrates to be a little more specific 
 in her statement ; and after another 
 ebullition similar to that with which she 
 had favoured the bench on her entrance 
 into the coui-t, she deposed that a relative 
 of the prisoner, a drunken, lazy lie-about, 
 had died suddenly in one of the apart- 
 ments of the prisoner ; and her husband, 
 finding that he had no other means of 
 securing what was due to him, had 
 recom'se to the expedient of seizing a 
 trunk which was in the dead man's room,
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 63 
 
 upon whicli the prisoner at the bar, who 
 was a well-known pugilist by profession, 
 had taken her husband by the throat, 
 carried him on to the staircase landing, 
 and there, with a death-dealing blow, had 
 struck her husband down the staircase — 
 dead 1 
 
 The prisoner, according to the usual 
 form, was asked if he had any questions 
 to put to the witness. 
 
 " Questions !" cried the woman ; " let 
 him look me in the face, if the villain can, 
 and put any questions he likes." 
 
 As is very commonly the case in charges 
 similar to this in a police court, when a 
 prisoner is required to put any questions 
 to a witness — that is, cross-examine him 
 or her as the case may be, — the accused 
 man at the bar commenced a rambling 
 statement of his answer to the charge 
 that had been made against him, and he 
 was entering into the whole facts of the
 
 64 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 case, when he was abruptly checked "by 
 the clerk to the magistrates, who informed 
 him that he would have an opportunity 
 of making any answer he had to offer to 
 the charge presently, but until then he 
 must confine himself to any questions he 
 might wish to put to the witness. The 
 prisoner then turned to the witness, and 
 commenced a recital of the incidents of 
 the scene which had led to the catastrophe, 
 which, in fact, was simply the defence in 
 another form, and he was ao-ain checked 
 by the magistrates' clerk, with the in- 
 timation that he must confine himself to 
 questions to the witness, and reserve his 
 statement for the close of the inquiry. 
 * This intimation only confused the prisoner, 
 W'ho could not understand what cross- 
 questioning the witness meant, unless he 
 Avas allowed at once to give his own 
 version of the entire matter respecting 
 which he was thus charged.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. C5 
 
 During the whole of the investigation 
 the j)risoner might have been observed 
 casting furtive ghmces first to one entrance 
 to the court, and then to another, as 
 though he anticipated the advent of some- 
 body who would come to his assistance 
 in the sore strait in which he was placed ; 
 but no one appeared to relieve his anxiety. 
 
 The magistrate inquired if there were 
 any otlier v/itnesses, and a police officer 
 stepped forward, and having been sworn 
 with that distinct exactness and solemnit}'- 
 which characterize the administration of 
 an oath in an English court of justice, lie 
 deposed that in going his rounds that 
 morning he was startled by the shrieks of 
 mm-der that proceeded from a street he 
 mentioned; and on proceeding to the 
 spot, he found a man lying at the foot of 
 the first flio^ht of stairs in the house in 
 question, in a state of insensibility, and 
 he immediately sprang his rattle, which 
 
 Vol.. I.
 
 66 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 brought to liis assistance two brother 
 constables who fortunately happened to 
 be near the locality referred to. Without 
 attending to the insensible man, they 
 promptly ascended the stairs, and found 
 the prisoner at the bar in violent alterca- 
 tion with the last witness, who had. made, 
 as it would seem, a fierce onslaught on the 
 accused ; and deeming this sufficient 
 evidence that he had been the aggressor 
 in the affray which had led to the con- 
 dition of the individual they had stumbled 
 over at the foot of the stairs, they had 
 promptly taken the prisoner into custody, 
 and conveyed him to the station-house, 
 whither he was followed by the last 
 witness, who forthw^ith charged him with 
 the wilful murder of her husband, upon 
 which they returned to the scene of the 
 affray, and had the body of the deceased 
 conveyed into a room of tlic house, where 
 it w^as examined by the divisional surgeon,
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 67 
 
 who at once pronounced that life was 
 extinct. 
 
 The prisoner was again asked if he 
 desired to put any questions to the 
 witness, and he intimated to the court 
 that the whole matter was accidental, and 
 that he had expected a gentleman would 
 be there to tell his lordship all about it, 
 as he was a lawyer, and liad been sent to. 
 The bench gathered from this intimation 
 that the prisoner expected legal assistance, 
 and asked him if this were so ; but before 
 the prisoner could answer the question, a 
 slight commotion was observed at the 
 magistrates' private entrance to the court, 
 and the next moment a gentleman entered. 
 The instant the prisoner saw him, he 
 cried, " This, your worship, is the gentle- 
 man I expected ;" and there was an ex- 
 pression of relief upon his countenance 
 as he said so. 
 
 The gentleman who had entered the
 
 GS THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 court was a tall man of about fifty years 
 of age, but liis appearance did not truly 
 indicate what his real age was. Indeed, 
 he was a remarkable man in this respect, 
 for, as will probably be seen in the course 
 of this history, he seemed to possess the 
 faculty of making himself appear older or 
 younger according to his will. He could 
 look decrepit and bent ; he could walk 
 erect and with a firm and determined 
 tread ; he could assume a nervous twitch- 
 ing of the hands, as though afflicted with 
 incipient palsy and paralysis ; and he 
 could grasp a man's throat with the iron 
 grip of an athlete. He had been known 
 to do so more than once since the time 
 when he could make himself appear to 
 be in age close upon the Psalmist's limit. 
 His hair was thick and dark, and there 
 w^as no indication of either baldness or of 
 grey. He had a thick beard and a heavy 
 moustache ; but the former was tinged
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. G9 
 
 with grey hairs, that appeared strong and 
 bristly amongst the rest, which was of a 
 deep, rich brown. 
 
 Such was Mr. Marl Baskerville, the 
 legal adviser with whom the prisoner 
 at the bar had communicated. His legal 
 practice was as peculiar as it was extensive, 
 although it was almost exclusively con- 
 fined to the members of the sporting 
 world. In the turf, the ring, the hunting- 
 field, the army, Mr. Marl Baskerville was 
 as well known as the prime minister — • 
 perliaps better, — and he was a conspicuous 
 lisrht in that veiled scene which has been 
 designated life in London. He was of 
 the legal profession, but that was not his 
 exclusive, perliaps not his principal 
 calling ; he had much to do with money 
 matters, and in his office, which was 
 situated in some obscure locality in tlie 
 west — obscure, and yet to a large portion 
 of the world of London as well known as
 
 70 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the Hay market — there were mysterious 
 iron boxes, respecting which there were 
 many legends ; for they were known to 
 enshrine strange documents, brief in 
 themselves, but which it were well to 
 keep hidden closely. With the members 
 of the pugilistic ring and its patrons, ]\Ir. 
 Marl Baskerville was an oracle. He it 
 was who prepared " the articles" that are 
 drawn up for every fight, — drawn up with 
 as much particularity and verbal strictness 
 as though they were treaties in diplomac}^, 
 or instruments which the law would 
 recognise, act upon, and, if necessary, 
 enforce. 
 
 Mr. Marl Baskerville had at once 
 answered to tlie summons of Abel Barnes, 
 the prisoner at the bar, and he now 
 appeared at the court in his defence. 
 
 A few words to the bench explained 
 the position of Marl Baskerville, and that 
 he requested a few minutes' consultation
 
 THE MAX IX CHAINS. 71 
 
 with the accused, which was at once 
 granted, and the prisoner was conveyed 
 into the obscure room that led out of the 
 dark corner of the court. 
 
 The consultation w^as but brief, and 
 presently the prisoner was placed at the 
 bar again, and the evidence that had 
 already been taken was read over to Mr, 
 Baskerville, who desired to cross-examine 
 the wife of the deceased, and she cried, — 
 
 " Cross-examine ? Yes ; you may cross- 
 examine me till you're blue in the face, 
 but you shan't cross-examine his neck 
 out of the noose ;" and she pointed with 
 a frantic gesture to the prisoner at the 
 bar. 
 
 Mr. Baskerville asked if the deceased 
 had not threatened the prisoner with a 
 knife, and the woman emphatically denied 
 it. In answer to further questions she 
 said that' her husband was the owner of 
 many houses similar to the one in which
 
 72 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the prisoner lived, and that they were all 
 let out in rooms, and she never inquired 
 how many people occupied them so long 
 as the rent was paid every three days at 
 the farthest. If it was not paid, the 
 tenants were ejected by force, without 
 the delay which any legal form would 
 necessitate, and whatever they had was 
 seized. Mr. Baskerville then put a 
 question to the woman which roused, her 
 fury to the utmost, and she clutched her 
 fingers at her questioner as though she 
 would like to tear him. The question 
 was a very plain one, and such as might, 
 under ordinary circumstances, be easily 
 answered. It was this, — 
 
 " Were you really married to the 
 deceased?" 
 
 Instead of directly answering the 
 question, she, as we have said, clutched 
 with her fingers at Mr. Baskerville, 
 and her rage glared through her eyes
 
 THE MAN IX CHAINS. 73 
 
 and swelled her throat. She broke out 
 into emphatic vituperation of the pri- 
 soner and his advocate, nor was her rage 
 at all calmed by the magistrate inquir- 
 ing what the question had to do with 
 the investigation, that was then being 
 made. 
 
 Mr. Baskerville, in a tone of voice that 
 was not audible in the court, told the 
 aldermen that he had merely put the 
 question with an ulterior object. The 
 fact was, he should be able to show that 
 the woman was not married to the de- 
 ceased, and as she therefore could have no 
 claim upon his property, her virulence 
 towards the prisoner might be accounted 
 for. 
 
 He then spoke in a louder tone of voice, 
 so that he might be heard over the whole 
 court, and said that as it was probable 
 that the aldermen would not finally deter- 
 mine upon the case at that hearing, but
 
 74 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 await the verdict of the coroner's jnry, he 
 should content himself b}^ calling one 
 witness only, and that was the prisoner's 
 son; and he requested the usher of the 
 court to bring in the boy, Severn Barnes 
 by name. 
 
 The boy, having been produced from 
 the dark room, \vas placed in the witness- 
 box; his eyes were red, his face was 
 haggard and pale, and the vibration of his 
 heaii; could almost be seen through the 
 threadbare and slender covering that was 
 upon his breast. In answer to the ques- 
 tions that were put, he deposed that on 
 the previous night his uncle had died — 
 and here the poor boy wept bitterly — 
 that shortly after the death of his uncle, 
 the landlord, who was the deceased 
 Ephraim Glasher, came home in a state 
 of intoxication, and demanded to know if 
 that — using a fearful imprecation in 
 Teference to the dead man — had paid his
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 75 
 
 rent, or paid anything in lieu of it ; and 
 on being informed that the man would 
 never pay rent again, for he was dead, he 
 declared, with an oath, that it was a lie ; 
 and he came up the stairs, and was at- 
 tempting to force his way into the room 
 in which the corpse lay, when the accused 
 intercepted him, and declared that he 
 should not enter the chamber. This 
 would seem to have infuriated the man, 
 and to have confirmed him in his behef 
 that the wretched occupant of the room 
 was not dead ; and drawing a knife from 
 his pocket, he swore that unless the 
 prisoner permitted him to enter the room 
 and satisfy himself, he would stick him. 
 "You shan't enter to-night," cried the 
 prisoner ; upon which the landlord made 
 a rush, with the knife in his hand, at 
 the prisoner, who struck out at the 
 deceased with such force that he was 
 knocked down the stairs, and, falling
 
 76 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 heavily to the bottom, was killed upon 
 the spot. 
 
 The policeman was recalled and ques- 
 tioned as to whether he had seen any 
 knife; and he replied that when the 
 deceased was carried upstairs, a large 
 clasp-knife was found firmly grasped in 
 his hand. 
 
 The crowd outside the court had been 
 informed of the course the inquiry inside 
 was taking, and some of the groups of 
 slatternly women expressed themselves 
 with something like indignation that a 
 case which had promised in the morning 
 to be one of atrocious murder, should be 
 dwarfed into manslaughter at the most. 
 What was the use of stopping to see the 
 prisoner brought out? he could not be 
 hung for manslaughter. All the interest 
 of the case was gone, and so most of 
 the crowd went too ; and when Abel 
 Barnes was remanded upon the charge
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 77 
 
 against him, there were few to notice 
 how pale he looked, and to feel sym- 
 pathy with that ragged but good-looking 
 boy who clung to him as he was being 
 removed.
 
 78 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 " THERE IS THAT CREATURE AGAIN, PAPA. LET 
 US GO HOME." 
 
 The London season is at its height, and 
 is in its glory ; indeed, it has been more 
 brilliant than usual, for there have been 
 many adventitious causes conducing 
 thereto. There have been great attrac- 
 tions in the metropolis, that have drawn 
 visitors from all parts of the civilized 
 world, and London has been the centre of 
 gay excitement that has been administered 
 to from every quarter of the globe. And 
 yet gaiety in the public streets, even 
 when that gaiety is exhibited by congre- 
 gated myriads, does not seem to harmonize
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 79 
 
 with London; it is not natural to it, it 
 is manifestly out of place. The people 
 know how to enjoy themselves, of course ; 
 they are constantly seeking outdoor 
 pleasures, and finding them after their 
 own fashion, and according to their own. 
 tastes; but the English people, never- 
 theless, do not understand, or, at all 
 events, do not exhibit, the real spirit of 
 al fresco enjoyment, that is in the me- 
 tropolis, or in any of the large towns. 
 But London is noisy enough in its mirth, 
 and it is excitable enough therein occa- 
 sionally, and it can get up demonstrations, 
 vast and almost overwhelming in them- 
 selves, but which are almost invariably 
 attended with something that is very 
 nearly allied to failure, although un- 
 doubtedly there are grand exceptions, but 
 still we should be but a sorry nation if 
 our national character were to be indicated 
 by our public demonstrations. They are
 
 80 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 always solid and substantial enough, but 
 tliey are generally bungling, and are only 
 impressive in the dense mass of hetero- 
 geneous order by which they are charac- 
 terized — a kind of order, however, that is 
 anomalously a mass of confusion, from 
 which it is something Avonderful that no 
 disaster arises, beyond the crushing to 
 death of some dozen or so of unfortunates 
 who happen to be unluckily thrown down 
 and trampled upon. A general illumina- 
 tion is not a frequent event in London, 
 and one would fancy that, being of rare 
 occurrence, something like versatility of 
 taste would be exhibited in canying it 
 out when it does take place ; but no, the 
 illumination of this year is precisely the 
 f>ame as the one two years ago, and stars 
 and garters, crowns and olive-branches, 
 are the limits of the nation's taste in this 
 respect. 
 
 The gayest scene in all London, in the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 81 
 
 London season, is witlioiit doubt Eotten 
 How, in Hyde Park ; and it seems distinct 
 from London, although it is a charac- 
 teristic part of it. If it were possible to 
 analyze the elements that compose that 
 scene in the drama of civilization, how 
 strange, and perhaps we might say how 
 startling, would be the result obtained ! 
 It is not our purpose to attempt such an 
 analysis, seeing that we have no alembic 
 for the purpose ; but the drive in Hyde 
 Park, and the ride in Eotten Row, in the 
 midst of London's season, could supply 
 an almost inexhaustible source of reflection 
 to the meditative philosopher who might 
 choose such a field for his speculations. 
 It is said that the most profound novelist 
 that France has ever produced has manu- 
 scripts in his library table that would fill 
 fifty large volumes, and that he intends 
 to write for ten years more, if he be 
 spared, before he publishes any of them ; 
 VOL. I. 6
 
 82 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 and the reason that he assigns for this 
 strange literary hoarding is, that he has 
 marked out a certain course for himself 
 in which to develop certain phases of 
 society to a limited extent, and only to a 
 limited extent; because he avers that if 
 he were to fashion out all those materials 
 that a walk along the Boulevards of Paris 
 would supply, he could not do it in a 
 hundred years. What, then, must Eotten 
 Eow and the drive in H3^de Park be to 
 the imaginative, and contemplative, and 
 creative mind ? 
 
 Marl Baskerville is no creative or ima- 
 ginative philosopher, and yet, as he stands 
 at the entrance to one of the crossings of 
 Eotten Eow, waiting for a favourable 
 opportunity to pass over to the other 
 side when an eligible opening shall pre- 
 sent itself in the stream of equestrians 
 then surging up and down the avenue, a 
 philosophical reflection does pass through
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 83 
 
 his mind, and* lie falls into a kind of 
 reverie as he leans against the railings at 
 the side of the road, from which, how- 
 ever, he is presently roused by a voice 
 exclaiming — 
 
 " Hollo, Baskerville, you're the very 
 man I wanted to see." 
 
 The voice proceeded from a gentleman 
 on horseback, who had reined in his 
 horse the moment he saw Baskerville. 
 He appeared to be a rather tall and s|)are 
 man as he was seated in the saddle, and 
 he looked between forty and fifty years of 
 age. By his side, on horseback too, was 
 a young lady, of probably about eighteen 
 or nineteen, attired in a riding-habit, and 
 wearing a cavalier hat, which was adorned 
 with a profusion of crimson feathers. She 
 wore gloves which, gauntlet-like, extended 
 nearly to her elbows ; and in her hand 
 she carried a riding- whip — not a toy, 
 however ; not the limp, light switch that 
 
 6—2
 
 84 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 young ladies commonly fionrisli when on 
 horseback, but a large black whip, thick 
 in the handle, and heavily mounted with 
 embossed gold, the top thereof being sur- 
 mounted by a figure of a racehorse with a 
 jockey on his back. She exhibited a com- 
 manding and most attractive figure on 
 horseback. The body of her riding-habit 
 fitted faultlessly, and displayed a beauti- 
 fully tapering waist, above which swelled 
 out, in rolling voluptuousness, those 
 rounded curves which such an attire is so 
 well calculated to make conspicuous. Her 
 face was exceedingly beautiful, but it ex- 
 hibited a haughty sternness, which per- 
 haps arrested the attention more forcibly 
 even than its beauty. Her eyes were 
 large and almost fierce in their brilliancy, 
 their colour being undefined, something 
 between blue and grey; but whatever 
 their colour might be designated, there 
 could be no doubt as to their power to
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 85 
 
 express strong passions, and to flash with 
 every fiery impulse of their owner. Her 
 lips, although they were full and large, 
 had an equal power of expression, when 
 passion called it forth ; and her nose was 
 large and prominent, but still in entire 
 harmony with all the other features. Al- 
 though her countenance in repose was 
 soft and beaming, yet had it an expression 
 of strength which was not masculine, and 
 of linear development which was not 
 power. It was a face in every way cal- 
 culated to express either passion or feel- 
 ing ; such a face as that with wluch the 
 Goddess of Tragedy might be represented 
 — with a dash of the voluptuous thrown 
 in to tone down the tragic element a 
 little. Her hair was light, and was 
 gathered in a mass behind her hat, and 
 held in bounds by a silken net. She has 
 reined in her horse as her companion had 
 done on seeing Baskerville, but she does
 
 86 THE MAN IN CHAINS, 
 
 not recognise that personage, for slie 
 seems to be intent upon observing tlie 
 horses of the fashionable equestrians as 
 they pass her. She looks at them criti- 
 cally, with scrutinizing eyes. 
 
 " What's this report that I see in the 
 papers to-day about a murder having 
 been committed in the City by one Abel 
 Barnes, a pugilist?" the gentleman on 
 horseback inquires of Marl Baskerville; 
 "surely it isn't our old friend the Bilston ?" 
 — Bilston was the sohriquet by which 
 Abel Barnes was designated by his fra- 
 ternity. 
 
 "It is our old friend the Bilston 
 though," replied Marl Baskerville ; " but 
 it is no case of murder." 
 
 "What was it?— a mill?" the gentle- 
 man inquired. 
 
 " No," said Baskerville ; " a scrimmage, 
 in which, as usual, Barnes was unlucky." 
 
 " D me ! it is extraordinary the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 87 
 
 ill luck of that fellow ; you know I stuck 
 to him till the last ; but Lord ! I couldn't 
 stand it. And yet I believe the Bilston 
 has got the right stuff in him; still I 
 was obliged to turn him up. I've made 
 stakes for him, I've backed him, and IVe 
 got good matches up for him ; but what's 
 been the good? he's never been able to 
 do anytliing but get licked. I thought, 
 however, he'd left the country. And 
 what is this case ? — what will it come 
 to?" 
 
 "WeU, I suppose they'll find it man- 
 slaughter at the inquest to-morrow, al- 
 though I don't believe it amounts to 
 that. He sent for me this morning, and 
 I couldn't very well abandon the poor 
 devil, so I appeared at the police-court 
 for him." 
 
 "What has he been doing lately?" 
 inquired the gentleman who was on 
 horseback.
 
 88 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " I rather tliink it has b6en going very 
 hard with him of late ; in fact, I am sure 
 it has/' said BaskerviJle. " When luck's 
 against a man, he hasn't much chance." 
 
 " That's true," responded the gentle- 
 man, with something very like a sigh. 
 *' Let us get him off if we can. Come to 
 me to-morrow morning about it. I sup- 
 pose you are going over yonder ?" and he 
 pointed in the direction of the centre of 
 the park, and smiled as he did so. 
 
 Baskerville said he was going thither, 
 as he must look after his clients occa- 
 sionally ; and as he said this he smiled 
 expressively — a smile that the gentleman 
 he was conversing with seemed very well 
 to understand. 
 
 To the uninitiated world it is not 
 known that under the trees in Hyde 
 Park there is a kind of betting exchange 
 held, in which a very motley class of 
 persons assemble daily and speculate
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 89 
 
 upon the current turf events, and in 
 which large sums of money exchange 
 hands and float about. The turf in Eng- 
 land now is not so much a sport as it is 
 a business : it is almost entirely com- 
 mercial in its character, and the commerce 
 .that it has created is conducted upon 
 mathematical principles, which seem, in- 
 deed, to be intuitive in those who are 
 proficient in them — for many of these 
 men can scarcely write. Indeed, there 
 are some speculators amongst them who 
 really cannot write, and who employ 
 amanuenses to record transactions which 
 are remarkable for their accuracy and 
 truth of calculation. 
 
 It was to this spot in the Park that 
 Baskerville said he was going; a spot 
 which, considering its associations and 
 the people who assemble there, may be 
 truly characterized as one of the mysteries 
 of London.
 
 90 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " You will come to me in the morning 
 then, will you, Baskerville ?" 
 
 "I will, my lord," said Baskerville, 
 and then he went across the Eow upon 
 his w^ay to the spot on which he said his 
 *' clients" were assembled ; but as Lord 
 Montalban cantered away, the man with 
 whom he had been conversing paused to 
 look after him, and as he did so, the ex- 
 pression of his countenance was entirely 
 changed from that which it exhibited but 
 a few minutes previously. It looked ma- 
 lignant now. Suppressed passion seemed 
 to burst through the eyes that glared 
 beneath those shaggy eyebrows, and Marl 
 Baskerville clenched his hand with an 
 iron grasp upon his thick walkingstick. 
 His lips were firmly compressed together; 
 indeed, he seemed to contract his whole 
 frame, to bind himself around, as it were, 
 with the terrible passion by which he was 
 agitated.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 91 
 
 He turned from the spot, and took his 
 way across the enclosure of the Park ; 
 and as he did so he muttered to himself — 
 " I never forget, and I never forgive." 
 The muttered exclamation seemed to give 
 him comfort, for he repeated it thrice, 
 and every time with more animation. 
 " The scheme is tedious, because his rank 
 is high ; but although it is so hideously 
 slow, yet will it be terribly sure in the 
 end. Yes, it has been working gradually 
 year by year; and such retribution as 
 that wliich I must work but gains 
 strength with time. Twenty years ago ! 
 — when I look back upon the events 
 which that time has produced, it seems 
 an age; but when I look on him, oh 
 Grod ! the interval seems but a night, and 
 yesterday the date of my great wrong. 
 Wrong? Yes, wrong!" He seemed to 
 thrust the word into his heart. "And 
 what has it made me ? Well, no matter
 
 92 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 what; perhaps that has yet to be seen. 
 I never forget, and I never forgive. No, 
 I never forget, even in the vortex of 
 those exciting scenes to which I minister 
 so much. Oh Heaven ! how bright and 
 promising was my youth ! how glorious 
 the scene of life appeared to me when 
 first it opened to my view ! but what a 
 terrible reality has it developed ! But I 
 never forget, and I never forgive !" and 
 then he walked hurriedly on, as though 
 by that means he relieved his agitation. 
 *' No wonder people fear me as they fawn 
 upon me. They cannot fathom me. No, 
 no ; and least of all you, Lord Yiscount 
 Montalban !" and he said this with a 
 tone of scorn that was manifestly a relief 
 to him. 
 
 By this time he had reached that 
 Bialto of the turf upon the turf itself, to 
 which we have alluded. Viscount Mon- 
 talban was a nobleman with but one
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 93 
 
 daugMer ; he liad no other family. His 
 wife had died several years before the 
 period at which we meet with him, and 
 he had not married again, and had pro- 
 bably never entertained any desire to do 
 so. He was, however, connected with 
 many noble families by kindred, and 
 amongst them was a cousin who was a 
 Duke. Viscount Montalban succeeded to 
 a princely fortune, after a long minority, 
 but year by year that fortune had sensibly 
 diminished, and now year by year he was 
 becoming less wealthy. The vast amount 
 of available money which he had inherited 
 on coming of age had been a misfortune 
 to him, and he had been frequently heard 
 to declare that, although he had been 
 born rich, he certainly had not been born 
 lucky. From his earliest youth a passion 
 for the turf had inspired him, but his ill 
 fortune in connection with it had become 
 proverbial in the sporting world. He had
 
 94 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 plunged with a wild recklessness into the 
 vortex of turf pursuits, and he commenced 
 his career by purchasing, at inordinate 
 prices, a stud of great extent: and he 
 would seem to have had a mania for 
 favourites for great races, especially for 
 Derby favourites ; and he would purchase 
 them at prices that were actual fortunes 
 in themselves. For one equine quadruped 
 he would pay a sum that would have 
 mounted " the six hundred" that galloped 
 into the yawning jaws of death in the 
 valley of Balaldava ; and at the back of 
 that he w^ould heap up sums of gold in 
 the shape of bets that v/ere almost fabu- 
 lous, and all which might at any moment 
 be irretrievably lost by any one of the ills 
 which equine flesh is heir to, or by the 
 negligence of a stable-keeper. As the 
 Viscount grew older, however, he became 
 more prudent ; and when all the accumu- 
 lated revenues of his minority had van-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 95 
 
 ished, he came to the resolution of 
 disposing of all his stud, and contenting 
 himself with being a spectator of and a 
 speculator upon the studs of others. The 
 trustees of his youth had, as though with 
 some misgiving with regard to the course 
 of the young lord when he came of age, 
 invested, under certain powers which had 
 been given them, a portion of the accu- 
 mulations in the purchase of an estate in 
 one of the midland counties; but as 
 though, even in this matter of prudence 
 on his behalf, the ill-luck which had been 
 born with him should be conspicuous, it 
 was discovered, when he came of age, 
 that the title to the estate so purchas"ed 
 had a stain upon it. In reality, however, 
 this was fortunate for him, strange as the 
 fact may appear; for while it was not 
 sufficient, as it would seem, to jeopardize 
 his enjoyment of the property, it precluded 
 him from raising money upon it. That
 
 96 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 one estate was the sole unencumbered 
 property tliat he now possessed. 
 
 Property, as we know, the axiom tells 
 us, has its duties as well as its rights : it 
 has its bitters as well as its sweets, too ; 
 and property sometimes has more of the 
 bitters than the sweets, though perhaps 
 not often. 
 
 Lord Montalban and his daughter are 
 mounted upon two splendid thorough- 
 breds, and as they are put into a canter 
 on Baskerville taking his way across the 
 park, the sweeping action of the steeds 
 and the graceful riding of the young lady 
 attract attention from the brilliant throng 
 in Eotten Eow. 
 
 And Viscount Montalban was justly 
 proud of his daughter's horsemanship. 
 She had been accustomed to riding on 
 horseback from the time she was a little 
 child, and in Lord Montalban's county 
 she was known now as the most fearless
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 97 
 
 and dashing rider across country that 
 county had ever produced. She had made 
 hunting fashionable amongst the ladies 
 of her neighbourhood, but none of them 
 could approach her in her equestrian ac- 
 complishment ; they all lacked her fearless 
 dash and energy. All save one. During 
 the previous season one fair rival had 
 appeared to contest with her for the 
 triumphs of the hunting-field, armed with 
 every requisite to make the trial. The 
 gentlemen of the hunt were delighted 
 with the advent of the stranger, who was 
 
 dashing, handsome, impetuous, and 
 
 well, utterly unrestrained in her conver- 
 sation. The all-important question, "Who 
 is she ?" was speedily answered, and the 
 majority of the members of the hunt 
 smiled; but Lord Montalban looked grave, 
 as did some few others. 
 
 The rival in the hunting-field to Lord 
 Montalban 's daughter was known in 
 
 VOL. I. 7
 
 98 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Kotten Eow too, for slie resided in Lon- 
 don, and had no seat in the country, save 
 that upon her horse, of which she was 
 undoubtedly the accomplished mistress. 
 
 Lord Montalban and his fair companion 
 are cantering towards Kensington Gar- 
 dens, when a brilliant horsewoman, attired 
 exactly like the daughter of Lord Mont- 
 alban — so exactly like, indeed, that one 
 might have been taken for the other, — 
 dashes by them upon a thoroughbred 
 steed ; and as she does so she turns with 
 something like a disdainful movement of 
 her head, and with a supercilious curl 
 upon her pouting lip, and casts a look of 
 recognition at the peer and his daughter, 
 which brings the blood into the young 
 lady's face, as she exclaims to her father, — 
 
 " There is that creature again. Let us 
 go home, papa." 
 
 They turned round immediately, and 
 cantered towards Park Lane ; but before
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 99 
 
 they had reached the extremity of the 
 Park, the fair equestrian who had been 
 designated " the creature " dashed past 
 them again, and gave them the same 
 kind of recognition as before. 
 
 When Miss Montalban reached home 
 she was very much flushed and excited. 
 
 7—2
 
 100 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 VISCOUNT MONTALBAN AND HIS DAUGHTER AT HOME. 
 
 Viscount Montalban lived in Park Lane, 
 in a row of houses that were not particu- 
 larly attractive outside, but which were, 
 nevertheless, very commodious, very com- 
 fortable, and very compact within. The 
 best part of the house looked into the 
 Park, and yet it did not appear to be the 
 front of the house. Indeed, it seemed to 
 have no front at all, for the jDrincipal 
 entrance was situated in a back street ; 
 and this arrangement probably made the 
 interior of the house the more charming, 
 by the agency of contrast. Entering the 
 house from the back street, and going
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 101 
 
 into the chief reception-room, was like 
 stepping from the pent-up town at once 
 into the free and glorious country ; for 
 there were green creeping plants in trellis - 
 work outside the house on the side that 
 faced the Park, and out beyond were the 
 spreading elms, and smooth, green turf, 
 the flower-beds and fountains of that 
 bright oasis which is the glory of western 
 London. From the windows of the house 
 the intervening road was not visible, for 
 there was between it and the thronged 
 thoroughfare a kind of teiTace, beneath 
 which were mysterious chambers, that 
 might be dungeons, or sculleries, or 
 vaults, or anything else that a lively or a 
 morose fancy might picture on the mind's 
 tablet; and these mysterious chambers 
 abutted on the road, and shut it out from 
 the windows that opened on to the terrace 
 that was formed by the flat roof which 
 covered them, so that from the interior.
 
 102 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the Park looked like pleasure-grounds 
 attached to the house itself. 
 
 It is in one of these rooms that Lord 
 Montalban and his daughter are seated at 
 the open windows ; each employed in 
 watching the moving figures that are out 
 upon the Park, and are crossing it in all 
 directions. The scene is constant and 
 never- varying in that particular spot ; 
 save when a regiment of soldiers is 
 brought out there to drill, and then a 
 temporary ' change is produced. The 
 carriage drive between the trees and the 
 Park makes the scene animated and inter- 
 esting, for it is ever jurying, although it 
 is the same for ever in all its leading 
 features. Lord Montalban is lounging in 
 the window at one end of the room, and 
 his daughter is seated at the window at 
 the other end : there are four windows in 
 the room, leading on to the terrace that 
 abuts upon the public way. The two are
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 103 
 
 gazing listlessly upon the scene tlie Park 
 presents; they are musing upon very 
 widely different subjects, however. Per- 
 haps, if Lord Montalban had been asked 
 on the moment to declare what he was 
 thinking about, he would have found it diffi- 
 cult to answer, or if he did at once answer, 
 might do so inaccurately. His thoughts 
 were roving and changing and revolving 
 as it were around a centre, which would 
 be found but ill defined in his own brain, 
 if he were to concentrate his mind upon 
 its elucidation. He was thinking of Abel 
 Barnes and Marl Baskerville — at least, 
 they were the staple of his thoughts ; and 
 the idea had suggested itself to his mind, 
 that if he were to witness the trial of the 
 pugilist it would produce a new sen- 
 sation, which it would be worth while 
 to seek, and so he had resolved that he 
 would be present on the interesting occa- 
 sion.
 
 104 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Miss Montalban's thoughts were not so 
 wandering as were those of her father, 
 and were far more concentrated. They 
 were stronger, too, in their effects, as 
 evinced by the varying expression of the 
 features which an observer might have 
 detected. As she gazed hiziiy out upon 
 the Park and its moving scenes, she was 
 mentally amusing herself — or deluding 
 herself, perhaps, would be the more 
 accurate expression — in drawing two por- 
 traits, and they were so like each other 
 that, as they came vividly upon her mind, 
 fresh from the pencil of her fancy, she 
 would contract her brow, and bite her 
 lips, and frown. If it had been possible 
 to photograph her thoughts, or the 
 pictures that her thoughts produced, the 
 result would have been a pleasing scene, 
 albeit the effect upon Miss Montalban, as- 
 we have observed, was that of a clouded 
 brow, and a general expression on lier
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 105 
 
 face which sometimes amounted very 
 nearly to agitation. 
 
 The scene that was in reality before 
 her in the Park seemed to partake in her 
 eyes of the character of a mental dis- 
 solving view, for her thoughts carried her 
 away to a spot by the cover side, and 
 miles away from any town; and she 
 would curl her lip in scorn, as at that 
 cover side she, with her mind's eye, ob- 
 served an arrival in that glittering gather- 
 ing — ^the arrival of one who was so like 
 herself, in figure, in face, and in attire, 
 as to look like her second self. In her 
 fancy she hears a ringing laugh, that 
 with its joyousness has a sound of 
 mockery, which is, or seems to be, ad- 
 dressed entirely to the imaginative lis- 
 tener, and it is then especially that her 
 eye dilates, and her lip curls, and there 
 is a slight heaving of the bosom, which 
 ordinary respiration does not necessitate
 
 106 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 or produce. For a moment she blurs the 
 picture out, b}^ flinging, with more than 
 necessary energy, her long curls over her 
 shoulders, and by changing her position 
 as she sits; but still, as her eyes again 
 sweep the scene that is really before her 
 in the Park, her thoughts revert to her 
 mental photograph, and the cover side is 
 vividly before her again, and the laugh 
 rings out again from that form that looks 
 like her other self; and that imaginary 
 laugh is the more galling now, as the 
 mental photograph shows other figures — 
 figures attired in the scarlet uniform that 
 the fashion of the chase demands, and all 
 grouped round her other self, and evi- 
 dently charmed by it. 
 
 Fancy is indeed inexplicable, and in 
 the case of Miss Montalban particularly 
 so. What is the feeling that curls that 
 lip, and fires that eye, and knits that 
 brow, and throws a shade upon all that
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 107 
 
 countenance ? Is it jealousy ? Is it 
 pride ? Is it offended vanity ? It may 
 be all those feelings commingled, and 
 tinged with scorn, which almost invari- 
 ably accompanies them in that strange 
 anomaly, the human heart. 
 
 Miss Montalban rubs her eyes, but she 
 cannot brush away that picture that her 
 thought has uncontrollably produced, and 
 through the real scene that is before her 
 in the Park she still gazes upon it. 
 
 But both her own reverie and that of 
 Lord Montalban were broken and dis- 
 persed by an announcement which 
 heralded the appearance, in a few mo- 
 ments, of a gentleman who was proclaimed 
 as the Marquis of Milltown. He was a 
 young man only just of age, but he was 
 a conspicuous member of the high life of 
 London. He was acknowledged to be 
 the most faultless dresser in the whole 
 world of fashion ; and yet he did not lead
 
 108 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the fashions, he only followed them — con- 
 spicuously, it is true ; but he illustrated, he 
 did not create. He had never attempted 
 anything like a strain upon his intellect, 
 which from his youth upwards had always 
 been delicate, not to say ailing, and 
 which, therefore, had always been treated 
 tenderly; and so anything like mental 
 exertion had been studiously guarded 
 against. The study, however, of his per- 
 sonal appearance had appeared to be very 
 congenial to his mental organization. It 
 was a matter to the development of which 
 it had been discovered he could devote 
 his undivided soul, without any great 
 strain or tax upon his genius. He was 
 an ^animated illustration of the fashion 
 which came by the last post from Paris, 
 and he was as well known in the haunts 
 of fashion as that mighty figure which 
 obligingly points the way that we should 
 go down Constitution Hill.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 109 
 
 It is ever thus. While the brilliant 
 gadfly, flitting athwart the gay parterre, 
 is being observed by admiring eyes, the 
 eagle that is soaring into the skies is 
 unperceived. 
 
 The Marquis of Milltown was the 
 eldest son of the duke who was the noble 
 kinsman of Viscount Montalban, and his 
 portrait was conspicuous in photographers' 
 glass cases, like the brightest page in the 
 book of fashions. He believed that in 
 his appearance he was possessed of irre- 
 sistible power over the female heart, and 
 this feeling had led him into utter in- 
 difference upon the subject. He was self- 
 glorified in the belief that he possessed 
 the fascinating power; he had only to 
 use it when it was wanted to minister to 
 his desires. It is true that his intimacy 
 with Miss Montalban liad somewhat 
 shaken this delightful belief, and he had 
 once or twice been verv near to the con-
 
 110 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 elusion in liis own mind that she was a 
 peculiar girl ; and if that impression had 
 become a conviction in his mind, perhaps 
 he would not have been in error. 
 
 Miss Montalban ivas a peculiar girl. 
 She had strong passions, which w^ere 
 easily roused. She had never known re- 
 straint ; she had never entertained a 
 desire that she had not gratified ; and it 
 is not surprising, therefore, that amongst 
 other failings she should be a little self- 
 willed. She had from a child evinced a 
 strong predilection for horses, and she 
 had taken quite as much interest in lier 
 father's career on the turf as he had him- 
 self; and when the stud was broken up, 
 she shut herself in her room, and cried 
 with vexation. It was the first trouble 
 she had ever experienced, and she felt it 
 sharply. She, however, speedily found 
 relief, for she could indulge her predilec- 
 tion by w^atching the records of turf
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. Ill 
 
 transactions, which she did studiously, 
 and she speedily became an adept in the 
 calculation of odds ; indeed, she became 
 attached to the study of mathematics, 
 and she took especial delight in instruct- 
 ing her father how to make his book 
 mathematically. If, therefore, the Mar- 
 quis of Milltown had succeeded finally in 
 arriving at the conclusion that Miss 
 Montalban was a peculiar girl, his con- 
 clusion could have been scarcely con- 
 sidered an erroneous one. 
 
 The young marquis entered the room 
 in which Lord Montalban and his 
 daughter were seated, and he moved 
 across it like an elegant portrait that had 
 stepped out of its frame, or, to use the more 
 homely simile, he looked as though he had 
 walked out of a bandbox that had just 
 been sent home from the man-milliner's. 
 The patent leather of his boots was bril- 
 liancy burnished ; his trousers might
 
 112 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 have been those of a statue, they looked 
 so like carved work ; his waistcoat was 
 quite plain, but no hand but that of 
 an artist could have produced it ; and 
 his surtout seemed to be a part of his 
 figure, which was symmetrical, and all 
 that could possibly be desired for outward 
 show. His beard and moustache, both 
 profuse, had evidently been cultivated 
 and nourished with peculiar care and 
 skill ; and both were rich, and flowing, 
 and soft, for they had never been ren- 
 dered bristly by the agency of the bar- 
 barous razor. His hair was thick and 
 wavy, and every young lady who knew 
 him intimately, or by sight only, acknow- 
 ledged that he was liandsome. And so 
 he was ; there could be no doubt of it. 
 
 The marquis, advancing to Lord Mon- 
 talban, said, ** Well, how d'ye do ?" not in 
 a lackadaisical tone, not in a mincing, cer- 
 tainly not in a hearty tone, but in a mild.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 113 
 
 beaming way, in which there was no 
 energy, or anything like it, but which 
 (;ombined the free and easy with the 
 inane. And then, turning to Miss Mon- 
 talban, he simpered, "How d'ye do?" as 
 he held out his gloved fingers to shake 
 hands. And his was a very peculiar 
 shake of the hand. He managed to 
 throw into his fawn-coloured kid glove a 
 kind of fervour, which was a combination 
 of the lover s gentle squeeze, the friend's 
 sympathetic pressure of the palm, and 
 the rapid action of the postman's double 
 knock. 
 
 Miss Montalban had risen when the 
 Marquis of Milltown entered, and she 
 received him with a smile which seemed 
 to melt into an undefined frown, that 
 rather appeared to throw a shade over her 
 face than to be a part of it. The young 
 Marquis had never professed any love for 
 her, and yet she knew — she instinctively 
 
 VOL. I. 8
 
 114 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 felt that the young man had some senti- 
 ment of the kind, a feeling unknown 
 directly to himself, but which, if she had 
 chosen, she might have fashioned to any 
 purpose she pleased. She had very little 
 art about her at present, however. She 
 had strength of purpose and of will, ^and 
 she had never been thwarted in any- 
 thing. She would not have understood 
 it, therefore, if anybody had made a 
 suggestion to her on the subject of the 
 worldly advantage of winning a marquis. 
 The Marquis of Milltown was in her eyes 
 an empty nothing, a dressed-up doll, a 
 marionette, anything Avithout a soul ; 
 although he had one solitary redeeming 
 quality in her eyes — he could ride well ; 
 but then, again, this solitary redeeming 
 point was almost lost in the anxiety 
 which he invariably displayed in the field 
 to avoid all obstacles of danger, especially 
 when the ground was muddy, lest an
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 115 
 
 accident miglit spoil the appearance of 
 his coat. 
 
 " I say, Montalban," he said, " I've 
 just come across the Park, and they tell 
 me they've made ' Peeping Tom,' first 
 favourite for the Goodwood." 
 
 "What, Drakengull's horse?" exclaimed 
 Miss Montalban, with much animation. 
 
 "Ya-a-s, Drakengull's, who has been 
 so devilish unlucky with all his nags." 
 
 " You mean the horse that ran at 
 Epsom last year, and was knocked over 
 the chains?" exclaimed Miss Montalban, 
 eagerly. 
 
 " That's the one. They changed his 
 name. You know he was called the 
 Top' then. Devilish bad name for a 
 horse, I think ;" and the Marquis of Mill- 
 town appeared rather languid after the 
 effort involved in giving a definite opinion 
 of that strength. 
 
 " Papa, you recollect that I said at the 
 
 S— 2
 
 IIG THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 time, that was the best made horse I had 
 ever seen in my life. If your stud had 
 not been broken np" — and she said this 
 with something like a sigh, — " we would 
 have added him to it." 
 
 " What ! did you fancy him so much?" 
 said the Marquis of MilltoAvn, with a 
 pleased smile. 
 
 '' It's my belief that he would have 
 won then but for that accident; and as 
 he has been so long laid up in lavender, I 
 don't wonder that they make him first 
 favourite for the Groodwood cup. Papa, 
 we shall go, of course ?" 
 
 " Of course, my dear. I've engaged 
 myself to Templebloke, whose seat is in 
 the neighbourhood." 
 
 '' Oh, then we shall meet on the lawn," 
 said the Marquis, in a tone of mild 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 A footman liere handed a card to Lord 
 Montalban, who, glancing at it, said,
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 117 
 
 " Show him up ;" and as the lackey left 
 the room, her father turned to Miss 
 Montalban, and said, " Here's Baskerville, 
 my dear, our commissioner/' 
 
 At the same moment Mr. Baskerville 
 was ushered into the room ; but lie seemed 
 to have become an entirely changed man 
 since the previous day. He walked 
 totteringly, and his hands appeared to 
 tremble as with incipient palsy; but a 
 close observer might have discovered that 
 his eye was as keen, his glance as pene- 
 trating, and his nerves as firm as when 
 he met Abel Barnes in the justice-room at 
 Guildhall. He bowed profoundly to Miss 
 Montalban, who said, — 
 
 " A touch of your old complaint, Mr. 
 Baskerville ?" 
 
 " An old complaint indeed, Miss Mon- 
 talban, and one that will remain with me 
 to the end ;" and he turned and smiled at 
 Lord Montalban.
 
 118 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " Well, Baskerville, liave you done 
 anything in the matter of this poor 
 devil?" inquired Lord Montalban, re- 
 ferring of course to Abel Barnes. 
 
 '' The inquest was held last night, and 
 a verdict of wilful murder returned — upon 
 what grounds I am at a loss to under- 
 stand, and so of course he must be tried. 
 I have seen him this morning, and he 
 has taken a strange fancy into his head, — 
 these ignorant people often do take these 
 strange fancies ; — he has a strong desire 
 to be defended by a young man who was 
 present when the brother-in-law died, and 
 who, it seems, has just been called in 
 Gray's Inn. I tried to persuade him that 
 it was a dangerous thing to entrust such 
 a case to a young and inexperienced man, 
 but he said he had a strange confidence in 
 him, which he hoped I'd humour." 
 
 "Well, as far as that goes, I think 
 one is as good as another, if the young
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 119 
 
 man has a good case," said Lord Mont- 
 alban. 
 
 " It's the good case that generally 
 destroys a young man," said Marl Basker- 
 ville. 
 
 "How do you mean?" Lord Montalban 
 exclaimed, in surprise. 
 
 " It may sound strange to say so, but 
 the sympathies of the court are generally 
 on the side of the bad case. Law is 
 often tortured in favour of the miscreant ; 
 it is never relaxed in the case of the 
 innocent." 
 
 '' Oh, that's cynical !" cried Lord Mon- 
 talban. — "What do you say to that, 
 Milltown ?" 
 
 " Well, I don't know," said the young 
 marquis; "I suppose it's as Mr. Basker- 
 ville says, although, to tell you the trutli, 
 I never troubled myself about the ques- 
 tion." 
 
 " Then you intend to retain the young
 
 120 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 man?" Lord Montalban said to Mr. 
 Baskerville. 
 
 "Well, as your lordship says, perhaps 
 we may as well ; one may be as good as 
 another. But I am going to see the 
 gentleman this evening, and then I shall 
 decide." 
 
 " Very good ; and you must let me 
 know when the trial comes on, as I intend 
 to be present." 
 
 " Your lordship intends to be present?" 
 cried Marl Baskerville, in a tone of great 
 surprise, and for the moment forgetting 
 his decrepitude. 
 
 " Yes. I'll see what perhaps may be 
 the end of him," said Lord Montalban. 
 
 " I'll be sure to let your lordship know," 
 said Baskerville. "Has your lordship 
 anything to communicate this morning ?" 
 
 " I have," broke in Miss Montalban. 
 '' You must go and execute a commission 
 for me."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 121 
 
 " Augusta, my dear !" exclaimed Lord 
 Montalban. 
 
 " Yes, papa. I am determined to try 
 my chance myself upon * Peeping Tom/ 
 for Goodwood. I feel a strong presenti- 
 ment that he will win, and we will be 
 there to see him." 
 
 " She must have her way, I suppose, 
 Baskerville," said Lord Montalban, 
 smiling ; " and of course if she goes that 
 way, I must go too." 
 
 "And I cei-tainly will follow Miss 
 Montalban," said the Marquis of Mill- 
 town. " What better lead could I have ?" 
 and he looked at Augusta Montalban 
 with an inane smile, expecting that she 
 would be delighted with the declaration ; 
 but she exhibited no such feeling, and so 
 the mind of the young lord received the 
 impression that Miss Montalban was a 
 very grand creature, and that she would 
 indeed be a splendid wife for him to
 
 122 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 choose. He felt quite struck with this 
 idea, and therefore he did not attempt to 
 follow up the conversation. 
 
 " And what shall the commission be ?*' 
 inquired Baskerville. 
 
 " Suppose we split five hundred between 
 us, eh, Milltown ?" suggested Lord Mon- 
 talban. 
 
 " I'm perfectly agreeable," replied the 
 marquis. But the idea occurring to 
 his mind that in that expression he 
 was complimenting himself, he said, 
 *' I mean, I'll go the five hundred with 
 you." 
 
 " And what is my proportion to be ?" 
 asked Miss Montalban ; but not waiting 
 for an}'- answer, she added, '' But I wont 
 have any proportion. There must be a 
 separate transaction for myself. So, Bas- 
 kerville, you will invest a hundred pounds 
 for me." 
 
 'Marl Baskerville looked inquiringly at
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 123 
 
 Lord Montalban, Avho shrugged liis 
 shoulders, and said — 
 
 " Oh, you must do it, I suppose." 
 " I will at once have the money put 
 on,'' cried Baskerville, taking up his hat ; 
 " and this evening you shall hear from 
 me respecting it, my Lord."- 
 
 " I'll go with you if you like, Basker- 
 ville. My cab's at the door," said the 
 Marquis of Milltown, who felt that he 
 could not much longer bear the interview, 
 which had opened up a new sensation 
 and impression in his mind. 
 
 " You look quite shaky," he said to 
 Baskerville ; " I'll drive you over." 
 
 "Your lordship is exceedingly obliging." 
 " Oh, there's one thing I should say, 
 you know," observed the young lord, at 
 once destroying the apparent kindness of 
 his offer; "I want to speak to you 
 myself — I do indeed — something very 
 particular." And he twirled his cane
 
 124 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 round with his finger, as a relief to 
 his mind. 
 
 " Good morning, Montalban. I .hope 
 I shall see Miss Augusta in the Eow this 
 afternoon. I haven't seen lier on her 
 new purchase." 
 
 This for a moment seemed to brighten 
 Miss Montalban tow^ards the young 
 marquis, and she exclaimed hastily — 
 
 " Well, I'll be there, on purpose that 
 you may see him." 
 
 The marquis felt quite agitated ; that 
 splendid creature before him, who was so 
 proud and unbending only two minutes 
 before, had at length found out what all 
 the world besides had known so well — 
 that his appearance was irresistible. 
 
 Hasten him away, Marl Baskerville, or 
 he will be rooted speechless to the spot 
 for at least twenty minutes longer, and it 
 is quite clear that Miss Montalban would 
 not like that. Baskerville had no such
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 125 
 
 impelling motive, but he did tak^ the 
 marquis away, and in a few minutes 
 afterwards this glass of fashion and mould 
 of form ' was drivino^ his mao^nificent 
 stepper across the Park, with Baskerville 
 seated in the cab beside him.
 
 126 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 SILVESTER LAifGDALE's FIRST BRIEF. 
 
 Silvester Langdale lias been reading 
 tlie report of the inquest upon the man 
 who was killed in the house in which 
 Nicholas Darvill's usher had died, and he 
 is flushed with something like indignation 
 at the verdict which has been returned by 
 the coroner's jury. 
 
 " Wilful murder !" he cries to himself; 
 *' why, how could the dolts have arrived 
 at such a conclusion upon such evidence ? 
 Surely it will require but small skill or 
 argument on the trial to relieve the man 
 of such a charge."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 127 
 
 And then he rises, and paces the room 
 hurriedly. '' That wretched chamber and 
 its emaciated tenant seem to haunt me," 
 lie soliloquizes ; " and to think that such 
 a tragedy as this should have followed 
 poor Margale's death ! That stalwart 
 pugilist, too ; I am sure he is to be pitied. 
 There was nothing vicious in his coun- 
 tenance, as it appeared to me in the dim 
 light of that fearful room ; and he acted 
 upon the instincts of a man in repelling 
 the heartlessness of the wretch whose 
 death he has caused. And that poor boy, 
 so intelligent, so poorly clad, and yet 
 evidently so carefully tended; and then 
 poor Margale's sister. The whole scene 
 appears to be the vivid remembrance of 
 some distempered dream ; but, alas ! it is 
 no dream, for it is an awful reality. Wliat 
 can I do for them ? Nothing. If I 
 visited them, I could merely offer them — 
 words. ^Nothing more. And of what
 
 128 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 value would words be to people in sucli a 
 situation as theirs ?" 
 
 There is often great value in mere 
 words. " A soft answer turneth away 
 wrath ;" and words have sometimes a 
 more potent influence upon the human 
 mind than more substantial gifts. Words 
 spoken kindly are a heavenly solace to 
 the broken spirit ; words of sympathy 
 and goodness have the power often of 
 lifting from the heart the pall that over- 
 whelming trouble has thrown over it ; 
 and words are alone the balm that human 
 aid can give wlien the spirit from its 
 earthly penthouse is about to seek the 
 awful mystery of the " undiscovered 
 bourne." 
 
 Yes : and when Silvester Langdale, 
 in his implied regret, soliloquized that if 
 he visited the family of Abel Barnes he 
 could only offer them words, he was un- 
 consciously enunciating that which might
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 129 
 
 be the greatest boon that he could offer — 
 a boon to them — a boon to him — a boon, 
 indeed, that should materially affect the 
 future lives of all of them. 
 
 " Trial by jury," he soliloquized still, 
 " is one of the grandest of our grand old 
 institutions : but it becomes blurred and 
 stained by verdicts such as these." 
 
 And then he paused, and pondered on 
 the subject of his thoughts. 
 
 " I'll write an indignant protest to the 
 editor," he exclaimed, as he took the 
 newspaper up again. And then he hesi- 
 tated. " No," at length he said, '' the 
 press is sure to take up a case like this. 
 They cannot pass it over." 
 
 Silvester Langdale has just arrived at 
 this conclusion when there is a knock at 
 his door. It is sharp, sudden, and clear ; 
 and, in the agitation that he feels, for the 
 moment it startles him. There could be 
 no mistake. The knock was at his own 
 
 VOL. I. 9
 
 130 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 door, and with a strange kind of hesita- 
 tion he opened the door to see who had 
 knocked thereat. He who had knocked 
 was a tall man, with a bushy beard and 
 moustache ; and as Silvester Langdale 
 opened the door the person stepped into 
 the chamber, and said he presumed he had 
 the honour of addressing Mr. Langdale. 
 
 Silvester bowed, and requested his un- 
 known visitor to be seated. 
 
 The visitor took the chair that was 
 placed for him, and said — 
 
 " We are unacquainted with each other, 
 Mr. Langdale, but it is possible that we 
 may hereafter be thrown much together. 
 You have only just been called, I think, 
 Mr. Langdale ?" 
 
 " Only in the last term," replied Sil- 
 vester, bowing. 
 
 " Yes, in the last term, I know. Then 
 of course your practice has not been ex- 
 tensive as yet ?" said his visitor, smiling.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 131 
 
 Silvester Laiigdale said he had not 
 even appeared in court yet ; and he smiled 
 too. 
 
 " Your present position is very different 
 from mine/* said the stranger, " for I 
 have had a very extensive practice." 
 
 " Are you at the bar, then ?" eagerly 
 asked Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " No, I am not, but my profession is 
 the law." 
 
 Silvester Langdale bowed, and said, 
 '' Oh, indeed." 
 
 '* My name is Marl Baskerville," 
 
 Again Silvester Langdale bowed, with 
 an expression on his countenance that 
 plainly indicated that he was not ac- 
 quainted with his visitor. 
 
 " You do not know me," said Mr. 
 Baskerville. " You have not been much 
 in London, I presume ?" 
 
 "No, indeed, I have not," said Lang- 
 dale, with a smile which may be said to 
 
 9—^
 
 132 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 have been apologetic of his want of ex- 
 perience of London. 
 
 "No, or I have no doubt you would 
 have recog-nised the name of Marl Basker- 
 ville," said that gentleman. "I have 
 been connected with the law for more 
 than thirty years, Mr. Langdale ; and I 
 have seen young men like you rise into 
 eminence, and assisted them thereto ; I 
 have seen men attain that eminence, and I 
 have seen them topple down headlong from 
 it, never to reach it again." 
 
 As Mr. Baskerville did not add tliat he 
 had also assisted at this latter performance, 
 the matter must therefore be supposed to 
 be in doubt. 
 
 " But my practice has not been wholly 
 in the law, although it has all tended 
 thereto. I am come," Mr. Baskerville 
 added, rather abruptly, " to place your 
 foot, Mr. Langdale, on the first round of 
 the ladder of your profession."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 133 
 
 Silvester Langclale bowed quite pro- 
 foundly this time, and his heart fluttered, 
 for he was in the presence of that sacred 
 personage, the first client. It is almost 
 unnecessary to add that he felt slightly 
 nervous. 
 
 " You are acquainted with a person of 
 the name of Barnes?" said Mr. Baskerville. 
 
 "Barnes! Barnes!" repeated Silvester 
 Langdale, and thinking for a moment. 
 " No, I am not acquainted with any one 
 of that name." 
 
 " Strange !" said Mr. Baskerville. " I 
 cannot have made any mistake." 
 
 Silvester Langdale fervently hoped not, 
 but he did not say anything. 
 
 "Abel Barnes, the pugilist, I mean," 
 said Mr. Baskerville. 
 
 "Oh," exclaimed Silvester Langdale, 
 recollecting who the person referred to 
 was, " the unfortunate man who has been 
 •committed for murder."
 
 134 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " The same," said Mr. Baskerville. 
 
 " I did not recollect liis name. In fact,. 
 I did not know it," said Silvester Lang- 
 dale, "althongli I have but just read the 
 report." 
 
 " You do not know him, then ?" 
 
 " I had never heard of him until the- 
 night before last, when I was summoned 
 to a scene in the wretched dwelling in 
 which he resided, which I shall never for- 
 get — never." 
 
 " Yes, I have heard it all from Barnes 
 himself," said Mr. Baskerville. " It must 
 have been a terrible scene." 
 
 " It was a scene that appears to have 
 burnt itself into my memory. Poor Mar- 
 gale." 
 
 *' He was with you at school, I under- 
 stand ?" said Mr. Baskerville. 
 
 " He was an usher, a fellow-usher with 
 me in the country." 
 
 '' Well, he is gone," said Mr. Basker-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 135 
 
 ville, " and it is of the living that I have 
 to speak now. You seem to have made a 
 wonderful impression upon Abel Barnes 
 the pugilist." 
 
 " That is strange. I do not think that 
 I exchanged a word with him," said Lang- 
 dale, in a tone of surprise. 
 
 "These men are sometimes very im- 
 pressionable," Mr. Baskerville observed. 
 " I have seen a great deal of them ; I have 
 been thrown much amongst them. In 
 fact, Mr. Langdale, I am the chief adviser 
 of the fraternity." 
 
 And Mr. Baskerville smiled as he said 
 this. Silvester Lang^dale smiled too, of 
 course, but he did not know whether he 
 ought to feel gratified at the communica- 
 tion which Mr. Baskerville had made to 
 him with regard to his connections. 
 
 "I suppose," continued Mr. Baskerville, 
 " that his brother-in-law must have talked 
 to Barnes about you, Mr. Langdale, and
 
 136 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 SO he liad become prepossessed in your 
 favour before he saw you." 
 
 " May I be allowed to ask to what this 
 tends ?" Silvester Langdale modestly in- 
 quired. 
 
 " I should have thought you might have 
 guessed, Mr. Langdale," said Baskerville ; 
 — and yet I don't know," he added, rather 
 to himself than to Langdale. " Ko, I 
 don't know how you should. — AVell then, 
 Mr. Langdale," he continued, rather 
 rapidly, " you have observed that Barnes 
 has been committed for wilful murder." 
 
 "A preposterous charge!" Silvester 
 Langdale observed, with something like a 
 flush of indignation. 
 
 "Very likely," Mr. Baskerville said, 
 very calmly, " but the verdict has been 
 returned, the indictment will be preferred, 
 and Abel Barnes will be arraigned. He 
 must, therefore, be defended." 
 
 Is Silvester Langdale agitated ? He is.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 137 
 
 Anybody, with far less penetration than 
 Mr. Baskerville possessed, would observe 
 it. He breathes quickly, and his eyes 
 glisten, and there is a visible, or almost 
 audible, palpitation of the heart. 
 
 " I think you have a faint glimmering of 
 the object of my visit, Mr. Langdale," ob- 
 servesMr. Baskerville, withapecuHar smile. 
 
 " I think I have,'' Silvester Langdale 
 says, but in a tone that is quite faint. 
 
 "Abel Barnes has expressed a strong 
 desire that you, Mr. Langdale, should 
 defend him," says Mr. Baskerville, with 
 something like precipitation. 
 
 Silvester Langdale clutches the back of 
 the chair that is near to where he is 
 standing. The golden dream that has for 
 three years been a glory to his life is 
 opening in reality before him. It is not 
 strange that he should be agitated. 
 
 " Do you think you will be equal to the 
 task ?" Mr. Baskerville inquires.
 
 138 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 The question seems to rouse Silvester 
 Langdale into eners^y, for he exclaims — 
 
 " I have been reading that report of the 
 inquest, Mr. Baskerville, and if good for- 
 tune had placed my opening case in my 
 new profession in my own choice, it is the 
 one I would have chosen ; for it is one in 
 which the greatest of our institutions has 
 been tarnished. It is a libel upon it that 
 I could have desired to repel. Wilful 
 murder ! — the verdict is a mockery." 
 
 " Your theme is a good one," remarked 
 Mr. Baskerville, with the same coolness 
 as before ; " but you must not be too im- 
 pulsive, or rather, perhaps, I should say, 
 you must not be too confident. You 
 cannot, probably, be too impulsive at the 
 bar. Impulse goes a great way with 
 juries, and so, indeed, does confidence, of 
 a sort ;" and Mr. Baskerville smiled sig- 
 nificantly. "EecoUect," he continued, 
 " that you still have a jury to deal with."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 139 
 
 " But I cannot believe that another 
 such a jury can be found in the same 
 month." 
 
 "Oh, entertain no such hope as that, 
 Mr. Langdale. Why, in the interest of 
 Abel Barnes himself I should not mind 
 submitting his case in trial to the very 
 same jury who have returned the pre- 
 posterous verdict, as you have very pro- 
 perly designated it." 
 
 "Indeed!" exclaimed Silvester Lang- 
 dale. 
 
 " You forget that this was a coroner's 
 jury; there was no defence, no cross- 
 examination, nay, even the accused him- 
 self was not present." 
 
 " True, true ; that did not strike me," 
 said Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " Indeed, Mr. Langdale, a young gentle- 
 man in your position, and with your 
 prospects, might pray to have the same 
 jury; for fancy the renown that you
 
 140 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 would gain by inducing the same jur}' to 
 acquit the man upon his trial." 
 
 " Certainly that would be a triumph for 
 the advocate," said Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " AVell, then, although you Avill not 
 have the same jury, that is, the same 
 persons, you will probably have precisely 
 the same class of men ; for a British jury 
 would seem to be a distinctive class, — just 
 as your county justices are," said ^h\ 
 Baskerville. 
 
 " You mean the juries of our criminal 
 courts." 
 
 " Yes, common juries, as they are 
 called. And you think that Abel Barnes 
 may entrust his defence to your hands, 
 jNIr. Langdale?" 
 
 " I have already said that such a case 
 is that for which my ambition could have 
 prayed," said Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " Very good. Then to-morrow I will 
 obtain the depositions, and in the course
 
 Tin: MAN IN CHAINS. 141 
 
 of the next day, or the day after, I will 
 send you your brief, Mr. Langdale." 
 
 The intimation thrills through the 
 very heart of Silvester Langdale. The 
 dream of young ambition is very alluring. 
 
 " And let me tell you, Mr. Langdale, 
 that the ordeal that you will have to go 
 through will be a trying one. You will 
 be watched by cynically critical eyes. I 
 believe, however, that you will be able to 
 strike them powerless. They will be 
 close around you ; they will be in front 
 of you, and they will be on each side of 
 you. Their effect depends upon yourself. 
 And you will have other eyes to watch 
 you. The aristocracy of birth will be 
 there, above you ; and the judicial bench 
 will be in judgment upon you before the 
 bar, as well as uj)on those behind it. 
 Abel Barnes's predilection may be but 
 the agent through whose instrumentality 
 inexplicable fortune works. From what
 
 142 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 I have seen of you, I believe it is, and 
 I shall be glad to congratulate you 
 upon it." 
 
 " Sir, I scarcely know how to thank 
 you," said Silvester Langdale, warmly. 
 
 " Why should you thank me, Mr. 
 Langdale ?" said Marl Baskerville, rising 
 from his seat and taking up his hat. " I 
 am merely an agent. I have discharged 
 a mission. You have nothing to thank 
 me for, because I have no feeling in the 
 matter, although — and, beHeve me, I 
 never flatter any one, Mr. Langdale — I 
 freely acknowledge that I can well under- 
 stand Abel Barnes's prepossession. ISlOy 
 I have no feeling in the matter. My 
 course of life, my profession, those with 
 whom I have for so many years been 
 thrown in contact, have thrust out from 
 my heaii what the world understands as 
 feeling. I have but one feeling there, 
 and tliat is my own, and is not that which
 
 % THE MAN IN CHAINS. 143 
 
 the world understands by the terms. 
 Good day, Mr. Langdale. I will send 
 you your brief, and 1 shall probably see 
 you again frequently." 
 
 And the next minute Marl Baskerville 
 was descending the staircase. 
 
 Silvester Langdale stands in the centre 
 of the chamber for a few moments, almost 
 bewildered. The interview that he has 
 just had with Marl Baskerville was so 
 unexpected, the proposition he had made 
 was so far beyond even the sanguine 
 hope which he had cherished upon enter- 
 ing the portals of his new profession, that 
 it can be no matter for wonder that he is 
 somewhat scared. The buoyant ambition 
 of an ardent aspirant, however, very 
 speedily dispels even the semblance of 
 such a feeling, and so Langdale experiences 
 a kind of bounding sensation. It seems 
 as though it would be a relief to take a 
 spring into the air, and he feels himself
 
 144 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 irresistibly drawing himself up to liis full 
 height. And then, again, he experiences 
 a momentary depression. For, wholly 
 unbidden, the scene of the death of his 
 fellow-usher at Nicholas Darvill's is 
 vividly presented to his mind, and this 
 draws audible words from his lips : — 
 
 *' I little dreamt, good fellow," he 
 soliloquizes aloud, " that your terrible 
 last scene would be the opening of my 
 career. And I am at once almost with- 
 out a guide, save my own strong, hearty 
 purpose and self-faith, to show myself 
 before the world, and dare the ordeal of 
 success or failure. Well, I am ready for 
 the ordeal. I am young, too young 
 perhaps, for such a responsibility ; and 
 yet why ? Pitt was prime minister of 
 England at three-and-twenty. Yes, 3'es ! 
 I have courage, I have faith, I have hope, 
 and I have strength of purpose, as I 
 think." And he seemed to knit himself
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 145 
 
 together as lie cried, in a joyous tone, 
 *' And may I not exclaim, as Glo'ster did, — 
 
 " Why now my golden dream is out, 
 Ambition, like an early friend, throws back 
 My curtains, to tell me what I dreamt was true !" 
 
 And Silvester Langdale paced up and 
 down the room rapidly. 
 
 VOL. I. 10
 
 146 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 A BOUDOIR NEAR TO KENSINGTON GARDENS. 
 
 Marl Baskerville proceeded from Sil- 
 vester Langdale's chambers in Grray's Inn 
 to bis own residence, wbicb was situated 
 in Spring Grardens. It was an unpretend- 
 ing-looking bouse, but its situation was 
 most convenient for Marl Baskerville's 
 operations. It was on the confines of 
 tbe aristocratic west and tbe plebeian east 
 of tbe migbty metropolis. It was a point 
 from wbicb Marl Baskerville could radiate, 
 as it were. Tbe metropolis was as a 
 spider's web, and be was its spider, in its 
 solitary watcbfulness ; for be was alone 
 in tbe world, and bad been for twenty
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 147 
 
 years past, during wliicli time his character 
 had become consolidated, as it were, into 
 inflexibihty. The interior aspect of his 
 abode was in keeping with his course of 
 Hfe and with his character. It was 
 gloomy and dim, and seemed to be relieved 
 by no colours in its contents. Everything 
 was dark and dismal, and his office was 
 the most dismal room in the house. It 
 was situated in the rear of the premises, 
 and looked upon the blackened wall of 
 the back part of the Admiralty. Dull, 
 and dismal, and dingy as it looked, it yet 
 contained that which was the representa- 
 tive of much wealth. There was a great 
 iron safe in one corner, so thick and mas- 
 sive that you could feel its great weight 
 as you looked at it. Its hinges were 
 thick bolts of iron, and its key might, 
 from its appearance, have dangled from 
 the leathern jerkin of some grim gaoler in 
 mediaeval times, and have become him and 
 
 10-^:1
 
 148 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 liis office well. And when the doors of 
 that great safe were opened, they appeared 
 to grind upon their hinges, and to evince 
 a determination onl}^ to open slowly. 
 And when they were shut to again they 
 seemed to close crushingly, and with a 
 resolve not to re -open. And such an 
 adjunct to his office was very necessary 
 for Marl Baskerville to possess, for the 
 nature of the profession which he followed 
 required that he should have hank-notes 
 at hand ; and those notes were stored in 
 that great safe, together with his boxes, 
 in which were other notes, for which the 
 engraved ones were exchanged. 
 
 Marl Baskerville was a money-lender as 
 well as a lawyer, and he practised much 
 more as the one than as the other. His 
 name was as well known at Tattersall's 
 as was that of the first favourite for the 
 next Derby, but it was not used so freely. 
 Men shouted out the name of the Derby
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 149 
 
 favourite just about that briglit time 
 when the Derby may be said to be in 
 everybody's mouth, but they only whis- 
 pered Marl Baskerville's name. Perhajos 
 they did not care even to do that, because 
 at such a time it was more than dangerous 
 for a member of the Eooms to be sus- 
 pected of being short of m.oney, and the 
 mention of Marl Baskerville's name might 
 create such a suspicion, and lead to the 
 inference that the person mentioning it 
 had been over-laying his " book." 
 
 In Marl Baskerville's safe were the 
 autographs of those who were high and 
 mighty in the land — autographs, how- 
 ever, which he had no desire to preserve ; 
 he rather looked hopefully to the time 
 when he should get rid of them, and ex- 
 change them for others. Amongst his 
 other callings. Marl Baskerville was what 
 is known as a turf commissioner, that is, 
 a person who invests upon the chances of
 
 150 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 a horse those large sums of money that we 
 see quoted daily in the papers as a branch 
 of the commercial transactions of the 
 nation. It is an office that requires much 
 shrewdness, great care, and no liiile ^nesse, 
 as we shall probably see as we become 
 better acquainted with Marl Baskerville 
 and his professional pursuits. 
 
 Marl Baskerville proceeded, as w^e have 
 said, from the chambers of Silvester Lang- 
 dale to his own residence in Spring 
 Gardens, but he did not remain there 
 long. He went at once into his office, 
 and found several letters lying on his desk. 
 There was one, however, that seemed to 
 attract his immediate attention. It was a 
 small, three-cornered note, with a super- 
 scription in a lady's handwriting. He 
 at once opened it, read its contents, 
 smiled, and put the note in his pocket. 
 He then opened the other letters, and, 
 having read them, unlocked a drawer in
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 151 
 
 his library table, and placed them therein, 
 and then took up his hat and went out 
 again. At the end of the street he hailed 
 a cab, and directed the driver to convey 
 him to Kensington. 
 
 The particular spot to which the cab- 
 man was directed to drive was in a street 
 not far from the Grate. It did not contain 
 many houses, but they were nearly all 
 detached, and were enclosed in their own 
 gardens. At the door of one of these the 
 cab stopped, and Marl Baskerville was at 
 once admitted to the lady of the house. 
 He was shown into a spacious room that 
 was fitted up with every appliance of luxury 
 that the ingenuity of man, or the skill of 
 accomplished artificers, could suggest. 
 The room was a delightful specimen of 
 light and elegant luxury. Its furniture — 
 that furniture which the upholsterer and 
 the cabinet-maker supply — was of the 
 most costly description. The curtains to
 
 152 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the windows were of embossed amber 
 satin ; the chairs and sofas were covered 
 with a corresponding material and fashion ; 
 the carpet felt to the tread as soft and 
 yielding and as springy as moss. Small 
 tables were distributed about the room, 
 covered with glittering elegances. The 
 mantel-shelf bore an immense ormolu 
 clock, with bronze figures a foot high, 
 representing a ilight of angels. Depend- 
 ing from the centre of the room was a 
 massive chandelier, with long crj^stal 
 pendants, each glittering in the sunshine 
 with its prismatic colours. One end of 
 the room opened into an extensive con- 
 servatory, in which were arranged choice 
 flowers, native and exotic, blooming 
 brilliantly; and in the centre of the 
 whole was an artificial cascade, which 
 plashed down over pieces of rock, and 
 amongst ferns and mosses. 
 
 The moment Marl Easkerville was
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. ] 53 
 
 announced, a lady who was reclining on 
 one of the artistic sofas that adorned the 
 room, and reading, sprang to her feet, and 
 threw the book she was perusing impetu- 
 ously from her, utterly regardless of its 
 course, for it struck against one of the 
 small tables that we have referred to, 
 shivering into atoms a beautiful ornament 
 that stood beneath a glass shade. The 
 accident, however, did not appear to give 
 the lady the least concern, for she bounded 
 towards Marl Baskerville, and exclaimed 
 as she did so, — 
 
 " Well, you are a dear, good man, to 
 come so quickly to my call." 
 
 She was a tall, commanding, handsome 
 girl, of about nineteen years of age. She 
 had large, brilHant blue eyes, and her 
 forehead was high and expansive. Her 
 hair was a rich auburn, and waved in roll- 
 ins: rinoclets down to her waist. She had 
 a mouth that seemed to speak even when
 
 154 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 she was silent. The lips were almost im- 
 perceptibly apart, and this seemed to stamp 
 a perpetual smile upon her countenance. 
 Her cheeks Avere full, but they were not 
 what is termed plump, and they exhibited 
 that undefinable pink which blends with 
 the edges of the tea-scented rose. Her 
 countenance was full of animation, her 
 eyes sparkled with joyousness, and her 
 carriage would have been worthy of that 
 Egyptian queen for whose love Mark 
 Antony considered all the world well lost. 
 
 '' You are a dear, good man, to come so 
 quickly to my call," she cried, as she took 
 Marl Baskerville's hat from his hand, and 
 placed it on a small inlaid table. " Now 
 sit down ; I want to talk to you seriously." 
 
 Marl Baskerville smiled expressively. 
 
 " Oh yes, I do," she said, " more 
 seriously than usual." 
 
 " The same theme as usual ?" Marl 
 Baskerville inquired.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 155 
 
 " Oh, of course ; I want money, you 
 know, if that is what you mean ;" and 
 the young lady laughed. It was a ring- 
 ing, joyous, hearty laugh. 
 
 MarlBaskerville shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Now, for goodness' sake, don't per- 
 form those weirdish shrugs. They would 
 do for the evil genius in a pantomime, 
 but not for you, Baskerville, not for you." 
 
 Marl Baskerville elevated his eyebrows, 
 and said, — 
 
 " Some people perhaps think that I am 
 an evil genius." 
 
 " Well, let them think it ; what do you 
 care ? I am sure you are not the man to 
 care anything about what anybody thinks. 
 In fact, you have as little to care about as 
 I have;" and she laughed out merrily 
 again. 
 
 Marl Baskerville cast a hurried glance 
 round the room, and echoed her last words 
 to himself, — ''As little to care about as
 
 156 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 she lias !'* What was the rapid current of 
 his thought at that instant, as he repeated 
 those words to himself? 
 
 " But how can you want money?" Marl 
 Baskerville inquired of the beautiful girl 
 who was standing near him. 
 
 " Oh, I know what that question im- 
 plies/' she answ^ered, quickly. " You fancy 
 that the Prince left me w^ith an inex- 
 haustible store. So do people generally, I 
 dare say. It was a substantial sum, un- 
 doubtedly, but it's all gone." 
 
 " All gone !" exclaimed Marl Basker- 
 ville, in unfeigned surprise. 
 
 " Well, all but about a hundred or two, 
 which is about the same thing, you know." 
 
 " You cannot expect such another rich 
 prize. They do not come every year," 
 Marl Baskerville observed, rather ob- 
 scurely. 
 
 The young lady, however, seemed very 
 well to understand him.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 157 
 
 " Perhaps not to the same extent ; but 
 although diamond- covered princes may not 
 be picked up every day, there are fine fish 
 to be caught always. My expectations 
 have always been fulfilled, you know. Did 
 I ever break an engagement with you ? 
 Come now, tell me that," she cried, sud- 
 denly, and with energy. 
 
 Marl Baskerville admitted that she 
 never did. 
 
 " Then why do you hesitate now ?" she 
 inquired, with a toss of her head. 
 
 " Why do you assume that I hesitate ?" 
 
 " Oh, you can't deceive me, you know. 
 I can read a countenance readily enough. 
 When you think that I want to borrow 
 some money, see how the jaw slightly 
 drops" — and with mock seriousness she 
 elongated her own countenance, — "just 
 like that. There is the ghost of a smile, but 
 the smiler almost instantly gives up that 
 ghost, as being unable to support it. Oh,
 
 158 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 I can read the tliouglit that lurks behind 
 that drop of the^ mouth that I refer to. 
 But one word is as good as a thousand — 
 I must have money by to-morrow after- 
 noon." 
 
 "Why is it so pressing?" inquired 
 Marl Baskerville. 
 
 " The Duke of Breakdown s stud is to 
 be sold to-morrow afternoon, and I must 
 have ' Eaglan/ the pick of the lot." 
 
 ^'Oh, that's it, is it?" said Marl Bas- 
 kerville, smiling as before. 
 
 " He is the best horse across country in 
 all England; I know it well, and come 
 what may I will have him. They have 
 put a reserve of eight hundred upon him, 
 and so you must get me twelve hundred 
 by to-morrow." 
 
 " Twelve hundred pounds!" said Marl 
 Baskerville ; *' that is a large sum ;" and 
 he elevated his eyebrows. 
 
 " Now, in the name of plain sailing and
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 159 
 
 straightforward business, don't let us have 
 any of that pantomime. You must do it."^ 
 
 "Then it must be upon a good name/* 
 
 " You shall have it." 
 
 " Whose ?" 
 
 "Milltown's." 
 
 "MiUtown'sl" 
 
 " Ay, Milltown's ;" and she laughed — 
 it was a serious, a convincing laugh, so to 
 speak — as she added, " Do you suppose I 
 have forgotten how to play my game ?" 
 
 Marl Baskerville said he knew she had 
 not. 
 
 " Then say that I shall have the money 
 to-morrow afternoon." 
 
 " You shall have it." 
 
 "There's my hand. Marl Baskerville. 
 You are the friend I have always found 
 
 you." 
 
 " And now tell me what is behind this 
 impulse that I have observed ? " Marl 
 Baskerville inquired.
 
 160 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " Oh, yoii are a cunning man, Basker- 
 ville. You saw tlie impulse, did you? and 
 you shrewdly guessed that there was some- 
 thing behind it, eh ? Yes, and you are 
 right. I am going to Goodwood/' 
 
 ]\Iarl Baskerville did not seem much 
 surprised at that intimation. 
 
 *' Milltown is going, of course ; and. 
 Marl Baskerville," she cried, in an excited 
 tone of voice, " there are others going that 
 you and I knov.^;" and she pointed her 
 finger as she spoke, even as though she 
 were pointing out the persons to whom 
 she alluded. 
 
 *' To whom do you refer ?" inquired 
 Baskerville. 
 
 '' Why, the Montalbans will be there, 
 and she will be there — yes, she is to be 
 there !" and as the majestic beauty spoke 
 her eyes flashed with passion, and her 
 bosom heaved. 
 
 " Why, surely you are not jealous of
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 161 
 
 Miss Montalban ?" said Marl Baskerville, 
 smiling. 
 
 The lady laughed scornfully, and then 
 exclaimed, — 
 
 "Jealous ? No, I am not jealous ; 
 I am only determined to bring her 
 down." 
 
 *' How do you mean ?" 
 
 " She tried to bring me down. Her 
 exalted virtue would have had me thrust 
 from the field. Ha ! ha ! the strait-laced 
 audacity !" 
 
 " I cannot altogether comprehend your 
 allusion," said Marl Baskerville. 
 
 " Oh yes, you can," she cried, quietly. 
 / " Believe me, I cannot." 
 
 " Do you mean to say that you have not 
 heard of the scene in Leicestershire ? Is it 
 possible that you, who are acquainted with 
 every man in the sporting world — you 
 from whom, as it is said, no secrets in that 
 strange world can be kept hidden — is it 
 
 VOL. I. 11
 
 162 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 possible that you are unacquainted with 
 that scene ?" 
 
 Marl Baskerville had heard of it, but 
 for the moment he had forgotten the inci- 
 dent, which had been talked of freely in 
 the circles in whichhe moved, and connected 
 with which he was so well known. 
 
 " Of course you knew of it," said the 
 tall beauty, observing the change in the 
 expression of Marl Baskerville's face. 
 "Well, then, that is why I wish to go to 
 Goodwood. She would have me expelled 
 from the field, would she ? I was to be 
 warned away from every meeting, was I ? 
 My presence was not to be tolerated in the 
 same field with Miss Montalban. I was 
 to be driven off by the huntsman, ha ! ha !'* 
 cried the tall beauty; but although she 
 laughed, it was plain to see that a tempest 
 was raging in her bosom, which swelled 
 with passion as she paced the room while 
 she was speaking.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 163 
 
 " And what do you intend to do at 
 Goodwood ?" inquired Marl Baskerville. 
 
 " To look lier down V she cried, her 
 countenance flushed \vith excitement. "Ay, 
 to look her down ; to walk by her side on 
 the lawn; to hold my head up proudly 
 by the side of her own ; to gratify one of 
 the strongest passions of my woman's 
 heart!" And she struck her breast with her 
 delicate hand, which was clenched with 
 convulsive energy. 
 
 " Let me counsel you not to do it," said 
 Marl Baskerville, calmly. 
 
 " Not do it !" she exclaimed : " Marl 
 Baskerville, you do not know the passions 
 of the female soul ;'' and she went up to 
 his side, and grasping his wrist, she cried, 
 in an undertone of excitement, " Suppose 
 the father had stood by your side, and had 
 wronged and humiliated you, what would 
 you have done? what would have been 
 your course ?" 
 
 11— a
 
 164 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 She little knew that she had touched 
 one string that vibrated through Marl 
 Baskerville's soul. It was but a wild and 
 aimless sweep of the hand that had touched 
 that chord, and yet she might, if slie had 
 been calmer, have observed that her ques- 
 tion had gone to the very centre of his 
 heart. It was a question that from that 
 moment secured liis devotion to herself 
 and to her schemes. Upon how small a 
 thread the destinies of people may some- 
 times hang ! by what insignificant trifles 
 may they be sometimes influenced ! 
 
 " Marl Baskerville, you can sympathize 
 with me ; I can see that you can ;" and as 
 she said this her passion became less, and 
 her excitement was evidently passing away. 
 She smiled, and added playfully, "JSTow 
 you will not fail me with the money?" 
 
 " You are sure of the name ?" he said. 
 
 " Why ask the question ? It is the 
 name that you will take in exchange for
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 165 
 
 the money. Marl Baskerville, we have 
 had money transactions before." 
 
 " We have," he said. 
 
 " And I have never failed vou ?" 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " Nor will I in this." And then she 
 added abruptly, and again in an excited 
 tone, " Why, do you know that she is 
 thinking of him ? but she has no more 
 chance of him than she has of you. Now 
 then, go, for I am engaged for a canter in 
 the Park. To-morrow, then, without 
 fail." 
 
 "To-morrow." 
 
 And Marl Baskerville left the splendid 
 boudoir and the fascinating presence of 
 Marie Wingrave, the most brilliant horse- 
 woman in Eotten Eow.
 
 166 THE MAN IN CHAINS* 
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 SILVESTER LANGDALE's FIRST APPEARANCE IS 
 COURT. 
 
 In due course, and in due form, Marl 
 Baskerville delivered tlie brief to Silvester 
 Langdale, who received it from the mes- 
 senger with his own hands. And never 
 did lover receive his mistress with more 
 rapture, never did speculative merchant 
 witness the arrival of a rich and long- 
 expected argosy with more joy, never did 
 ardent enthusiast look upon what he 
 believed to be the fruition of his hopes 
 with more emotion, than did Silvester 
 Langdale receive those folded sheets of 
 paper which constituted his first brief, and 
 which were to be his introduction to the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 167 
 
 great world into whose vortex he was 
 about to enter. He carried the magic 
 document tenderly, and as he laid it upon 
 his office table he gazed upon it with some- 
 thing like awe, and seemed almost afraid 
 to open it. Over and over again he read 
 its inscription, — " The Queen v. Abel 
 Barnes. Counsel for the prisoner, Mr. 
 Silvester Langdale." And as he did so 
 he found himself catching his breath as he 
 drew long respirations, and the veriest 
 trifle would at that moment have caused 
 him to shed tears, or to have laughed 
 immoderately, for conflicting emotions 
 were agitating his breast — conflicting, 
 and yet so commingled that at one moment 
 he almost trembled with doubt and fear, 
 and nearly at the same instant braced 
 himself up, as it were, with that confidence 
 and hope which are founded upon inherent 
 mental power and determined purpose. 
 In the solitude of that chamber in Gray's
 
 1C8 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Inn, shut out for the moment from all the 
 world, there, in the midst of the solitude 
 of the heart of London — for what solitude 
 is more oppressing than that of him who 
 is alone, without a friend, in this great 
 metropolis ? — perhaps that was the most 
 trying moment of Silvester Langdale's 
 life. It was an ordeal that was indeed 
 a trying one to bear, as he stood alone in 
 that sombre chamber, almost dazzled by 
 the mystic light which appeared to him 
 to be the dawning of the golden sun of 
 his good fortune. It was but natural 
 that he should feel excited; it would 
 have been strange indeed, and have indi- 
 cated a callous heart, if at such a moment 
 he had experienced no emotion. 
 
 It was some time before he could sit 
 calmly down, and open the document which 
 contained the reality of his new-born 
 hopes, and when he at length did so, it was 
 with a trem])ling hand and a beating
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 169 
 
 heart; but as he read the instructions which 
 his "brief" contained, the weakness — for 
 such, of course, it was — passed away, and 
 his whole soul became absorbed in the task, 
 the responsibility that was now cast upon 
 him, and he rose from the perusal of the de- 
 tails of Abel Barnes's case fired with deter- 
 mination and strengthened in resolve. It 
 was a case which was well calculated to ex- 
 cite the sympathies of a generous heart ; it 
 was a case in which the impulses of a 
 kindly nature would be strongly roused, 
 even in a stranger whose sympathies were 
 rewarded with material acknowledgments. 
 But Silvester Langdale was no stranger, 
 as we have seen. Although in no way 
 connected with the lamentable affair which 
 had so strangely brought him fortune — 
 a dismal cloud, out of which a bright sun 
 shone for him, — yet he felt that he was 
 closely connected with it, and the scene 
 of Margale's death-bed v/as in his mind a
 
 170 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 portent of a dread picture in which he 
 was at once actor and spectator. He 
 felt, in the seriously trying ordeal of his 
 first appearance before the world, utterly 
 unknown even by name, standing as he 
 would be amidst strangers, and before a 
 solemn tribunal, that liis connection with 
 the subject of the inquiry would nerve 
 him in his efforts, and imbue him with 
 that confidence which should justify what 
 otherwise might appear a step to be cha- 
 racterized as temerity. 
 
 It was known that the trial of Abel 
 Barnes, as it was a charge of murder, 
 would not come on for three or four days 
 after the commencement of the sessions ; 
 but Silvester Langdale was in attendance 
 as soon as the court opened on the Mon- 
 day morning, in order that he might 
 accustom himself to the place in which 
 he was soon so conspicuously to appear. 
 When he entered the court the seats at
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 171 
 
 the table appropriated to counsel were all 
 occupied, and for a minute or two he had 
 to stand in the gangway that leads down 
 to the table. He was a stranger, a new 
 man; perhaps he was thought by some 
 in that court an interloper ; and so, as he 
 stood at the bottom of the gangway, all 
 eyes were turned upon him, especially 
 those around the barristers' table. He 
 could see that whisperings were going on 
 respecting him, and although he could 
 not hear what was being said, he knew 
 well enough what was the purport of the 
 observations that were being indulged in. 
 Immediately opposite was one young and 
 impulsive member of the bar, who had 
 attended the court for more than seven 
 years, but who had never even *' smelt a 
 brief," as he himself would observe ; 
 although in personal appearance he was 
 conspicuous enough, and therefore might 
 have attracted the attention of some of
 
 172 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the legal wolves who prowl about the 
 purlieus of that court, for he had a big 
 round face, fringed with large red whiskers. 
 This interesting ornament of the bar of 
 England, as soon as Silvester Langdale 
 entered the court, brought his eye-glass 
 to bear full u^^on him, and stared point- 
 blank at him, as though he were some 
 unusual phenomenon, just descended 
 through the roof, or come up from the 
 cells beneath. With an unmistakable 
 action of the elbow he called the atten- 
 tion of his immediate neighbour, another 
 member of the bar, of long standing but 
 short practice — a gentleman with a face 
 as sharp as a hatchet, but with wit about 
 as dull as a grindstone ; but there was no 
 necessity to call his attention to Silvester 
 Langdale's presence, because he was 
 already indulging in a supercilious stare 
 at the new-comer. Gradually the eyes 
 of the whole bar were centred upon Sil-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 173 
 
 vester, and of course tlie benoli followed 
 the bar ; the bencli at the moment con- 
 sisting of the recorder and two aldermen, 
 — the one short and thick, and so plethoric 
 about the neck and face that his tongue 
 protruded from his mouth, and he breathed 
 stertorously ; and the other so tall and 
 thin that when he stood up he looked 
 like a wafer man, attired in a purple silk 
 gown, fringed with fur. 
 
 Silvester Langdale stood the battery of 
 these legal eyes right manfully, and 
 although at the first, just for an 
 instant, he felt a little nervous, he 
 boldly confronted that united bar, and 
 gazed around him with the utmost self- 
 possession. Indeed, so unmistakable was 
 his self-possession that the briefless one, 
 with the large round countenance with 
 red fringe, remarked to his neighbour that 
 Silvester had " cheek enouo^h for a vouno^ 
 'un, and no mistake."
 
 174 ' THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Presently the members of the bar sat a 
 little closer together, so that Silvester 
 Langdale was enabled to take a seat at 
 the table, and as he did so the gentleman 
 next to whom he sat cast a sidelong glance 
 at him, and scanned him out of the corners 
 of his eyes. Emboldened by this pro- 
 ceeding, he turned his head quite round, 
 and stared full into Silvester's face, as 
 though he desired to stamp a photograph 
 thereof upon his own brain. Silvester 
 Langdale could not refrain from smiling, 
 and so he smiled, not exactly at the learned 
 gentleman next to him, because he looked 
 across the court ; but the learned gentle- 
 man himself felt that the smile was in- 
 tended for him, and so he patronized 
 Silvester by turning his back full upon 
 him. 
 
 The bar, however, very soon got recon- 
 ciled to the presence of the new-comer, 
 or, at all events, they ceased to scrutinize
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 175 
 
 him as a curiosity, and so lie was left to 
 himself, to look upon the scene around 
 him. The habitues of that court had 
 their separate functions marked upon their 
 countenances as distinctly as though they 
 had been printed there. It was not diffi- 
 cult for a sagacious observer to distin- 
 guish which were the jurymen, which the 
 witnesses, which the several officers of 
 the court individually, and the offices they 
 filled; which the barristers' clerks, and 
 above all, which were the attorneys regu- 
 larly practising in that court. These last 
 were as distinctive as though they had 
 been labelled. There were three of them 
 present. One was an old man, with a 
 countenance so seamed that it appeared 
 to have been ploughed, and his skin was 
 of the colour and of the texture of parch- 
 ment. About his mouth there was a very 
 remarkable expression. It seemed to have 
 been drawn on one side, as with a string.
 
 176 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 He spoke apparently without any mo- 
 tion of the lips ; and he held down his 
 head while in conversation, as though he 
 were speaking with his ear rather than 
 with his mouth. What a course of villany 
 could that man record as the reminiscences 
 of his professional career ! Another mem- 
 ber of the same fraternity then present 
 was one much younger in years, and with 
 an entirely different cast of countenance. 
 Indeed, he was rather good-looking. He 
 had an open countenance, and was tall 
 in stature. He had a very considerable 
 practice amongst the most degraded clients 
 of that august court. In fact, he and the 
 man with the ploughed face divided nearly 
 the whole of the practice therein. TJiey 
 took the cream — we were going to write, 
 the scum — of that terrible social cauldron, 
 Newgate. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had an ample opportu- 
 nity, during the three days that he visited
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS, 177 
 
 the court, to become acquainted with its 
 practice, for it was very simple. During 
 that time, too, he had become thoroughly- 
 habituated to it, even as though he were 
 an old practitioner therein ; and after the 
 first day he was no longer an object of 
 curiosity to the scrutinizing bar, but was 
 received by them as an installed member 
 of the fraternity. Silvester Langdale felt 
 quite at home and at his ease amongst 
 them. He had ample opportunity of ob- 
 serving the amenities of the bench and the 
 bar, before which and of which he was now 
 a practising member. Indeed, on the 
 second day this opportunity was something 
 more than conspicuous, — in a case ol petty 
 larceny which was being tried, and in 
 which a leading member of that bar was 
 engaged for the prisoner. Wlien the time 
 for his address to the jury came, this legal 
 functionary impressively and at once threw 
 himself into the case which he had to make 
 VOL. I. 12
 
 178 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 out for his client, and as the evidence for the 
 prosecution had been entirely conclusive, 
 and admitted of no doubt whatever, he 
 had recourse to the expedient of misquot- 
 ing it. This course was allowed for some 
 time by the presiding functionary, but at 
 length he ventm-ed to suggest that the 
 learned counsel was entirely perverting 
 the evidence which had been adduced. 
 Upon this the learned counsel, thus 
 checked, turned fiercely upon the presiding 
 judge, and requested to be informed if he 
 were sitting there for the purpose of in- 
 structing him (the learned counsel) in his 
 business. 
 
 " I sit here to administer justice," the 
 judge remarked, 
 
 " But you don't sit there to teach me 
 how I ought to conduct a case," cried the 
 arrister, fiercely, and casting a meaning 
 glance at the jury, as though he would say, 
 " Have the goodness to observe how I will 
 put him down."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 179 
 
 "One of my functions is to preserve 
 order and regularity in this court," ob- 
 served the judge. 
 
 " And one of my functions is to defend 
 the prisoner at the bar!" roared the learned 
 counsel. 
 
 " But I cannot allow you to misquote 
 the evidence that has been taken," said 
 the judge. 
 
 "The jury are the judges of that, my 
 lord ; I was addressing them /' and the 
 learned counsel cast a kind of reverential 
 glance towards the jury. 
 
 " Proceed," said the judge. 
 
 And the learned counsel did proceed. 
 
 " Grentlemen of the jury," he said, " the- 
 institution of trial by jury is one of the 
 noblest — the noblest — of the institutions 
 of our glorious constitution, and the bar 
 of England has been the great palladium 
 of English liberty. You, gentlemen, are 
 now the representatives of the sacred in- 
 
 12—2
 
 180 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 stitution of trial by jury ; and I, unwortliy 
 though I may be, unworthy as I know I 
 am" — and he tapped his breast, as indi- 
 cating that he nevertheless was a man of 
 principle, — "represent the great palladium 
 of British liberty. In former days of our 
 history, gentlemen, when the liberties of 
 the subject have been attacked b}^ despotic 
 power, the bar of England has stood up 
 for the persecuted and the oppressed." 
 
 A rather intelligent juryman here ob- 
 served that he thought that in all those 
 cases there were counsel on both sides. 
 
 " Sir, I admire your depth of reasoning," 
 said the learned counsel, bowing profoundly 
 to the observant juryman ; " that is true 
 enough, although it is not every one who 
 has the sagacity to observe it ; but in the 
 times to which I refer, the counsel for the 
 Crown, in the cases of oppression and 
 tyranny, were miserable hirelings and 
 place-holders — men who looked at nothing
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 181 
 
 beyond the despotism of the ruling powers 
 of the day, men who were, I may say, not 
 to use too strong a figure of speech, out- 
 side the great palladium of British liberty. 
 In those days, gentlemen, a judge upon 
 the bench could overawe a jury and brow- 
 beat an advocate ; but those days have 
 passed away, no such judge can sit upon 
 the bench in our time ;" and in the excite- 
 ment of the moment he pointed his finger 
 full upon the judge who was presiding. 
 The learned judge — 
 
 "Did address 
 Himself to motion, like as he would speak," 
 
 but he checked himself — evidently, how- 
 ever, with an efibrt. The learned counsel 
 observed this, and seemed to become more 
 emboldened. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the jury," he continued, 
 " I may have a weak case, or a strong one ; 
 I may be counsel for the prisoner, or have
 
 182 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 to conduct the prosecution ; but whatever 
 be mj position, however humble may be 
 my efforts, as I know they are, no judge 
 shall ever turn me aside from the straight 
 path of my strict duty. Gentlemen, al- 
 though we may no longer witness the 
 terrible spectacle of a judge overawing a 
 jury and browbeating an advocate, yet, as 
 you have seen, we may have a legal pre- 
 sident prejudging a case, and attempting, 
 metaphorically, to trip up a counsel in the 
 discharge of his sacred duty in behalf of 
 an unhappy prisoner." 
 
 This was too much for the judge, and 
 so he warmly said that he could not sit 
 there and allow the court to be insulted by 
 imputations which were as gross as they 
 were uncalled for. 
 
 The learned counsel for the prisoner 
 drew himself up, looked full across at the 
 jury, and then threw at them a shrug, 
 which said, as plainly as any language could
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 183 
 
 do, " Now, gentlemen, what do you think 
 of the difficulties of my position?" 
 
 The judge, addressing the jury, said: — 
 
 "Gentlemen, while I preside in this 
 court I will not allow its decorum — that 
 decorum without which justice cannot be 
 properly administered — to be infringed, 
 or the dignity of the bench to be vio- 
 lated." 
 
 " Does your lordship intend that obser- 
 ration for me?" inquired the learned 
 counsel, sneeringly. 
 
 "Most unquestionably I do," the learned 
 judge replied. 
 
 " Then I have to say this," cried the 
 advocate, laughing scornfully, " that 
 while I have the honour of practising in 
 this court, I will do my duty to the 
 prisoner and the gentlemen of the jury, in 
 spite of the prejudices of any Metho- 
 distical old woman who may happen, by a 
 strange freak of fate, to be placed in the
 
 184 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 responsible position of president of the 
 court." 
 
 "If these observations are continued I 
 shall feel it my duty to adjourn the court. 
 I have to request that this unseemly 
 altercation may be brought to a close," 
 said the judge. 
 
 *' Very well, then ; have the goodness 
 to allow me to conduct my case according 
 to my own discretion, and don't attempt 
 to prejudice the jury," cried the learned 
 counsel, in a tone that he might have 
 used towards a cabman with whom he 
 had had a dispute respecting the amount 
 of a fare. 
 
 The case was accordingly allowed to 
 proceed, as the counsel for the prisoner 
 had suggested ; and taking advantage of 
 •the concession, he lashed himself into a 
 fury, threw his arms wildly about, and 
 indulged in such energetic gesticulation 
 that he cleared a vacant space on each
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 185 
 
 side of him. He dashed his brief upon 
 the table, upset the inkstand that was 
 before him, and finally, in his peroration, 
 jumped upon the seat behind, and from 
 that elevation frothed out a stream of 
 words, full of sound and fury indeed, but 
 nothing more. 
 
 Then came the summing up of the 
 learned judge, who, having read over the 
 evidence to the jury, alluded to the scene 
 which had taken place in the course of 
 the trial. After referring to his long 
 experience on the bench, the uniform 
 courtesy with which he was treated by 
 the bar generally, and the high estimation 
 in which he was held by the world at 
 large, he implored the jury to dismiss 
 from their minds all recollection of what 
 had but a few moments before occurred, 
 even as though it had never happened, 
 for it was highly essential that the pure 
 stream of justice should not be polluted
 
 186 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 by even the resemblance or shadow of per- 
 sonality. He therefore again appealed to 
 them to dismiss entirely from their minds 
 the recollection of the misunderstanding 
 which had arisen between the learned 
 counsel and himself. 
 
 Judges on the bench generally appear 
 to have the notion that the mind of a 
 jury is like a schoolboy's slate, from which 
 impressions can be removed at will, and 
 without the least exertion. If an atrocious 
 crime has been committed, with the details 
 of which all the newspapers of the land 
 have been teeming for a fortnight before, 
 a jury will be seriously requested to dis- 
 miss from their minds all that they may 
 have happened to have read upon the 
 subject. Sometimes, when the subject- 
 matter of the investigation has been the 
 topic of conversation amongst all classes, 
 and has been commented upon for days 
 previously by the public press, the pre-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 187 
 
 siding fanctionary will suggest that 
 possibly some of the jury may have heard 
 comments out of doors on the case ; thus 
 leading to the inference that juries are 
 not of the general public, and take no 
 interest in its affairs. In all cases the 
 jury are told to look upon their mind 
 as a slate, and to treat it accordingly, 
 — that is, rub all recent impressions 
 out. 
 
 Such was the initiation which Silvester 
 Langdale received into the mysteries and 
 amenities of his new profession, upon his 
 first appearance in court, and it must be 
 confessed it was not calculated to give 
 him a very elevated notion of the dignity 
 of the tribunal before which he was to 
 make his professional dAhtt. He, how- 
 ever, congratulated himself that the court 
 before which the case in which he was to 
 appear would be taken would be dif- 
 ferently constituted from that in which
 
 188 THE MAN IX CHAINS. 
 
 the disorderly and most undignified scene 
 lie had just witnessed had taken place, as 
 the judges would be altogether of a 
 different stamp and standing.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 189 
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 THE TRIAL OF ABEL BARNES. 
 
 The trial of Abel Barnes was fixed for the 
 third day of the sessions, and as the case 
 was one of murder, the galleries and places 
 set apart for the free accommodation of 
 the general public were besieged by eager 
 applicants at the opening of the court, 
 and the doorkeepers — or money-takers, 
 perhaps we should more appropriately 
 designate them — obtained proportionately 
 high prices for the privilege of free admis- 
 sion to this interesting public court of 
 justice. Viscount Montalban, in right of 
 his position as a peer of the realm, was 
 accommodated with a seat on the bench.
 
 190 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 between two aldermen, one a tallow- 
 chandler, and the other a raw hide mer- 
 chant ; and the two civic functionaries — 
 attired, of course, in their purple gowns 
 edged with fur — smirked and ogled at 
 their friends in different parts of the 
 court, indicative of the high gratification 
 they felt at having a lord between them. 
 
 It had, of course, got noised about 
 amongst the profession that the young 
 unknown barrister, who had been observed 
 to enter the court at the opening of the 
 sessions, was to be entrusted with the 
 defence of the prisoner, and the bar of the 
 court had been struck with something 
 like consternation when the intimation 
 was conveyed to them. The men of stand- 
 ing in the court — that is, those who had 
 the most practice — looked at one another, 
 and smiled sarcastically ; and one of them 
 was heard to ejaculate, " Poor devil !" 
 But whether the implied sympathy was
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 191 
 
 intended for the prisoner or liis advocate 
 the world has never been informed. The 
 briefless ones discussed the matter indig- 
 nantly. What next? they reasoned. 
 The profession was coming to something 
 indeed ! In former days, long study and 
 years of patience were sure to produce 
 their just reward ; but now men of ex- 
 perience and observation were to be thrust 
 aside by unknown whipper-snappers and 
 upstarts. Every gentleman had a different 
 form of expression for his suggestive dis- 
 content, but they all agreed uj^on one 
 point with wonderful unanimity, and that 
 w^as of course the exhibition would be a 
 preposterous and ludicrous failure; and 
 with this comforting assurance they 
 flocked into the court to witness Silvester 
 Langdale rush upon his own professional 
 destruction. 
 
 When Silvester entered the court, on 
 the morning of the trial of Abel Barnes,
 
 192 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the eyes of tlie whole bar were turned 
 upon him ; but although he was a little 
 flushed he did not appear at all nervous. 
 A vacancy was immediately opened for 
 him at the table, and he took his seat 
 thereat, placing his brief before him. 
 Immediately behind him sat Marl Basker- 
 ville, and as soon as the young barrister 
 had settled in his place, the attorney 
 money-lender and turf commissioner whis- 
 pered to him, — 
 
 " How are your nerves ?" 
 
 " As firm as steel," Silvester Langdale 
 replied, in a tone of voice that was con- 
 firmatory of his declaration. 
 
 " They will need to be." 
 
 " They are." 
 
 The next moment the clerk of the 
 arraigns rose, and, addressing the gaoler 
 who was seated at one side of the dock, 
 said, — 
 
 " Bring up Abel Barnes."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 193 
 
 And Abel Barnes was brought forward 
 from behind, at the back of the dock, 
 accordingly. 
 
 " I appear for the prosecution, my lord," 
 said a stout gentleman, who sat at a little 
 distance from Silvester Langdale, at the 
 same time rising and making an obeisance 
 to the presiding judge. 
 
 " Is the prisoner defended ?" the judge 
 inquired. 
 
 " I appear for the prisoner, my lord," 
 said Silvester Langdale, rising and bow- 
 ing also. 
 
 " Mr. eh ?" said the judge, with his 
 
 pen in his hand, and looking with a smile 
 towards, and over his spectacles at, the 
 young barrister. 
 
 " Silvester Langdale, my lord." 
 
 The learned judge wrote the name down, 
 and several of the briefless ones looked at 
 each other, and in a subdued voice said, 
 " Silvester Langdale 1" in a tone which 
 
 VOL.1. 13
 
 194 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 implied that even the name was an im- 
 pertinence. 
 
 The trial then proceeded, but the 
 counsel for the prosecution had scarcely 
 concluded his opening address when the 
 judge said he had been looking over the 
 depositions, and it appeared to him that 
 the capital charge could not be main- 
 tained, and therefore the learned counsel 
 had better confine themselves to the 
 second count of the indictment, that of 
 manslaughter. 
 
 The counsel for the prosecution said that 
 such was the course which he intended to 
 pursue, but his lordship would see that 
 the prisoner had been committed — upon 
 the coroner's warrant for murder, and bj 
 the justices for manslaughter. 
 
 " They are clearing the way for you," 
 whispered Marl Baskerville to Silvester 
 Langdale. 
 * *I am sorry for it, " was the whisper ed reply.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 195 
 
 " Your lordship will observe that there 
 are two indictments," said the counsel for 
 the prosecution ; " and, if your lordship 
 pleases, I will take the second one, which 
 is for the minor charge of manslaughter, 
 first." 
 
 "That will perhaps be the better 
 course," said the judge. 
 
 And so the charge of manslaughter was 
 taken. The evidence that was adduced 
 was precisely the same as upon the in- 
 quest, and before the magistrates at 
 Guildhall; but the wife of the unfortu- 
 nate deceased, or rather, the woman who 
 had passed as his wife, was not so violent 
 or demonstrative in giving her testimony 
 as she was at the investigation at Guild- 
 hall. Indeed, she was quite subdued on 
 the trial. 
 
 Silvester Langdale did not attempt any- 
 thing like a searching cross-examination 
 of the witnesses, inasmuch as he was not 
 
 13—2
 
 196 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 instructed to dispute the facts ; they were 
 indeed indisputable. He questioned the 
 woman with regard to the attempted use 
 of a knife by the deceased, but nothing 
 could induce her to admit that he had 
 had a knife in his hand at all. The 
 evidence of the policemen, however, was 
 conclusive upon the point : when they 
 picked the deceased up at the foot of the 
 stairs he had a large and formidable knife 
 clasped firmly in his hand. 
 
 The case for the prosecution having 
 closed, the moment for Silvester Lang- 
 dale^s own trial came. The ordeal upon 
 which his success or failure in his profes- 
 sion was to be based had now to be 
 encountered, and the counsel for the pri- 
 soner rose to meet it. There was a 
 sonorous cry of silence from the usher, 
 the members of the bar settled themselves 
 in their places, attentive, scrutinizing, and 
 critical listeners, and the learned jud<re
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 197 
 
 looked down encom-agingly upon the 
 young barrister, as he rose to perform 
 the duty which had been assigned to 
 him. 
 
 Silvester Langdale was possessed of a 
 magnificent voice, and he had acquired 
 the faculty of modulating it without 
 effort, as the due expression of emotion 
 or passion required. There was a charm 
 in the voice, and in its modulated tones, 
 which gave more than ordinary force to 
 the words of the speaker. We have said 
 that he had acquired the power of modu- 
 lating his voice according to the dictates 
 of passion or emotion, but this is not 
 strictly accurate. The faculty was a 
 natural one ; he had only developed it. 
 Such a faculty cannot be wholly acquired. 
 As the gift of poesy must be born with a 
 man, so the man who is not born an actor 
 can never become an actor by any studious 
 process whatever. We know that it is a
 
 198 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 kind of canon of the stage, tliat no man 
 can become an actor who has not gone 
 through a certam course of probation, and 
 study, and practice. The canon is a fal- 
 lacious one. The truly great tragedian 
 is as great an actor when he first places 
 his foot upon the stage as when he has 
 risen to the eminence of universal popu- 
 larity. David Garrick, John Kemble, 
 and Edmund Kean were great actors when 
 they played their first part, and they 
 needed no instruction, no study. Study 
 will not create genius, although it may 
 polish it where it is found to exist. 
 
 In addition to the advantage of a fine 
 voice, Silvester Langdale exhibited grace- 
 ful action, this again being natural, and 
 not acquired. He could emphasize a sen- 
 tence with a wave of his hand, and he 
 could exhibit energy even in the move- 
 ment of his finger. It is but seldom that 
 we find a noble voice and the power of
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 199 
 
 expressive action combined in the same 
 person; still less frequently do we dis- 
 cover, in addition to those two natural 
 gifts, a third, which is greater than either 
 — that of mental power, displayed in high 
 oratory. These three great qualifications 
 were possessed by Silvester Langdale, and 
 the opportunity was now presented to 
 him of exhibiting them to the world. 
 
 When he rose to address the jury he 
 himself felt surprised at the perfect self- 
 possession which he displayed. He did 
 not even feel nervous in the position in 
 which he stood, although the eyes of 
 every one in that court were fixed upon 
 him. Presently, so far from any nervous- 
 ness agitating him, he felt strongly con- 
 fident in his own powers, which seemed, 
 indeed, to be newly opening even to him- 
 self. He felt, he deeply felt, the cause 
 which he had to advocate, and so he 
 threw his whole soul earnestly into it.
 
 200 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 In feeling, and at tlie same time glowing 
 terms, lie depicted tlie death-bed scene at 
 which he had, as if by a strange coinci- 
 dence, assisted; he painted in terrible 
 colours the encounter between the pri- 
 soner and the deceased ; and he drew a 
 touching picture of the anguish of mind 
 of the prisoner, — anguish that was the 
 more deeply imbittered by the man's 
 afflictions which had. so recently culmi- 
 nated in what was called his home, when 
 the prisoner contemplated the fatal result 
 which had ensued. The young advocate 
 denounced with strong language that 
 mockery of an investigation which could 
 have resulted in a charge of wilful murder 
 against the prisoner ; and, while paying a 
 just tribute to the laws of the country, 
 he said he feared that those laws were 
 too frequently perverted, and made the 
 instruments of wrong, through the agency 
 of incompetence and ignorance. He far-
 
 THE MAN I\ CHAINS. 201 
 
 vidly declared his conviction that the pri- 
 soner could have been actuated by no 
 malicious motive ; nay, he believed that 
 it was a noble impulse which had led to^ 
 the catastrophe which had made the pri- 
 soner amenable to the laws of his country, 
 an impulse born of reverence for the sacred 
 dead. The deceased would have rushed 
 into that terrible presence, and have dese- 
 crated the chamber of death, and the pri- 
 soner stood between him and the sacri- 
 lege, for such it was, seeing that the dead 
 are sacred ; he would have ruthlessly vio- 
 lated that sanctity, and have offered ribald 
 indignity to the emaciated corpse of him 
 who was the stark tenant of that denuded 
 chamber ; this in his drunken fury he 
 was endeavouring to do when the stalwart 
 arm of the prisoner arrested his course,, 
 and thrust him back from the dismal 
 chamber of death. This it was that had 
 aroused in the mind of the deceased the
 
 202 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 passion ; that he had drawn the coward's 
 weapon, the assassin's knife, and rushed 
 upon the prisoner, who in his own defence 
 had struck the miscreant down, unhappily 
 to rise no more. Why, there was a man- 
 liness in the deed which claimed our ad- 
 miration; it was the prompting of that 
 spirit which animated heroes, and led 
 them on to glory. It was but the fitting 
 punishment of a dastard, the rough retribu- 
 tion which true courage would suggest. 
 And was this to be branded as a crime ? 
 In the name of justice and of right, in 
 the name of the best instincts of our 
 nature, he protested against such a 
 thought, and in the name of a great bene- 
 ficence he called upon the jury to declare 
 before the world that the unhappy man 
 at the bar was guilty of no crime, and 
 had committed no wrong. 
 
 When Silvester Langdale sat down 
 there was a manifestation of applause, at
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 203 
 
 which the usher indignantly cried out 
 " Silence !'* and the learned judge looked 
 over his spectacles full into the face of 
 the gaoler, who stood by the side of the 
 prisoner, as though the applause had pro- 
 ceeded from him, and said, — 
 
 " If that indecent exhibition is repeated, 
 I will commit the parties." 
 
 Judges always say this in such cases, 
 and yet they must know that it is an 
 empty threat, and cannot be carried out 
 unless the whole of the British public 
 then assembled in the court are committed 
 en masse. And the threat invariably pro- 
 duces a ludicrous effect, — because, of the 
 people who have applauded, some receive 
 the rebuke with solemn, supernaturally 
 solemn, countenances ; others receive it 
 with a leer and a jest ; and the jury in- 
 variably look upon it with stolid indiffer- 
 ence. By-the-bye, suppose the jury in 
 such a case were to manifest their appro-
 
 204 THE »UN IN CHAINS. 
 
 bation by open applause, what form would 
 the rebuke of the judge then take? 
 
 The address of Silvester Langdale had 
 undoubtedly created a profound impres- 
 sion, and many whispered comments upon 
 it ran round the circle of the barristers* 
 table. 
 
 The judge inquired if the learned counsel 
 had any witnesses to call, and Marl Bas- 
 kerville hurriedly conveyed some intima- 
 tion to the young barrister, who imme- 
 diately said, — 
 
 " Yes, my lord, I have an important 
 witness to call, who will speak to the 
 peaceable disposition of the prisoner gene- 
 rally." 
 
 " I think the prisoner has been described 
 as a pugilist, has he not ?" inquired the 
 judge, looking over his spectacles, with a 
 meaning smile upon his countenance. 
 
 " That is his calling, my lord, and it 
 is on that account that I desire to call
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 205 
 
 the witness to his character," observed 
 Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " As you please," acquiesced the judge. 
 
 " Viscount Montalban," said Silvester 
 Langdale, turning to where the noble 
 lord was seated between the two alder- 
 men. 
 
 Lord Montalban started to his feet as 
 though lie had been struck, and ex- 
 claimed, — 
 
 "Call me?" 
 
 " I am instructed to call your lordship, 
 as I am informed that you have seen 
 something of the prisoner," said Silvester 
 Langdale. 
 
 " Oh, very good. I'll tell you what I 
 know about him with pleasure," said Lord 
 Montalban, recovering from the mo- 
 mentary surprise into which he liad been 
 thrown, while the prisoner looked eagerly 
 at his noble patron, as though in doubt 
 whether he would say good or evil of
 
 206 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 him. The doubt, however, was soon re- 
 solved, for the noble witness, in answer 
 to tlie questions that were put to him, 
 after the usual formula, said he had known 
 the prisoner for some years, and, notwith- 
 standing his calling, had known him to 
 be a peaceable, well-disposed man. 
 
 " Never harmed a fly, my lord, know- 
 ingly," said the prisoner, speaking for the 
 first time since he had pleaded, and 
 casting a kind of imploring look at the 
 judge. 
 
 At the close of Lord Montalban's evi- 
 dence the jury whispered to one another, 
 and nodded their heads impressively ; and 
 it was plain enough to observe that the 
 speech for the defence and the evidence to 
 character had left a strong impression on 
 tbeir minds. 
 
 The learned judge succinctly summed 
 up the evidence, and merely left one 
 question for the jury to decide, Had the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 207 
 
 prisoner struck the deceased maliciously, 
 or had he done so in self-defence against 
 what could only be termed the atrocious, 
 un-English, brutal, and dastardly use, or 
 attempted use of the knife by the de- 
 ceased? — a habit, the judge said, which 
 was unhappily prevalent amongst a certain 
 class, and which, when it came under his 
 judicial notice in th eshape of a charge 
 against a prisoner, he invariably visited 
 with the utmost rigour that the law would 
 allow. The question, then, that the jury 
 had to determine was, whether the blow 
 by which the deceased had met his death 
 was given to resist a dastardly attack with 
 a knife, or was it maliciously given in an 
 ordinary brawl ? 
 
 The jury immediately returned a ver- 
 dict of Not Guilty, with an addendum to 
 mark their strong reprobation and horror 
 of a resort to the knife in personal en- 
 counters.
 
 208 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 The verdict, notwitlistancling tlie pre- 
 vious admonition of the judge, was 
 received with applause, especially in the 
 ■galleries ; and the prisoner was ordered to 
 be forthwith discharged. And as he left the 
 bar he bowed profoundly, and evidently 
 gratefully, to the judge, and then more 
 profoundly still to his young advocate. 
 
 When Silvester Langdale retired to the 
 robing-room, at the back of the court, he 
 was met in the corridor by Lord Mont- 
 alban, who advanced to him, and with a 
 smile said — 
 
 *' Allow me to congratulate you, Mr. 
 Langdale, upon the great success of your 
 dchut in public. Your address was very 
 masterly and convincing.'* 
 
 " Your lordship is pleased to say so.'* 
 
 "But may T ask you, Mr. Langdale, 
 how it was that you came to call me as a 
 ivitness?" and his lordship still smiled 
 approvingly as he put the question.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 209 
 
 " Simply because I was instructed, my 
 lord," said Silvester ; "I had not at tlie 
 time the honour of even knowing your 
 lordship's person." 
 
 " Marl Baskerville instructed you, did 
 he?" 
 
 " He was the attorney from whom I 
 received my brief, my lord." 
 
 " Here he comes," said Lord Mont- 
 alban, looking down the corridor; and 
 the next instant Marl Baskerville joined 
 them. 
 
 *' Your lordship will, I am sure," he 
 said, " see the motive I had in calling you 
 as a witness, and forgive it. It suddenly 
 struck me that your lordship's evidence, 
 following immediately upon the brilliant 
 oration of our young friend here, would 
 be conclusive with the jury." 
 
 " It was the eloquence of our young 
 friend, Baskerville, that did it," said his 
 lordship ; and then, turning to Silvester 
 
 VOL. I. 14
 
 210 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Langdale, he added, " Sir, I am extremely 
 glad I have had the opportunity of 
 making your acquaintance. If your en- 
 gagements will permit, will you do me 
 the honour of dining with me to-morrow 
 evening, at seven, in Park Lane ?" 
 
 Lord Montalban was not half so much 
 astounded at being called as a witness as 
 Silvester Langdale was when he received 
 this invitation, and he felt hot all over 
 his head and face as he did himself the 
 distinguished honour of accepting his 
 lordship's invitation.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 211 
 
 CHAPTEE X. 
 
 SILVESTER LANGDALE'S NEW CLERK. 
 
 Silvester Langdale returned to his 
 chambers in Gray's Inn on foot, and as 
 he -walked along the crowded streets he 
 was perfectly oblivious of all that was 
 passing around, noisy and perhaps exciting 
 as it was. He was, so to speak, wrapped 
 up in his own emotions ; ambition was 
 indeed now bright upon his mind. Why, 
 in a few more hours he would be famous. 
 He seemed instinctively to feel this. It 
 was not anticipation — it was not hope; 
 it was conviction, which the approaching 
 reality seemed to cast before it into his 
 80ul. He walked along those crowded 
 
 14—2
 
 212 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 streets with a light and elastic step, and 
 a light and bounding heart. His bosom's 
 lord not only sat lightly on its throne, 
 but throbbed in the excitement of ecstasy. 
 Oh, how ardent is the hope of youth ! It 
 gilds success with glorj^, and decks ambi- 
 tion's crown with glittering gems. 
 
 When Silvester Langdale arrived at 
 the door of his dingy chamber he found 
 three humble but enthusiastic suppliants 
 there, — suppliants who had come in the 
 fulness of their gratitude to beg the privi- 
 lege of pouring out their heart-suggested 
 thanks upon him. 
 
 *'Come in, Barnes; I am not sorry 
 that you have come here," said Silvester 
 Langdale, as he opened the door of his 
 chamber with the latch-key. " Come in." 
 
 And Abel Barnes and his wife and 
 their only son entered the chamber of the 
 young advocate, who had that day so 
 well pleaded the cause of the man who,
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 213 
 
 stalwart as lie was, stood before liim 
 tremblingly now. 
 
 Silvester Langdale requested his visitors 
 to be seated, but they hesitated modestly. 
 He therefore placed a chair for the 
 woman, and she sat down respectfully^. 
 Abel Barnes, however, persistently refused 
 to be seated in the presence of him upon 
 whom he looked as his present benefactor. 
 
 " Might I be allowed to ask a favour of 
 you, sir ?" Al^el Barnes inquired, almost 
 tremulously. 
 
 " Assirredly, Abel ; what is it ?" 
 
 And the burly pugilist modestly 
 advanced to the library table, at which 
 Silvester had taken his seat. 
 
 " Will you let me, sir," he said, in a 
 faltering voice — "will 3^ou let me, sir, 
 take your hand ?" and his big, broad chest 
 heaved with emotion as he begged this 
 honest favour. 
 ^ Silvester Langdale put out his hand,
 
 214 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 and the man, grasping it fervently, carried 
 it to his lips, big, heavy tears rolling 
 down his brawny cheeks as he did so. 
 
 " Now sit down, good feUow, sit down," 
 said Silvester Langdale, soothingly. 
 
 " We have been so bold as to come to 
 you, sir, to thank you for your generous 
 assistance in our trouble to-day," said the 
 woman. 
 
 "And you are Margale's sister," said 
 Silvester Langdale, turning the subject; 
 " I vfas not aware that he had any rela- 
 tives. When he was with me in the 
 country I do not recollect his having 
 mentioned any." 
 
 " We have been a strange family, sir," 
 said the woman, "and a strange history 
 ours has been ; and yet, perhaps, not more 
 strange than common." 
 
 " Indeed !" said Silvester. 
 
 "For years past — long, long years — 
 we have not known of each other^s
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 215 
 
 existence, and it was only by accident at 
 last that we were brought together after 
 so long a separation. He, sir, was an 
 only son, and I an only daughter ;" and 
 the woman bent her head. 
 
 " Pray calm yourself,'' said Silvester 
 Langdale : "I need not tell you that your 
 story is deeply interesting to me ; but, at 
 the same time, if it distresses you to tell 
 it, pray abstain from doing so. 
 
 " Distress me ! oh no, sir," she answered, 
 bitterly ; " it is a relief to me if you will 
 allow me so to trouble you." 
 
 He motioned to her to proceed. 
 
 "You, sir, know how extensive were 
 the mental acquirements of my poor 
 brother. I fear me those acquirements, 
 great as they were, availed him little, for 
 in his youth I know that he was wild and 
 reckless. But it is not for me to speak of 
 that ;" and she said this in a tone which 
 might have been one of self-reproach.
 
 216 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " He was most improvident, I know/' 
 said Silvester Langdale. " He lived for 
 the hour, and cared not for the mor- 
 row. 
 
 " Too true," said the woman ; " and 
 not he alone." 
 
 " But how came you to be separated ?" 
 asked Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " We were idolized by our parents in 
 our youth, and nothing was denied us 
 that we desired. We were educated ex- 
 ponsivety — look at me no^v, sir." 
 
 And for the first time during the in- 
 terview the woman wept. 
 
 " Never mind, old woman," said Abel 
 Barnes, m a rough voice, but still kindly 
 and soothingly ; *' never mind, let's hope 
 for a turn of luck : who knows but what 
 this gentleman's kindness to-day is our 
 turn of luck ? And it's been a long run 
 of bad that we've had, sir," he said, 
 tm^ning to Silvester Langdale.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 217 
 
 "I wish to know the whole of your 
 history," said Silvester to the woman. 
 
 She lifted her eyes to his, and said, 
 sorrowfully — 
 
 '' Not now — not yet — perhaps never." 
 
 " I thought yov*. wished to tell it me ?" 
 
 " Of the separation from my brother, 
 yes. The rest is a blank — a black blank." 
 
 " Of your brother, then." 
 
 " Our parents died, and we drifted out 
 upon the sea of the world, where all ap- 
 peared to us to be calm and sunshine, 
 and we never met again until three 
 months ago, and the interval was more 
 than twenty years. We separated in 
 affluence, and with everything bright 
 around us ; we met again in desolation — 
 the desolation of abject poverty." 
 
 " I've strove hard, sir, all my married 
 life to get a good living," said Abel 
 Barnes ; " but luck must be born with a 
 man, he never can get it without. He
 
 218 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 may have pluck, and all that there ; but 
 if he hasn't got no luck he must go to 
 the bad." 
 
 Silvester Langdale smiled, but did 
 not attempt to controvert the philo- 
 sophy of the pugilist. It was part of 
 the moral code of the prize-fighter's pro- 
 fession. 
 
 " He has always been kind to me, and 
 kinder, I do believe, when he knew all 
 that the dark blank of my life concealed," 
 said the woman. 
 
 " I am exceedingly glad to hear this of 
 you, Abel Barnes," said Silvester Lang- 
 dale ; " for, to tell you the truth, I have 
 been led to believe that you fighting men 
 do not as a rule treat your wives as men 
 should do." 
 
 " There's plenty of very black sheep 
 amongst us, sir ; and when they are black, 
 they're very black indeed. I've been 
 unlucky, sir — very unlucky nearly all my
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 219 
 
 life, but I never in all my life, sir, struck a 
 woman, or hit a man when he was down." 
 
 " You are an honest fellow, Abel," 
 cried Silvester Langdale, "and perhaps, 
 as you say, this is the turning day of 
 your fortunes. You have come here to 
 thank me for my exertions in your behalf 
 to-day. It may be that equal gratitude 
 is due from me. Events in life are 
 strangely blended, and if I can, believe 
 me, good fellow, that I will care for you." 
 
 "Oh, sir, you have already cared for 
 me enough," said the man, gratefully. 
 
 " What is your boy ?" inquired Silvester 
 Langdale. 
 
 " He gets a few shillings, sir, by sing- 
 ing in the chorus at one of the music 
 halls," said the woman. 
 
 " Only a few shillings ?" said Silvester. 
 
 " A shilling a night," the woman said. 
 
 " I think he tpld me that you had 
 attended to his education ?"
 
 220 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 *•' In the intervals of our struggles for 
 bread," said tlie woman, " I have not 
 ])een unmindful of that/' 
 
 '' Is he particularly attaclied to his 
 present calling ?" 
 
 " I like it very well, sir ; but I should 
 like it a good deal better if I could get 
 some more money for father and mother," 
 the boy said, speaking for the first time 
 during the interview. 
 
 " Which do you care most for, the 
 money or the occupation ?" inquired 
 Silvester Langdale. 
 
 *' Oh, the money, sir," the boy an- 
 swered, hastily. 
 
 " How would you like to be with me ?" 
 
 Abel Barnes clutched his son by the 
 arm, and cried hoarsely, as though he 
 were almost choking — 
 
 " Severn, do you hear what the gentle- 
 man says ?" 
 
 " Yes, father," said the boy ; and then
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 221 
 
 addressing the young barrister, lie added, 
 " Oh, I should so like it, sir." 
 
 " Would jou like this dingy room as 
 well as the brilliant music hall ?" 
 
 " Should I be always with you, sir ?" 
 the boy inquired. 
 
 "Mostly." 
 
 " Then I should like it a good deal 
 better, sir." 
 
 Abel Barnes patted his son appro vingl}' 
 on the back. 
 
 "You shall come to me, then," said 
 Silvester Langdale. 
 
 " Severn, my boy," cried the burly 
 pugilist, in a tone of delight, " your for- 
 tune's made. Only think, it was lucky 
 after all that the old villain did break his 
 neck in tumbling down stairs ;" and then, 
 thinking he had outstepped the bounds of 
 decorum, he rather ludicrously turned to 
 Silvester Langdale, and said, "Begging 
 your pardon, sir, I didn't mean to say
 
 222 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 that, you know; but out of evil comes 
 good sometimes, doesn't it, sir ?" 
 
 Silvester Langdale was prevented con- 
 testing this point, supposing that he had 
 desired to do so, by a knock which was 
 heard at the door. 
 
 " Have the goodness to see who is 
 there, my boy, will you?" said Silvester 
 Langdale to Abel Barnes's son ; and the 
 boy sprang with alacrity to the door, and 
 opened it. 
 
 " Mr. Langdale's chambers ?" cried a 
 voice, in a flippant tone, interrogatively. 
 
 " Yes," replied the boy, with a little 
 hesitation. 
 
 " Are you his clerk ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Where is he, then ?" 
 
 Silvester Langdale here stepped to the 
 door himself, and outside thereof he encoun- 
 tered a young man, very flashy in appear- 
 ance, and yet rather shabby in his attire. 

 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 223 
 
 " Oh, here's three briefs for Mr. Silvester 
 Langdale, from our people ; and precious 
 sharp work we've had to get them ready, 
 — only about three quarters of an hour to 
 do the lot in. Cant say I relish this 
 forcing system." 
 
 The speaker had clearly undergone a 
 long course of forcing, and was evidently 
 beginning to run to seed. 
 
 " You'll see that Mr. Langdale has 'em 
 directly, will you ?" 
 
 " I am Mr. Langdale," said that gen- 
 tleman. 
 
 " Oh, beg your pardon, sir," the bearer 
 of the briefs that had undergone the 
 forcing process cried, in an altered tone, 
 and taking off his hat — " beg your pardon, 
 sir; Bluggett's case is fixed first on the 
 list in the morning." 
 
 " Very good," said the young barrister. 
 
 " Good day, sir," cried the individual 
 who appeared to have run to seed; and
 
 224 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 having made a profound bow with his 
 limp hat, he took his way downstairs. 
 
 Fortune was beginning to shower her 
 gifts early upon the young barrister. If 
 his visitors had known the nature of the 
 communication that had just been made 
 to him, how gladty would they, humbly 
 and with heartfelt pleasure, have shared 
 the delight which at that moment he 
 naturally felt. 
 
 "Abel Barnes, good fellow," said Sil- 
 vester Langdale, putting his hand on to 
 the big shoulder of the pugilist, " you, as 
 well as your son, shall change 3'our course 
 of life. I'll think of it to-morrow." 
 
 " Oh, sir," cried the man, with rough 
 feeling, " I could put my neck under your 
 foot, sir ; and I'll show you yet that the 
 character Lord Montalban give me was 
 deserved by me." 
 
 " Did Lord Montalban give you a 
 character ?" cried the woman, in a tone
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 225 
 
 that seemed to Silvester Langdale to be 
 one of affright, or of strange agitation. 
 
 " Ay, my girl, that he did ! and spoke 
 Tip well for me too — didn't he, sir ?" 
 
 " He did certainly, and he seems to 
 have taken a sudden fancy to me, for he 
 has invited me to dine with him to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " Lord Montalban ?" cried the woman, 
 with a kind of gasp, and clasping her 
 hands. 
 
 Before Silvester Langdale could remark 
 upon this exclamation, Abel Barnes whis- 
 pered in his ear, " It's a very strange 
 thing, sir, but she is often took in that 
 way when people's names is mentioned. 
 It's her troubles, poor thing, her troubles." 
 
 There was something, however, in the 
 woman's manner which Langdale thought 
 was not indicative of the soundness of 
 Abel Barnes's conclusion upon this point. 
 He thought that it required little pene- 
 
 VOL. I. 15
 
 226 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 tration to perceive or discover that there 
 was something beneath the surface which 
 had taken deep root in the woman's mind 
 never to be eradicated. The pugiHst's 
 theory with regard to it was based, no 
 doubt, upon homely and honest phi- 
 losophy, but it was very wide of the 
 mark nevertheless, and this Silvester 
 Langdale was not slow to perceive. He, 
 however, did not pursue a subject which 
 was evidently painful to the wife of Abel 
 Barnes, but he resolved within himself to 
 take some future opportunity of observing 
 her bearing further. Eeverting to the 
 subject of the boy's entering his service, 
 he said — 
 
 " I suppose your son can write tolerably 
 well?" 
 
 This question was addressed to the 
 woman, and it seemed immediately to 
 brighten her up. At all events it in- 
 stantly dispelled the expression of her
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 227 
 
 countenance, wliicli Silvester Langdale 
 had observed that the mention of the 
 name of Lord Montalban had produced, 
 as she said with something like an ex- 
 pression of pride in her smile, 
 
 "Sir, I have taught him to write." 
 
 Silvester Langdale inclined his head in 
 compliment to her, and smiled approval. 
 
 "And he has been an apt pupil," she 
 added; "for not only has he learnt to 
 write well, but he has imitated my hand 
 exactly." 
 
 " I presume, then, that you have some- 
 thing to be proud of in your hand- 
 writing ?" said Silvester Langdale, smiling. 
 
 The question made the woman colour, 
 and she drew back as though she had 
 inadvertently overstepped some imaginary 
 line. Her husband, however, stepped 
 forward to her relief, and with a gratified 
 expression sufiusing his whole counte- 
 nance, he said — 
 
 15—2
 
 228 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " She's the most beautiful writer you 
 ever see, sir ; she was trained at a 
 boarding-school, slie was." 
 
 *' Oil, Abel, what does Mr. Langdale 
 care about tliat ?" said the woman, in a 
 tone which implied that she was in doubt 
 whether to alloAv her husband to go on 
 with this reference to her early history, or 
 to check him at once. 
 
 " And Severn writes just like her, sir ; 
 don't you, Severn?" continued the pugilist, 
 turning to his son. 
 
 "Yes, sir, you could hardly tell my 
 writing from mother's, sir; it's so like 
 hers," answered the boy, rather proudly. 
 
 " The gentleman would like to see it, 
 Severn. I am sure he would ; wouldn't 
 you, sir?" and the burly pugilist appealed 
 in a confident tone to the young barrister. 
 
 Silvester Langdale was amused at the 
 suggestion, and smilingly intimated liis 
 approval of it.
 
 THE MAX IN CHxVINS. 229 
 
 " Now, Severn," exclaimed the pugilist, 
 in quite a dignified tone of authorit}^ 
 *'you take Mr. Langdale's pen there, 
 and write what I am a-going to tell 
 you. 
 
 And the boy sat down at the desk 
 opposite to Silvester Langdale, and taking 
 the pen in his hand, said he was ready to 
 receive his father's instructions. 
 
 *' Write this, Severn," the pugilist 
 said : " Abel Barnes and Mrs. Barnes his 
 wife, and Severn Barnes, the son, agrees 
 to do everything that Mr. Silvester Lang- 
 dale, Esq., tells them." 
 
 As soon as the boy commenced writing, 
 Silvester Langdale observed that the 
 woman noiselessly approached the chair 
 where her son was sitting, and, as he 
 wrote, looked over his shoulder ; the 
 interest she felt in the proceeding mani- 
 fested itself in the expression of her 
 countenance. There was anotlier expres-
 
 230 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 sion, too, which appeared to be blended 
 with it, and that was one of relief, as it 
 would seem ; for when the boy had got to 
 one part of the dictation which his father 
 Lad given, she said in an under-tone, and 
 in a tone of encouragement to the boy, 
 " That's right, Severn !" and she was evi- 
 dently pleased. 
 
 The boy handed to Langdale what we 
 suppose must be taken as a specimen of 
 his hand- writing, but which had not been 
 asked for as such by the young barrister ; 
 and he did so evidently with satisfaction 
 to himself, and certainly with the proudest 
 satisfaction to Abel Barnes, who gazed 
 with a kind of burly dignity upon the pro- 
 ceeding. 
 
 Silvester Langdale took the paper from 
 the boy's hand, and he found that the 
 pugilist had in no way exaggerated the 
 ability of his son, with regard to his 
 hand- writing. It had all the elegance of
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 231 
 
 a female hand, but what perhaps surprised 
 Langdale more than the caligraphy itself, 
 was the fact that the instructions of Abel 
 Barnes had been rendered in correct 
 English; and therefore they had been 
 slightly departed from. It was this that 
 had called forth the subdued expression of 
 approval from the woman, as she gazed 
 over her son's shoulder whilst he was 
 writing that which Abel Barnes had dic- 
 tated. 
 
 " There, sir, that's something like 
 writing, aint it ?" inquired Abel Barnes, 
 quite proudly. 
 
 The inspection of the writing was in 
 itself, of course, gratifying to Silvester 
 Langdale. It, however, created a fresh 
 interest in his mind, beyond that of the 
 ordinary satisfaction which it was calcu- 
 lated to produce. He could not but 
 asso(iiate with it the woman before him, 
 and she was beginning imperceptibly to
 
 232 
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 become a kind of mystery in his mind. 
 Probably, however, the feeling was merely 
 an impulsive one. 
 
 "It is a beautiful hand I" he said ; and 
 as he did so he looked with a kind of 
 newly-awakened curiosity towards the 
 woman. 
 
 " I think he'll be a credit to you, sir,'* 
 said Abel Barnes, confidently. 
 
 "Certainly everything seems favour- 
 ably to recommend him," the barrister 
 replied. 
 
 " I am convinced that he will be all 
 that you will desire of him, sir," and as 
 the woman said this, she looked earnestly 
 into the countenance of the young bar- 
 rister. 
 
 And so it w^as arranged that young 
 Severn Barnes should on the morrow- 
 become the clerk of Silvester Lang- 
 dale. 
 
 The three then took their leave of the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 233 
 
 young barrister, who, as soon as they 
 were gone, commenced to devour eagerly 
 the contents of the briefs which the 
 seedy young gentleman had placed in his 
 hands.
 
 234 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTEE XI. 
 
 SILVESTER LANGDALE DINES WITH VISCOUNT 
 MONTALBAN. 
 
 Silvester L an gd ale's experience in dining 
 out had not been extensive. He had not 
 unfrequently been invited to dinner by the 
 parents of some of the pupils at the school 
 in the old street of the old city in the 
 country; and although some of those 
 banquets had been rather grand in their 
 way — at least, some of the people v/ho 
 gave them thought they were, — still they 
 were quite a different sort of affair from 
 those which commonly take place in the 
 purheus of Park Lane. Some of them 
 were homely and jovial, for they were
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 235 
 
 held in the best rooras of big farmhouses, 
 which, though they were not surrounded 
 by great parks, with avenues of ancestral 
 trees, beneath which browsed herds of 
 beautiful deer, had glorious grounds 
 withal, stretching around them, — grounds 
 which every year yielded rich crops of 
 fruit and grain of every kind, and about 
 which, in place of the browsing deer, large 
 flocks of stock grazed and grew fat. 
 Others, again, were rather stiff and formal, 
 not to say slightly stuck up ; for they 
 took place within the genteel circle of a 
 genteel cathedi-al city, and the guests 
 thereof treated each other with super- 
 cilious politeness, and a chilling warmth 
 of ardent friendship, which is oftentimes 
 softened down to amiability, if the dinner 
 be a good one. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had never dined 
 with a lord. In the first place, there was 
 no lord in the old city to dine with,
 
 236 THE MAN in' CHAINS. 
 
 altliougli there were several resident in 
 the county, but they were only known in 
 the old city as people who should be held 
 in awe, and who were expected occa- 
 sionally only to honour the city with 
 their presence, and even then to flit 
 through it like brilliant social meteors as 
 they were. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had once dined with 
 the Mayor of the city at his inaugural 
 feast, and he retained a lively recollection 
 that he did not enjoy himself at the 
 banquet; for tlie citizens who happened 
 to sit around him were rather impulsive 
 in their feeding, and were almost ravenous 
 after the good things on the table. The 
 interesting citizen who sat immediately 
 opposite to him was impressively stout, 
 and peas being in season at the time, he 
 had an unpleasant habit of shovelling 
 them down his capacious throat with his 
 knife, which in the operation for a 
 
 i
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 237 
 
 moment completely disappeared from 
 siglit, — as completely, indeed, as if the 
 man had been Eamo Samee himself 
 Then after dinner the stout citizen 
 breathed so exceedingly hard, that tlie 
 expression of his countenance became un- 
 pleasantly suggestive of a sanguineous 
 determination towards the head. He was 
 clearly, however, a man of weight in more 
 respects than one, as Silvester Langdale 
 inferred from the respect and attention 
 that were paid to him by those decayed 
 citizens who were charitably employed as 
 waiters on the occasion. Silvester, how- 
 ever, had no doubt about the matter 
 when, the cloth having been drawn, and 
 the wine and dessert placed on the table, 
 the plethoric citizen was called upon to 
 propose the toast of " the Sheriff." The 
 stout citizen ponderously rose, and dis- 
 charged the duty in a thick, unctuous 
 voice ; and his words rolled out greasily
 
 238 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 and wholly unfettered by those rigid 
 trammels which grammatical accuracy im- 
 poses. He proposed the toast in a brief 
 but highly complimentary speech, and he 
 concluded by informing the assembled 
 guests that "the gentleman whose health 
 he was 23roposing was one as he was 
 proud to know, and was a honour to the 
 city, for he could say what very few could, 
 that by his own exertions he had rose 
 from the very dregs of society." Whether 
 the sheriff felt gratified by this especial 
 reference of his honourable friend to his 
 early history, Silvester Langdale had no 
 means of knowing, but he could not fail 
 to observe that the good intentions of the 
 plethoric citizen caused much amusement 
 to his worship) the Mayor and his friends 
 around him. 
 
 As the time for preparation for the 
 visit to Lord Montalban approached, 
 there is no doubt that Silvester Langdale
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 239 
 
 felt considerable embarrassment. He 
 certainly felt far more nervous than lie 
 did when he went down to the court to 
 make his dehut at the bar on the previous 
 day, for he was about to make his appear^ 
 ance in a circle of which he knew nothing 
 from experience, and in which he might 
 possibly have to stand isolated, as it were. 
 This thought, however, brought a sliglit 
 flush into his countenance, — not, certainly, 
 arising out of a feeling of nervousness or 
 embarrassment, but from that pride which 
 j^laces men of widely different social status 
 upon a footing of equality. The passing 
 thought that he might be received — not 
 by his host, but by those who would be 
 around his host — with the hauteur of 
 patronage and condescension, roused that 
 pride within him, and seemed to nerve 
 him for his advent to a new sphere. He 
 had assumed that there were to be other 
 guests besides himself at Lord Mont-
 
 240 THE ^AN IN CHAINS. 
 
 alban's, and yet he had no warrant for 
 such an assumption, because Lord Mont- 
 iilban liiniself had said nothing about it, 
 and of course nobody else had. Indeed, 
 if Silvester Langdale had reasoned at all 
 upon the matter, he would have inferred 
 that the probability was that there would 
 he no other guests, considering the manner 
 of the invitation he had received, and the 
 brevity of the interval between the time 
 it was given and the time to which it 
 referred. Silvester Langdale, however, 
 liad not reasoned upon the matter; his 
 mind was full of glowing hopes and 
 bright aspirations : the deduf of yesterday 
 2iad opened to his mental view a brilliant 
 future, and he was naturally dazzled by 
 st; and so he had not, as probably he 
 would otherwise have done, occupied his 
 thoughts exclusively with the invitation 
 he had received from Lord Montalban. 
 That invitation had, so to speak, blended
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 241 
 
 with the picture which had opened to his 
 mental vision, and he had from the first 
 moment associated it with a brilHant 
 cratherinor.' He was invited to dine with 
 a nobleman whom he had never seen 
 until yesterday, and had scarcely ever 
 heard of. His fancy, however, was not 
 altogether in antagonism with the reality, 
 for it so happened that Lord Montalban 
 had previously invited a small party to 
 dinner on this particular day. 
 
 The Marquis of Milltown was one of 
 the guests ; and when he was introduced 
 to Silvester Langdale, he placed himself 
 before the young barrister so as to exhibit 
 his magnificently and artistically con- 
 structed clothes to the fullest advantage, 
 and smiled inanely upon him. The smile, 
 however, had just sufficient expression in 
 it to indicate that the brilliant Marquis 
 felt personally gratified in making the 
 acquaintance of Silvester Langdale. He 
 
 VOL. I. 16
 
 242 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 had seen by the papers of that morning 
 that Langdale had made a brilliant 
 •defence for a fighting man, and had got 
 him off; and so Silvester was a great 
 character in his eyes in consequence, not 
 so much because he had made a brilliant 
 speech — perhaps not at all on that 
 account, — but because he had associated 
 himself with a pugilist. 
 
 " How d'ye do ? So glad to see you," 
 said the Marquis, extending three of his 
 fingers to Silvester Langdale. " You 
 managed to get Abel Barnes off, I 
 see." 
 
 Silvester bowed in acknowledgment. 
 
 " Sorry I wasn't there to hear it," the 
 Marquis was pleased to say; "but the 
 fact is, Barnes has been so often licked 
 that I didn't feel inclined. Sorry I 
 didn't, though, now." 
 
 And the noble Marquis turned laugh- 
 ingly away towards a large glass, and
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 243 
 
 became wholly absorbed in the contempla- 
 tion of his clothes. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had never seen such 
 a magnificent figure as that of Miss 
 Montalban ; and until that moment when 
 he gazed upon her face he had never 
 known what true and unalloyed female 
 beauty was — at least those were the 
 instantaneous impressions that were pro- 
 duced upon his mind when he was in- 
 troduced to Lord Montalban s daughter. 
 That introduction certainly for the 
 moment made him feel nervous. 
 
 The other guests were high and aris- 
 tocratic, of course. There was a member 
 of the House of Commons, who entered 
 that assembly thirty years ago as a 
 staunch member of the country party, 
 had never swerved from one special 
 political line, was a magnate amongst 
 farmers, had gradually expanded in 
 obesity, and from a county squire had 
 
 16—2
 
 244 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 blossomed into a baronet. He was 
 famous in the House for a loud, boisterous 
 voice, an expansive waistcoat, and a power 
 of bellowing down a speaker wliicli no 
 other member could exhibit. 
 
 One of the guests was a foreigner. 
 Count Moule, a tall man, of about forty 
 years of age ; very slight in figure, wliicli 
 was exceedingly upright and good; a 
 sharp, thin face, and raven black whiskers, 
 moustache, and liair. He spoke English 
 with scarcely a tinge of a foreign accent. 
 The most remarkable peculiarity, liow- 
 ever, about liini perhaps was his liand, 
 which was delicately white, the fingers 
 thereof being rather long and tapering. 
 While he Vv^as speaking, he exhibited a 
 peculiar restlessness about the hands, 
 which he seemed to move floatingly 
 about, as it were. They appeared to float 
 upon the air as he moved them, as though 
 they were, in some mysterious way, self-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 245 
 
 supporting. You could see that they 
 were soft — a softness that was suggestive 
 of the ])aw, which at one moment feels 
 like velvet, and in the next puts forth 
 claws that are like steel. 
 
 The other guests were proudly aris- 
 tocratic, highly connected — some of them 
 very rich, and all very insignificant. 
 
 Silvester Langdale felt perfectly at his 
 ease in tliis, to him, strange company, 
 and he scrutinizingly observed them all. 
 At dinner he was placed between the 
 Marquis of Milltown and a grandly made- 
 up maiden lady of fifty-three — tall, gaunt, 
 bony, and evidently strong-minded, with 
 a power and a determination to maintain 
 the dignity of her rank — she was the 
 sister of an earl — not frequently met with 
 even in the circles of society that are up 
 above. In the youthful days of this 
 lady, however, Mrs. Candour had been 
 very busy with her reputation, which.
 
 246 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 happily, being of a vigorous constitution, 
 had flourished on notwithstanding. There 
 was, however, but little doubt that Mrs. 
 Candour had something to do with the 
 celibacy of the tall lady seated next to 
 Silvester Langdale, for she had frequently 
 maliciously observed that men might 
 marry widows, as they did every day; 
 but for her part she also observed, that 
 as a rule they did not much cure about 
 marrying a w^oman that was neither one 
 thing nor another. And then she would 
 laugh, and say that the world was very 
 censorious truly. 
 
 There, between these two, the Marquis 
 and the sister of an earl, Silvester Lang- 
 dale got on tolerably well. The earl's 
 sister was quite patronizing to him, and 
 the Marquis of Milltown talked inanely 
 about the odds at the Corner, a wonderful 
 terrier that a friend of his had got, and a 
 doubt in his own mind — which he hoped
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 247 
 
 by great exertion to solve — whether he 
 should start a dog-cart instead of a cab. 
 
 There was nothing particularly remark- 
 able about the dinner, which was rich 
 and elegant. When the ladies had with- 
 drawn, the county member with the ex- 
 pansive waistcoat pushed the decanters- 
 along with great regularity and swiftness. 
 
 "Langdale," exclaimed the host, sud- 
 denly breaking into a new subject of 
 conversation, " I never heard anything 
 more brilliant than your speech yesterday,, 
 and yet I am told it was your first 
 appearance at the bar." 
 
 "True, my lord, it was my first ap- 
 pearance in a new character." 
 
 "And do you intend to confine your- 
 self to practise in that court?" Lord 
 Montalban inquired. 
 
 " I trust not," replied Langdale. " In^ 
 November I hope to make my bow at 
 Westminster."
 
 248 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 "What, come into our House?" in- 
 quired tlie baronet with the waistcoat, 
 meaning by the phrase " our House" the 
 House of Commons. 
 
 " Not at present," said Silvester Lang- 
 dale ; " although by-and-b3^e, perhaps, I 
 may spur on my ambition for such a 
 goal." 
 
 "I had a couple of boroughs once," 
 said Lord Montalban, " but somehow 
 they seem to have slipped imperceptibly 
 away." 
 
 " You were never half political enough," 
 the expansive waistcoat observed, as he 
 peeled a peach, and, first removing the 
 stone, put the whole of it into his capa- 
 cious mouth at once. " You always 
 years ago thought more of field sports 
 and the allurements of female charms 
 than politics. Look at me." 
 
 Well, he was something to look at, 
 certainly. His great round head seemed
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 249 
 
 to have expanded under the influence of 
 the wine and dessert, for he was equally 
 busy Avith both ; but of course it was no 
 ordinary supply that was required for the 
 support of that expansive waistcoat. 
 
 "When I was a young man I swore 
 that I'd be a kind of political pickaxe in 
 the side of the reforming whip, and, ecod ! 
 IVe kept my oath ; and look at me now. 
 I'll bet an even thousand this minute 
 that I'll go down to the House, and from 
 my usual place on the second opposition 
 bench I'll put down any man — I don't 
 care who he is — that is at the time 
 speaking, — in what time shall I say? — 
 in ten minutes. There now ! I call that 
 being a power in the State ; but I could 
 only have obtained it by beginning 
 early. You, on the contrar}^ were gal- 
 livanting after boarding-school Misses at 
 Brighton." 
 
 Lord Montalban laughed, and said Sir
 
 250 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Timotliy always was and always would 
 be censorious. 
 
 " Censorious ! Not a bit of it," cried 
 Sir Timothy, with his mouth full of jar- 
 sronelle ; " it's all true. Onlv I recollect 
 that it was the talk of our club twenty 
 years ago that you had boasted that 
 you would carry off three girls from a 
 Brighton boarding-school in three months. 
 I recollect also that you didn't do it, 
 though; you only carried off one, but 
 you said she was worth any tliree others, 
 so you satisfied your conscience in that 
 way." 
 
 "Ah, those are days gone by, Sir 
 Timothy, never to return," said Lord 
 Montalban, with something like a sigh, 
 but in no way attempting to deny the 
 truth of the reminiscence which Sir 
 Waistcoat had favoured them with. 
 
 Count Moule, who had spoken \'ery 
 little, observed that he thouo^ht it mis^lit
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 251 
 
 be taken as conceded that his lordship 
 and Sir Timothy represented two different 
 kinds of intrigue, which, however, he 
 believed were very often combined in the 
 same person — he meant political intrigue 
 and amorous intrigue. 
 
 " I have been told that they are almost 
 invariably associated, although, like all 
 other rules, it has its exception, for have 
 we not Sir Timothy here?" said Lord 
 Montalban, laughing. 
 
 "And which is yours? or have you 
 got them both. Count ?" Sir Timothy 
 inquired. 
 
 The Count shrugged his shoulders, and 
 his fingers floated on the air. He smiled 
 significantly, but he made no answer in 
 words to the query that had been put to 
 him. 
 
 Count Moule was an intriguer, but in 
 quite a different line from the two that 
 had been indicated by Sir Timothy. Hi&
 
 252 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 was a still more subtle intrigue, for it 
 bordered frequently upon something more 
 venal, and it had to do frequently with a 
 passion in the female heart — a passion 
 that, when once implanted, growls imper- 
 ceptibly; a dishonourable passion too, 
 that flourishes sometimes in an otherwise 
 pure heart ; a passion that prostrates the 
 will, especially where that will has always 
 been unchecked and yielded to ; a passion 
 that exists and expands sometimes even 
 where female purity in all other regards 
 exists in all its chasteness in the human 
 heart. 
 
 The Marquis of Milltown felt that the 
 subject under discussion was either far 
 above him or infinitely beneath him — it 
 matters little which — and so he did not 
 attempt to throw any light upon it at all. 
 He was, however, struck with a novel 
 idea, and he gave expression to it in these 
 words —
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 255 
 
 " If a fellah dresses to the point I don't 
 think there need be much intrigue, if lie 
 minds what he is about. So what do 
 you say to our joining the ladies ?' 
 
 The brilliant Marquis could not have 
 made a more welcome proj^osition to 
 Silvester Langdale, who, truth to say, 
 was not much gratified by the tone of the 
 conversation of those around him. It 
 was sufficient to enable him, he thought,, 
 to judge of their characters. It was 
 palpable enough that Lord Montalban 
 had been a libertine in his youth, wliat- 
 ever he was now, and it required little 
 discernment to discover that he was self- 
 satisfied with his own antecedents in that 
 respect.
 
 254 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 I 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 MISS MONTALBAN AXD SILVESTER LANGDALE. 
 
 Silvester Langdale found liimself seated 
 by the side of Miss Montalban in the 
 drawing-room, near to one of the open 
 windows that looked out upon the Park, 
 from which there proceeded the pecuKar 
 hum that issues from a distant crowd, 
 and wdiich is more palpable on a summer 
 evening than at any other time. 
 
 " Are you fond of racing ?" Miss Mont- 
 alban inquired of Silvester Langdale, 
 rather abruptly. 
 
 " I have never been upon a racecourse 
 Tnore than three times in my life," he 
 repHed. 
 
 " Do you hunt ?" she asked.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 255 
 
 " I have never seen a pack of hounds," 
 he answered, laughing. 
 
 " Dear me ! where have you lived ?" 
 she said, elevating her beautiful eyebrows. 
 
 " I have been immured in the country 
 all my life." 
 
 " Well, you could not follow the hounds 
 in town. You can have hunting only in 
 the country." 
 
 And Miss Montalban looked upon 
 Silvester with an expression upon her 
 countenance as of pity ; perhaps that was 
 her feeling. 
 
 As Silvester Langdale gazed upon that 
 beautiful face — beautiful and intellectual 
 too, tinged, as it was, with an almost 
 imperceptible shade of melancholy — he 
 felt perplexed at the questions she had 
 just put to him. 
 
 " I may infer, then," he said, " that 
 you are attached to the sports of the 
 field?"
 
 256 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 "Ardently," slie replied, a beaming 
 smile mantling over her noble countenance. 
 
 " I have no doubt I should have been 
 so if the opportunity of indulging the 
 predilection had been throvrn in my way," 
 said Silvester. 
 
 *' But you say you have been on 
 a racecourse two or three times," Miss 
 Montalban observed. 
 
 '* Yes, our own racecourse down in the 
 country," he answered. 
 
 "And where is that?'' 
 
 " Sabrinister." 
 
 " I know it well," she exclaimed, almost 
 enthusiastically — "its beautiful racecourse, 
 its nuble country, and its gallant steeple- 
 chase." 
 
 "Oh, I saw the steeple-chase there 
 once," Silvester Langdale said. 
 
 " I have been three times there," cried 
 Miss Montalban, quickly ; " and as I 
 stood upon that Stand to watcli the
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 257 
 
 contest, do you know tliat I felt an 
 almost irresistible impulse to jump down 
 from it into the ring below ?" 
 
 " Dear me ! why ?" exclaimed Silvester 
 Langdale, in a tone of alarm. 
 
 Miss Montalban laughed, and said that 
 Mr. Langdale looked as though she were 
 really then going to take the perilous 
 leap she had spoken of 
 
 " It was the first time I had seen a 
 steeple-chase," she explained ; '' and do 
 you know that, as I saw that phalanx of 
 daring horsemen come dashing down the 
 course to take the water-jump, my heart 
 bounded within me, and I wished at the 
 
 moment what do you think I wished 
 
 at that moment ?" she inquired, smilingly, 
 of Silvester Langdale. 
 
 The young barrister ventured to suppose 
 that it was a wish that all the horses 
 would get over the leap safely. 
 
 " Nothing of the sort," she cried, hastily, 
 
 VOL. I. 17
 
 258 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 as though such a wish would have been 
 puerile. " No, I wished at that moment 
 to be one amongst them/* she exclaimed, 
 while her eyes bore sparkling evidence of 
 the fervency of her declaration. 
 
 " You must indeed be attached to the 
 chase," said Silvester Langdale, with 
 almost a scared look, for the declaration 
 had quite astounded him. 
 
 "The chase !" she cried ; "yes, I madly 
 love it. You don't, you say?" 
 
 " No, no, no, I did not say that," cried 
 Silvester Langdale ; " I meant to say that 
 I have had no experience in connexion 
 with it." 
 
 " One so clever as you ought to love 
 the sports of the field. I should like you 
 all the better if you did," she said, play- 
 fully, and, as it seemed to Silvester Lang- 
 dale, tenderly and hopefully. 
 
 What is the matter with you, Silvester 
 Langdale ? — you who went through that
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 259 
 
 trying ordeal in the Court in tlie City yes- 
 terday; you who stood unabashed before the 
 scrutinizing eyes of captious and jealous 
 critics ; you who had so nobly achieved a 
 great triumph, why do you feel a tremor 
 now ? why does the beating of your heart 
 appear to check your breath ? and how is 
 it that you feel a flush of something like 
 jealousy as the Marquis of Milltown 
 saunters across the room, and takes a 
 seat on the other side of Miss Montalban? 
 Why, it is no novel sensation in itself, 
 although it may be to you, Silvester 
 Langdale, because that sensation is almost 
 universal in the breast of man; it is 
 felt and recognised the wide world 
 over. You are in love, young man, as 
 you will find before twenty-four hours 
 have passed over your head; so madly 
 in love that the object of your passion 
 will sit as empress over that queen 
 whom you till now believed was ruling 
 
 17—2
 
 260 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 over all your soul under the title of 
 Ambition. 
 
 " The inane puppy !" Silvester Lang- 
 dale thought to himself, as the Marquis 
 of Milltown inquired of Miss Montalban 
 which day she intended to go to Good- 
 wood. 
 
 " Because you know," the Marquis 
 said, " I shall go down with you ; and if 
 I decide upon the dog-cart, I shall drive 
 it for the first time in Goodwood Park. 
 That will be something, wont it ?" 
 
 "We intend to go on the Saturday 
 previously," Miss Montalban said. 
 
 " Oh dear me !" cried the Marquis of 
 Milltown, "how particularly unfortunate!" 
 
 "Indeed! Why?'* 
 
 " Wliy, Tattersall's will meet on Mon- 
 day, you know, and I shall be anxious to 
 know if our friend * Peeping Tom' rides 
 easily in the market," the Marquis replied, 
 twisting his moustache.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 261 
 
 "Will you go to Goodwood, Mr. 
 Langdale ?" Miss Montalban inquired, 
 turning to Silvester. 
 
 " Oh, I wish you would ; 'pon my soul 
 I do," interposed the Marquis ; " and you 
 can have a seat in the dog-cart, you know." 
 
 Silvester Langdale's mind was made up 
 on. the instant, and he recklessly promised 
 that he would go. 
 
 " Oh, papa," cried Miss Montalban to 
 her father, " Mr. Langdale says he will 
 go with us to Goodwood." 
 
 " I am sure I shall be delighted ;" and 
 as Lord Montalban said this it was plain 
 enough that he meant what he said. 
 "By-the-bye, that reminds me that I 
 have received a note from Baskerville, in 
 which he says he has got our money on 
 * Peeping Tom,' but at ridiculously short 
 prices." 
 
 " Baskerville 1" exclaimed Silvester 
 Langdale, involuntarily.
 
 262 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " Yes, Marl Baskerville," replied Lord 
 Montalban. " He's a friend of yours, 
 you know, because lie was the man who 
 gave you your first brief, and introduced 
 you to the world, I am sure I may say it 
 now, the most rising young man at the 
 bar." 
 
 Silvester Langdale scarcely heeded the 
 compliment, as he said, smiling — 
 
 " I did not know that his professional 
 avocations embraced that kind of busi- 
 ness." 
 
 "Oh, you'll know him better by-and- 
 bye. Why, that is his chief business — 
 that and money-lending." 
 
 " And a devilish fine thing he makes of 
 it, I am told," joined in Sir Timothy. 
 " True spirit of a miser, I believe — always 
 brooding over his gold." 
 
 "I know him too," observed Count 
 Moule ; " and I think you are in error 
 when you say that he broods over his
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 263 
 
 gold. I believe that it is something else 
 that he broods over. He is one of the 
 shrewdest men I have ever met with ; 
 one of the cleverest, I may say. Yet do 
 you know that I think he has a slight 
 touch of lunacy ?" 
 
 " Indeed ! Why do you think that?" 
 Lord Montalban inquired. 
 
 '* Well, it may be only fancy of mine," 
 said the Count, " although I don't think 
 it is ; and if I am right in my conjecture, 
 it is that kind of brooding lunacy which, 
 feeding upon itself, as it were, frequently 
 in the end breaks out into suicide or some 
 fearful crime." 
 
 " Grood heavens !" exclaimed Miss 
 Montalban; "you do not mean to 
 say that the Marl Baskerville who 
 comes here sometimes is that kind of 
 ^.. — 
 
 " It may be a mere suspicion of mine, a 
 mere fancy,'' said the Count.
 
 264 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " I sliall always feel alarmed when I 
 see liim," said Miss Montalban. 
 
 " Oh, I think you need not/' the Count 
 said. 
 
 " Well, I don't think he looks any- 
 thing like a lunatic myself," said the 
 Marquis of Milltown, drawlingly. 
 
 Probably, if the two had stood side by 
 side at the moment, the conclusion with 
 regard to the powers of mind of the two 
 would not have been to the advantage of 
 the Marquis. 
 
 " But why do you think there is any- 
 thing of the lunatic about Baskerville ?" 
 inquired Lord Montalban. " As you 
 have remarked, I have always understood 
 that he was considered one of the 
 shrewdest men on town." 
 
 " And that is so," returned Count 
 Moule ; " but madness is sometimes 
 linked with the greatest shrewdness." 
 
 *' Ah,' that I don't believe," observed
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 265 
 
 Sir Timothy. " You can't have the two 
 combined; it's all stuff to say so." 
 
 " What is that one of your poets says 
 about great wit being nearly allied to 
 madness ?" Count Moule inquired. 
 
 " Oh, I know nothing about that," 
 answered Sir Timothy; "but this I do 
 know, that to say Marl Baskerville is 
 anything like a lunatic is to say that a 
 handsome man is a monkey," and he 
 quite accidentally turned his head to the 
 Marquis of Milltown, who said — 
 
 " That's true enough." 
 
 "You have given us no reasons for 
 your opinion. Count, with regard to Marl 
 Baskerville," said Lord Montalban. 
 
 " It is scarcely an opinion," the Count 
 replied ; " it's an impression merely." 
 
 " But why the impression ?" 
 
 " I have been thrown a good deal with 
 him," observed the Count. 
 
 "Yes, we know that well enough,"
 
 266 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 said Lord Montalban, with a slight shrug 
 of the shoulders. 
 
 "And I feel convinced from observa- 
 tion that there is something weighing 
 upon his mind beyond the passing anxiety 
 of the hour,'*' the Count observed. 
 
 " May be so — thousands upon thou- 
 sands are in the same category — but that 
 is not madness,'' said Lord Montalban. 
 
 "True enough; but although we do 
 not recognise in such permanent impres- 
 sion any indication of lunacy, yet in some 
 minds, and I may add in the man of 
 great strength of mind especially, such 
 impressions have a tendency towards 
 madness." 
 
 " Towards melancholy, or moroseness, if 
 you like," said Lord Montalban. 
 
 " Call it what you please," the Count 
 said, smiling. 
 
 " That means that you still adhere to 
 your opinion," said Lord Montalban.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 267 
 
 Count Moule indicated by a motion of 
 his shoulders that he agreed with Lord 
 Montalban in that deduction. 
 
 *' And still you have not told us why ?" 
 said Lord Montalban, interrogatively. 
 
 " I have already told you that it is an 
 impression of mine," replied the Count, 
 smiling. 
 
 "And something more, as I take it," 
 suggested Lord Montalban. 
 
 " An inference of your own that, my 
 lord," and the Count still smiled as j^e 
 spoke. 
 
 " Have you studied madness?" abruptly 
 asked Sir Timothy of the Count. 
 
 " No, I certainly can't say that I have 
 made it a study ; I am merely speaking, 
 as I have said, of general impressions." 
 
 " Do you think there are outward and 
 visible signs indicating veiled lunacy ?" 
 asked Lord Montalban. 
 
 "Such has been an impression pro-
 
 268 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 duced upon my mind by association with 
 Marl Baskerville," said the Count. 
 
 " Tlien you are no man of penetration, 
 Count," Lord Montalban rcpHed. " You 
 have merely mistaken a rugged exterior 
 in Marl Baskerville as an indication of 
 some settled purpose, or some gnawing 
 internal passion. Now, Count, you are 
 altogether right aild altogether wrong, 
 strange as it may sound to say so," and 
 Lord Montalban laughed as he spoke. 
 " Marl Baskerville has a settled purpose 
 undoubtedly, but it has nothing whatever 
 to do with the past, it has reference only 
 and wholly to the present, and that pur- 
 pose is to get money." 
 
 " And what's the most remarkable part 
 of it is," joined in the Marquis of Mill- 
 town, as though he had made a wonderful 
 discovery ; " whenever I do anything for 
 a friend or myself it's sure to come into 
 his hands — extraordinary, ain't it?" and
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 269 
 
 the brilliant Marquis immediately retired 
 under the strain of this mental effort, and 
 looked out of the window towards the 
 Park. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had listened to the 
 conversation with much interest, but he 
 had taken no part in it. From what 
 little he had seen of Marl Baskerville, he 
 thought there was very little real foun- 
 dation for the impression which Count 
 Moule had expressed, and it struck him 
 that if Marl Baskerville was to be taken 
 as a lunatic, there were but very few 
 sane men at large in society. 
 
 " Still, after what you have said. Count," 
 said Lord Montalban, pursuing the sub- 
 ject, " I will certainly try and observe a 
 little more closely the peculiarities ''of 
 Marl Baskerville the next time I see him." 
 
 " And in all probability you will fail 
 to discover the indications to which I have 
 alluded," the Count said.
 
 270 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 "In all probability!" exclaimed Lord 
 Montalban ; " I am sure of it." 
 
 The shadows of the summer evening 
 have closed over the Park, and the 
 curtains have been drawn. The drawing- 
 room is brilliantly lighted, and as the 
 night advances a portion of the party sit 
 down to cards. Amongst the card party 
 are Lord Montalban himself, the Count, 
 Sir Timothy, the Marquis of Milltown, 
 and Miss Montalban, who, Silvester 
 Langdale observes, plays eagerly. He 
 also observes that the whole party play 
 for very heavy stakes, and that the Count 
 appears to be particularly lucky. 
 
 It is late in the evening before they 
 rise from the card-tables, and then Miss 
 Montalban appears much flushed. They 
 have risen earlier than they would have 
 done, for there is an important discussion 
 in the House of Commons that is to be 
 brought to a close that evening, and Sir
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 271 
 
 Timothy must go down to lend his voice 
 to the Opposition, and the Marquis of 
 Milltown to vote with him. And so 
 they take their leave to attend to that 
 sacred duty which their country demands 
 of them. 
 
 Silvester Langdale finds himself again 
 by the side of Miss Montalban, and they 
 walk up and down the room. Seeing a 
 small and elegant piano open, Silvester 
 says he is sure Miss Montalban is a lover 
 of music. 
 
 " Why ?" she inquires, with a pleased 
 smile. 
 
 " Because I have been told that all 
 who are fond of field sports are ardent 
 lovers of music." 
 
 " I never heard of the association 
 before," she said, " but in my case it is 
 true enough, for I am passionately fond 
 of music." 
 
 Silvester Langdale indicated by a move-
 
 272 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 ment of his hand that the piano was 
 open. 
 
 "Oh, I am but an indifferent performer," 
 she said, at once taking her seat at the 
 piano, and running her fingers over the 
 keys. 
 
 " Shall I play only, or shall I sing ?'* 
 she inquired. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to record 
 Silvester Langdale's answer, or the tone 
 in which it was given ; agreeably, how- 
 ever, Miss Montalban sang an exquisite 
 air to the following words : — 
 
 " The morn raay break in brightest hue, 
 
 The sun may rise in glory bright, 
 TJndimm'd by e'en a fleeting cloud 
 
 To mar the glory of his light ; 
 But yet the noon such clouds may show, 
 
 And o'er that brightness shadows fling. 
 So we on earth can never know 
 
 The sorrows that an hour may bring. 
 
 " Then let us live prepared for all, 
 With resignation's solace sweet ; 
 So that, whate'er perchance may fall. 
 The blow we may with courage meet.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 273 
 
 To all alike Fate's arrows fly, 
 
 And all-unerring is her wing ; 
 We know not, when dark care is nigh, 
 
 The solace that an hour may bring." 
 
 As he went home Silvester Langdale 
 felt himself in a delirium of delight, and 
 the cadence of that half-melancholy song 
 rang in his ears the whole night through. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 18
 
 274 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 SILVESTER LANGDALE FORGES HIS FIRST CHAIN. 
 
 As Silvester Langdale lay in his bed 
 awake the next morning — and he was 
 awake early enough ; as soon, indeed, as 
 it was light, early as that was — the events 
 of the last two days appeared to him Kke 
 a glorious dream. Only in that short 
 space of time he had accomplished with- 
 out any exertion of his own, that which 
 some men toil through half their lives 
 for, and even then do not always obtain 
 the object sought. " Surely there must be 
 an inscrutable chance in all this," Silvester 
 Langdale reasoned with himself, "although
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 275 
 
 it were idle to inquire whence good for- 
 tune — that which is really good fortune — 
 springs. If poor Margale had not sent 
 for me to be the witness of his death-bed 
 scene, I might have struggled on almost 
 hopelessly. I can see it; and no such 
 chance for me might have arisen as that 
 of Abel Barnes being arraigned on a 
 charge of manslaughter. But that a man 
 cannot be reckless unless he has a natural 
 bent that wa}^, these strange chances of the 
 last two days might make me recklessly 
 confident as to the future." 
 
 Thus reasoned Silvester Langdale to 
 himself, as he lay dreamily awake on his 
 bed, arguing with himself, indeed, that he 
 was not recklessly confident as to the 
 future — congratulating himself upon the 
 absence in himself of that recklessness, 
 little dreaming in this waking dream that 
 by so reasoning he was taking the first 
 step towards that recklessness with regard 
 
 18—2
 
 276 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 to the future wliicli lie was congratu- 
 lating himself upon having avoided : 
 that self-congratulation was a delusion, 
 indeed. 
 
 The recent past was bright in the mind 
 of Silvester Langdale, but it was not half 
 so bright as that future vrhich he could, 
 with so much to justify himself in doing 
 so, picture to himself; for since yester- 
 day — since last night, something had 
 arisen before his mind, and taken posses- 
 sion of it, which was not ambition, 
 although it was something like it ; but it 
 was more akin to hope. The form of 
 Augusta Montalban was present in his 
 mind as something to hope for beyond his 
 own ambition; something separate and 
 apart from it, if it could be so. His 
 ambition had suddenly taken a new form. 
 Yesterday its object was that he should 
 be famous in his new profession, an object 
 wholly confined to himself; now, as he
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 277 
 
 lay upon his bed dreaming, yet awake, liis 
 ambition was gradually assuming a new 
 form, or rather a new motive, that of 
 being really worthy of Augusta Mont- 
 alban. And how fantastic is the mind 
 of youth under such circumstances ! 
 Silvester Langdale was thinking over his 
 conversation with Miss Montalban the 
 night before ; and already was he resolved, 
 in order to gratify her, as he thought, to 
 become a horseman, and to ride to hounds, 
 and to take an interest in the sports of 
 the turf, — he who, but a few minutes 
 previously, had been reasoning with him- 
 self upon his prosperity, and indulging 
 in self-gratulation that his brilliant suc- 
 cess, so rapid and yet so unequivocal, had 
 not in any way led him to a tendency to 
 recklessness. Why, all the impulses of 
 youth are reckless mostly. 
 
 Yes, he has resolved to become a horse- 
 man, and to be conspicuous in the field ;
 
 278 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 in fact, lie is vigorously heating the iron 
 with which to forge those links that shall 
 form the first chain that, as a Man in 
 Chains, he will have to wear. 
 
 For a moment, amidst the glowing 
 retrospect and the dazzling future, as he 
 contemplates them, his thoughts wander 
 to the old schoolroom, in that grim old 
 house far away in the ancient city, from 
 which he seems to have been separated by 
 a long interval of time, and he resolves 
 that he will write to his old friend and 
 protector and guide, with an account of 
 his success, and the strange means by 
 which it had been achieved ; and he rises 
 from his bed for the purpose, although it 
 is so early that nobody is astir, and the 
 sounds of passing traffic in Gray's Inn 
 Lane are only fitful, and not in volume 
 yet sufficient to drown the merry carolling 
 of the birds that are in revelry, on this 
 bright summer morning, in the big trees
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 279 
 
 that were planted wlieii green fields were 
 all around them. 
 
 Silvester Langdale has fully attired 
 himself, but he does not sit down at his 
 desk ; for, in truth, he has forgotten the 
 impulse which had induced him to rise. 
 He walks up and down his chamber, and 
 as he muses thus he is again in the draw- 
 ing-room in Park-lane, and listening to 
 those words and those tones that have 
 sunk into his heart, there to illuminate it 
 with a brilliancy that it has hitherto 
 unknown. 
 
 At length his eye rests on a thick brief 
 that had been sent him the previous even- 
 ing, and at the sight of it his old ambition 
 — it is old now to him, although but forty- 
 eight hours ago it was but dawning upon 
 him — ^holds for the moment dominion over 
 his mind. He sits at his desk, and unty- 
 ing the brief, begins to peruse its contents, 
 in which occupation he speedily becomes
 
 280 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 absorbed, and so the early morning 
 passes. 
 
 Silvester Langdale had altogether for- 
 gotten the appointment that he had made 
 to receive the son of Abel Barnes as his 
 clerk ; but the boy's father and mother, 
 and the boy himself, had not, for as the 
 clock struck nine they, in accordance with 
 the aj^pointment, were at the door ; and 
 it did Silvester's heart good to see them. 
 He had a kindly, generous heart ; easily 
 impressioned, it is true, but sterling to its 
 core. The appearance of all three was 
 changed materially — the boy's especially, 
 because he was in his new attire ; and the 
 father and mother Avere changed in their 
 looks and in the expression of their faces. 
 Their attire was unchanged. The woman 
 in particular looked happier ; indeed, she 
 almost looked cheerful ; and as Silvester 
 Langdale gazed upon her countenance, he 
 thought that in her youth she must have
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 281 
 
 been exceedingly handsome ; and then the 
 thought seemed suddenly to strike him, 
 as though it had never occurred to him 
 before, that she was Margale's sister. 
 
 " "What is yom- name ?" Mr. Langdale 
 inquired of the boy. 
 
 " Barnes," replied the boy. 
 
 " Yes, of course I know that," said Sil- 
 vester, smiling ; " but I mean your other 
 name." 
 
 " Severn Barnes, sir." 
 
 "Very good; then you can enter on 
 your duties at once, the principal of which 
 will be to attend upon me ;" and then 
 turning to the burly form of the pu- 
 gilist, he said : " And I shall see if 
 I cannot arrange something for you, 
 Barnes." 
 
 '* I would go to the end of the earth 
 to serve you," joyfully exclaimed Abel 
 Barnes ; and his wife added : " That I am 
 sure he would, sir."
 
 282 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 "Do you understand anything about 
 horses ?" Silvester Langdale inquired. 
 
 " I do, sir ; I've had plenty to do with 
 'em in my time," was the reply. 
 
 " Then you can serve me, and I will tell 
 you how to-morrow morning, if you will 
 be here about this time. I cannot v/ait 
 now, as the time for opening the court is 
 approaching, and I have more business 
 there." 
 
 "And them poor devils will be glad 
 enough to see you, I'll warrant," cried the 
 pugilist, with a lively recollection, pro- 
 bably, of his own feelings on a recent 
 occasion. 
 
 Silvester Langdale smiled at the heai-ti- 
 ness and the form of the expression of 
 Abel Barnes ; and then turning to the 
 boy, he said : " You know your way to 
 the Old Bailey?" 
 
 " Oh, yes," replied the boy ; " we live 
 close there, you know, sir."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 2S3 
 
 '' Very well, then ; take my bag down 
 there, and ask for the robing-room, and 
 there wait until I come." 
 
 The boy took the bagwith great alacrity, 
 and, with something like pride in his new 
 position, he prepared to go. Abel Barnes 
 said he would accompany him, for it was 
 all in the way home ; " But," he said, 
 turning to Mr. Langdale respectfully, '' it 
 wont be our home after this afternoon." 
 
 " I am glad to hear it," said Silvester 
 Langdale ; "it nrust be a rather melan- 
 choly place for you." 
 
 " It is, sir ; but the people round, sir, 
 have treated us very well ; and it was your 
 speech, sir, that did it all with them." 
 
 The man and his wife would fain have 
 showered expressions of their gratitude 
 upon Silvester Langdale, but the poor 
 pugilist did not know how to frame them, 
 and the wife felt her heai4} too full to 
 do so.
 
 284 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 Abel Barnes said lie would be sure to 
 be with Mr. Langdale in tlie morning, and 
 in a few minutes afterwards the pugilist 
 and his wife and their son were gleefully 
 congratulating themselves on their change 
 of fortune, as they made their way down 
 Holborn. 
 
 In tiie afternoon, when Silvester Lang- 
 dale returned to his chambers, his new 
 clerk having been sent on previously, 
 he found Marl Baskerville waiting for 
 him. •► 
 
 " The very man I wished to see," said 
 the barrister, eagerly ; " I dined with Lord 
 Montalban last night." 
 
 " So I have seen," said Baskerville. 
 
 " Seen where? and how ?" inquired the 
 young man. 
 
 " Why, in the papers, of com*se." 
 
 *' The papers ! what papers ?" 
 
 " The morning papers. You have seen 
 them yourself, surely ?"
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 285 
 
 " No, I have not liad an opportunity of 
 looking at them to-day." 
 
 " So full of business already, eh ?" said 
 Baskerville, smiling; "I thought that 
 would be the result. Well, in the papers 
 this morning they clironicle the fact that 
 Lord Montalban had a dinner-party last 
 night, consisting of the Marquis of Mill- 
 town, Count Moule, Sir Timothy Wurzell, 
 Bart., M.P., and Silvester Langdale, Esq., 
 the new barrister, who made such a sen- 
 sation the other day in his defence of a 
 well-known character. Fame, you see, 
 Mr. Langdale, comes in large waves when 
 it comes effectually." 
 
 But Silvester Langdale did not hear this 
 last observation, for he had seized the 
 newspaper which he had not that day pre- 
 viously looked at, and was in search of the 
 gratifying paragraph to which Marl Basker- 
 ville had referred. He speedily found it, 
 and read it with glowing eyes.
 
 286 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " I referred to tlie fact of my dining 
 tliere the moment I saw you," said Sil- 
 vester Langdale to Baskerville, " because 
 Lord Montalban, in mentioning your name 
 last niglit, intimated tliat you are in the 
 habit — that is, that you occasionally — 
 a " said Silvester Langdale. 
 
 "Advance money? was that it?" Marl 
 Baskerville inquired, with a meaning look. 
 
 " Exactly," said Langdale. 
 
 " And you would like to raise some ?" 
 Marl Baskerville suggested, as though he 
 were speaking of the most commonplace 
 matter possible. 
 
 " Do you think I should be justified in 
 borrowing some money ?" Silvester Lang- 
 dale inquired, rather tremulously. 
 
 " Perfectly," Marl Baskerville replied. 
 " You have got the ball at your feet, and 
 the game is your own." 
 
 " And you will do it for me ?" 
 
 " Nay, I did not say that."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 287 
 
 Silvester Langdale's countenance fell. 
 
 " Did Lord Montalban tell you that I 
 advance money myself?" Baskerville in- 
 quired of Langdale. 
 
 '' He did." 
 
 " He was in error, then, — an error 
 which people are very apt to fall into." 
 
 Silvester Langdale felt humiliated, — 
 not so much at having intimated his 
 necessities to Mark Baskerville, as at 
 having made that intimation, as he 
 thought, fruitlessly. Marl Baskerville 
 sat with his back to the window of the 
 chamber, so that the light should fall full 
 upon the countenance of the young man, 
 and not upon his ovvn. Those who knew 
 him well said that he always did this 
 when in consultation with any one npon 
 matters of business. He would seem to 
 have read at a glance what was passing 
 in the mind of Silvester Langdale, and he 
 said, —
 
 288 THE MAX IX CHAIXS. 
 
 " He was in error in saying that I do 
 this myself, although it is true enough 
 that I am the means by which it is fre- 
 quently done." 
 
 Silvester Langdale's countenance bright- 
 ened. 
 
 " And I have no doubt that I can be 
 the means of doing it in your case, Mr. 
 Langdale." 
 
 Silvester Langdale's countenance was 
 full of glowing anticipation again. 
 
 " What amount do you require ?" Marl 
 Baskerville inquired. 
 
 " You think that I shall get plent}^ of 
 business, don't you ?" Silvester Langdale 
 asked. 
 
 " I am convinced of it." 
 
 " Well, then, in November I may rea- 
 sonably calculate upon being in ample 
 funds?" 
 
 " I think you may." 
 
 " Under those circumstances, then, it
 
 THE MAN IX CHxMNS. 289 
 
 will scarcely be considered unreasonable 
 or extravagant that I should require three 
 hundred pounds." 
 
 As he said this Silvester Langdale 
 looked eagerly into the countenance of 
 Marl Baskerville, to see if he could dis- 
 cover what impression the statement of 
 his requirements had made. But much 
 older men than he in the ways of the 
 world had failed to read impressions in 
 Marl Baskerville's countenance, even 
 when the light was shining accidentally 
 fully upon it, which it was not doing 
 now. 
 
 *'I think you may, considering your 
 prospects, reasonably borrow that sum,'* 
 said Marl Baskerville, in a measured tone, 
 and in a voice that seemed impervious to 
 emotion. 
 
 " And may I ask you to give me your 
 assistance, Mr. Baskerville?" 
 
 " I need not tell you, Mr. Langdale,'* 
 
 VOL. I. 19
 
 290 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 said Baskerville, " that I never do any- 
 thing upon impulse. My course of life 
 is purely one of hard business ; I do 
 nothing except as business. But in your 
 case I confess to something just outside 
 the pale of business, — a feeling which I 
 cannot explain or describe. In short, it 
 is one of confidence in your prospects. 
 The proof of that confidence is easily 
 shown. By a remarkable coincidence I 
 happen to have about me the exact sum 
 that you require, for I was on my way to 
 execute a commission to that amount for 
 Lord Montalban. [This was not true.] 
 I can do it as well in the morning as 
 this evening. Till November, you say ?" 
 
 '' Till November, when you know the 
 courts at Westminster will commence 
 their sittings." 
 
 " It is now J uly ; — ^that is three months, 
 then," said Baskerville. 
 
 Silvester Langdale did not trouble him-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 291 
 
 self to make the calculation, but at once 
 answered, — 
 
 '' Yes." 
 
 " You have not got a bill stamp, I sup- 
 ^^^^ . 
 
 " No, I have not," said Silvester Lang- 
 dale, laughing. " I never had such a 
 thing in my life." 
 
 " And I don't think I have got one," 
 said Marl BaskerviUe, unconcernedly, and 
 looking into his pocket-book. " Oh, here 
 is one : shall I draw the bill ?" 
 
 " Do so, if you please." 
 
 And Marl BaskerviUe drew up the 
 binding document, saying, — 
 
 " I draw it, 3^ou know, for £350," — at 
 the same time taking notes to the extent 
 of £300 out of the book. 
 
 It was that morning that, while lying 
 in bed, Silvester Langdale had congratu- 
 lated himself upon not being reckless as 
 to the future, and yet he signed this 
 
 19—2
 
 292 THE MAX IN CHAINS. 
 
 document without thought, and by his 
 signature struck a blow that clenched the 
 binding link of the first chain that was to 
 coil round him.
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 293 
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 THE YOUNG BARRISTER TAKES ABEL BARNES INTO 
 
 HIS CONFIDENCE AND HIS SERVICE. SEVERN 
 
 BARNES IS HEARD A LITTLE MORE CONSPICUOUSLY 
 IN THIS HISTORY. 
 
 Silvester Langdale in his early life liad 
 had but little money, of course ; indeed, 
 he had not required much. The household 
 of old Nicholas Darvill was a very simple 
 one; its wants were few, and anything 
 approaching to extravagance was unknown 
 within it. Langdale, as we have already 
 said, had been studious in his youth, and 
 had not mixed much in the society which 
 the old cathedral town afforded. He was, 
 therefore, not very much experienced in
 
 294 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 the ways of tlie world, and yet now that 
 he had arrived in London, and was 
 moving in its great A^ortex, he seemed 
 intuitively to be experienced in some of 
 its courses. In fact, he appeared to have 
 been suddenly transformed from the 
 obscure position of a pupil usher in an 
 obscure school far away down in the 
 country, to something like a man of the 
 world, and one apparently acquainted with 
 its intricacies. This, however, was not 
 the reality, because he was as yet wholly 
 unacquainted with the devious paths of 
 the great world, although he had been 
 dazzled, as it were, into a kind of confi- 
 dence with regard to them. He was ver}- 
 sanguine as to the future, of course, but 
 surely there could be no stronger proof of 
 his inexperience of the wa3^s of the world 
 than his being at tliat moment in posses- 
 sion of three hundred pounds, considering 
 the channel and the means by which that
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 295 
 
 sum had been obtained. If the possession 
 of the money had not engendered a feeling 
 of recklessness in his mind, it had produced 
 something that was very much like it. 
 Although he had never previously been 
 possessed of such a sum of money, yet he 
 acted and planned in his mind as though 
 he had been accustomed to wealth and its 
 disposal. If he did not actually reason 
 with himself that he had opened up a 
 golden mine that was probably inexhausti- 
 ble, yet did he seem to treat with him- 
 self, as it were, as if such had been the 
 case. He rose the next morning after his 
 transaction with Baskerville considerably 
 altered in his feelings. In fact, the 
 events of the three days last past had 
 changed him much, — not in appearance, 
 but with regard to his aspirations and his 
 hopes. He felt that he was no longer 
 a dreamer; a bright reality was at his 
 feet. And then he looked around him.
 
 296 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 and was mucli dissatisfied with liis cham- 
 bers and their locality. This must be the 
 first outward change that he must effect, 
 and so his thoughts wandered towards 
 the Temple Gardens, and he resolved that 
 his footsteps should wander there also as 
 speedily as possible. He was a friend of 
 Lord Montalban's, and he could scarcely 
 ask his noble friend to visit him at Gray's 
 Inn ; and he felt a slight flush upon his 
 forehead as the thought suggested itself 
 to his mind of having to give Miss Mont- 
 alban his present address. And how 
 suggestive was the name of Augusta 
 Montalban ! The prospects which were 
 opening upon him would justify him in 
 the endeavour to gain her approbation 
 and applause in Eotten How, and ulti- 
 mately in the hunting-field. For that 
 approbation and applause he would dare 
 the perils of the new accomplishment, 
 and — well thought of 1 — Abel Barnes was
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 297 
 
 coming that morning. He was well 
 acquainted with horses, and he should 
 purchase one for him, and become his 
 master of the horse. Such a man would 
 be an acquisition to him in more ways 
 than one. Yes, he would create an office 
 for Abel Barnes, so that the man might 
 be constantly near him. Abel Barnes was 
 a good fellow, he knew, and he would 
 befriend him. 
 
 Such were the thoughts that were pass- 
 ing almost feverishly through the mind 
 of Silvester Langdale as he was dressing 
 on the morning after his monetary trans- 
 action with Marl Baskerville, and they 
 were only partially interrupted by the 
 arrival of Severn Barnes at the appointed 
 time for the commencement of his 
 duties. 
 
 "Has your father come with you?" 
 Silvester Langdale inquired of his juvenile 
 clerk.
 
 298 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " He will be here almost directly, sir. 
 He has been helping mother to get into 
 our new place ; — not that it will take him 
 long, sir, for we haven't got much to 
 move," said the boy, with a smile. 
 
 " He told me yesterday, I think, did he 
 not, that he has had something to do with 
 horses ?" Langdale inquired. 
 
 " Oh, yes, sir, he has had a good deal 
 to do with them ; in fact, sometimes, 
 when the Derby or the St. Leger is on, 
 he gets some very good pay by going to 
 watch the favourites." 
 
 "Watch the favourites? how do you 
 mean ?" inquired Silvester Langdale, in a 
 tone of surprise. 
 
 " Why, you see, sir, those horses are 
 not always safe in their stables, and so 
 they are obliged to be watched by those 
 who can keep guard over them and pro- 
 tect them. And if anybody attempted to 
 get into the stable, they'd find father
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 299 
 
 rather an awkward customer, wouldn't 
 they, sir ; especially as he has a tremen- 
 dous big stick for such occasions.*' 
 
 " Oh, that's what I've read of, then, in 
 the newspapers, when great races — ^in 
 which I take no interest myself— have to 
 come off. I dare say your father has had 
 some experience of the villanies that are 
 practised in that vicious and degraded 
 circle." 
 
 " I am sure he has, sir, for he used to 
 make us laugh at some of his adventures 
 when he came home from watching the 
 stables." 
 
 This was not exactly what Silvester 
 Langdale meant. 
 
 " He used to tell us how the nobblers, 
 as they are called, would try to evade 
 him, and watch their opportunity when 
 they thought he was off his guard, — he 
 watching all the time; and how he would 
 pounce upon them, and thrash them until
 
 300 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 tliey roared again. It must have been 
 prime fun, sir, mustn't it ?" 
 
 Silvester Langdale could scarcely tell 
 why, but he laughed at what the boy said; 
 and the boy would probably have con- 
 tinued his reference to his father's remi- 
 niscences if he had not been prevented by 
 a knock at the door ; upon hearing which 
 he said, — 
 
 " This is father, I daresay, sir." 
 
 And it was Abel Barnes, who, though 
 still attired in his rough and shabby 
 clothes, looked much improved, even from 
 yesterday, in his face. He had a cheery 
 smile, and the careworn look which he 
 exhibited when Silvester Langdale first 
 saw him was gone, and in its place there 
 was a hopefal expression. He said he 
 had attended upon his honour according 
 to appointment. 
 
 " Take a seat, Barnes," said Silvester 
 Langdale.
 
 THE MAX IN CHAINS. 301 
 
 " Your honour's very good and kind, 
 sir, but I can stand. I don't think I 
 ought to sit in your honour's presence." 
 
 " Nonsense, man !" said Silvester Lang- 
 dale, laughing ; "sit down ; I have got a 
 good deal to say to you." 
 
 " Very well, if your honour insists ; but 
 it would be a pretty long spell of stand- 
 ing as would tire Abel Barnes, I'm a- 
 thinking." 
 
 " Well, I suppose you are pretty well 
 used to standing up ;" and Silvester 
 Langdale lauglied knowingly. 
 
 *' It's many a stand up as I've had, sir, 
 it's true," replied Barnes ; " but, after all, 
 what good is it ? It ain't often as it 
 makes a man much better, and I'm sure 
 it's very often as it makes a man a good 
 deal worse." 
 
 " You of course know a good deal about 
 the men in your" — profession, Silvester 
 Langdale was goinp- to say, but a sense
 
 302 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 of the ludicrous prevented him, and so he 
 substituted the word — " line ?*' 
 
 " Well, sir, I've seen as much of them 
 as most men, 'and I think I know them 
 all." 
 
 " And what sort of men are they really ? 
 I mean " and Silvester Langdale hesi- 
 tated, for he scarcely knew how to convey 
 his meaning to the man before him. " I 
 mean, what are they morally or intellec- 
 tually ? Are they bad men, or are they, 
 considering their line of life, as good as 
 others ?" 
 
 Por a moment Abel Barnes looked 
 puzzled, and then said, — 
 
 " Some of 'em are very queer indeed, sir; 
 perhaps I might say that some of them 
 are very bad indeed, and not be far out in 
 what I did say." 
 
 " Are they a very ignorant class of men 
 generally ?" 
 
 " That's where it is, you see, su\ Some
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 303 
 
 of 'em are very so-so in that way, very ; 
 and do you know, sir, that I've always 
 noticed that where a man has got his head 
 screwed on the right way, and has had a 
 bit of learning, he always makes a better 
 fighter tlian the man as can't read nor 
 write ? and nearly all of 'em can't." 
 
 " I can easily understand that," said 
 Silvester Langdale ; " even in such a call- 
 ing as yours is, intelligence must be of 
 advantage." 
 
 " Such a calling as mine is, you said, 
 Sir r 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Beg your pardon, sir, will you kindly 
 correct that, and say, such as mine 
 was ?" 
 
 Silvester Langdale laughed, and said 
 he was very glad to be able to make the 
 correction as suggested. 
 
 " And that reminds me that we may as 
 well change the subject, and discuss the
 
 304 TPIE MAN IX CHAINS. 
 
 object I had in view in requesting you to 
 be here this morning. You told me yes- 
 terday that you understood horses." 
 
 " That I do well, sir." 
 
 " I want to buy a horse," said Silvester 
 Langdale, in a kind of hesitating tone, as 
 though he had not as yet quite taken 
 himself into his own confidence, or it was 
 some faint whisper of discretion or pru- 
 dence that checked the flow of the words 
 in which he had just made the declaration 
 to Abel Barnes. No matter, the deter- 
 mination had been come to — why should 
 not the declaration be made ? 
 
 " I hope you'll let me do it for you, 
 sir — that is, go with you to buy him. A 
 hack, sir, for your own riding ?" 
 
 " No, no," replied Silvester, in the same 
 tone of slight hesitation as before ; "a 
 hunter." 
 
 Abel Barnes elevated his eyebrows. 
 
 " Eh, a hunter ? I think I know a
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 305 
 
 good hunter when one comes before me. 
 And you go across country, do you, 
 
 SU' ^ 
 
 At this question Silvester Langdale 
 felt a great deal more embarrassed than 
 he did on the morning that he made his 
 debut so successfully in his profession. In 
 the first place, he was not altogether sure 
 that he was quite acquainted with the 
 exact meaning of the phrase, " going 
 across country ;" and to have questioned 
 Abel Barnes upon the point seemed 
 ludicrous. He therefore nodded his head 
 in such a manner as to relieve his own 
 conscience in the matter; it was a nod 
 that might mean anything or nothing, 
 although Abel Barnes took it to be one 
 decidedly in the affirmative. 
 
 " Where do you hunt, sir?" 
 
 This was a direct question that could 
 not be evaded, and so Silvester Langdale 
 nerved himself up to reply, — 
 
 VOL. I. 20
 
 306 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " The fact is, Barnes, I don't hunt." 
 
 '* Sir 1" said Abel Barnes, incredu- 
 lously. 
 
 " I may as well tell you at once, Barnes, 
 that I am as ignorant of matters in the 
 hunting-field as I am of pugilism ; but I 
 intend to become a huntsman, and I want 
 your assistance both in the purchase of 
 my steed and in his management after I 
 have got him;" and Silvester Langdale 
 laughed as he said this. 
 
 Abel Barnes rubbed his hands in glee, 
 and said it was the very thing he should 
 like to do for Silvester Langdale. 
 
 "You want a thorough good hunter, 
 do you, sir ?" he asked ; " well, then, I 
 know a friend as knows where to get a 
 good one, and no coping or chaunting." 
 
 " No what ?" inquired Silvester Lang- 
 dale, in utter ignorance of what coping or 
 chaunting meant, — whether those terms 
 lia.d reference to the bad points of a horse
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 307 
 
 or tlie bad points of the persons wlio had 
 horses to sell. 
 
 Abel Barnes was quick enough to per- 
 ceive the extent of Silvester Langdale's 
 ignorance in this respect, and so he ex- 
 plained that coping and chaunting were 
 slang or technical phrases (slang and tech- 
 nical are sometimes synonymous terms) 
 for certain arts and impositions that were 
 practised by persons whose calling was the 
 selling of horses. 
 
 " I know a friend who was almost born 
 in a stable, sir, and he has had to do with 
 buying and selling of horses ever since he 
 could walk, and I've only to ask him to 
 do the kind for you, sir, and hell do it. 
 I'll go to him this very day ; he's at a 
 repository in the City." 
 
 " You think you can depend upon him, 
 do you ?" inquired Silvester. 
 
 " I've been acquainted with him all his 
 life, sir ; and although I know he's up to 
 
 20—2
 
 308 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 every dodge that can be done in a stable- 
 yard, and can take in anybody that's green 
 better, perhaps, than any other man in 
 in his line, I'm sure that he'd no more 
 think of putting the double on me than 
 he would upon his own father." 
 
 To men of the class of the friend to 
 whom Abel Barnes referred, this, perhaps, 
 would not have been considered conclu- 
 sive as to the bona fides of the individual 
 referred to, but it was perfectly satisfac- 
 tory to Silvester Langdale, who said, 
 *' Very well, then, Barnes ; will you go 
 and see him this very day, because I want 
 the horse immediatelv ?" 
 
 " I'll go down this very minute, sir, 
 and he'll tell me at once if there's a good 
 'un to be had just now in London." 
 
 " Very good, Barnes ; I think you had 
 better go at once. But, by-the-bye," 
 said Silvester Langdale, recollecting him- 
 self, " I have not made the proposition I 
 
 I
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 301) 
 
 had intended with regard to yourself. I 
 want to take you into my service, if you 
 have no objection to enter." 
 
 " Objection, sir !" cried the pugilist, his 
 big, burly face glowing with gratification; 
 "as I said yesterday, do what you like 
 with me, sir, 111 be your slave for ever- 
 more : and no more of the ring for me ; 
 and no more sporting of any kind, unless 
 your honour likes it." 
 
 Silvester Langdale did not give an 
 opinion upon this point, but directed 
 Abel Barnes's attention to the subject of 
 his duties, which would be chiefly to 
 attend upon the young barrister, and to 
 act as his messenger. The matter of 
 remuneration was very speedily settled, 
 for nothing that Langdale could have 
 proposed would, at that moment, have 
 been objected to by Abel Barnes. The 
 terms that his new employer did actually 
 propose he considered munificent ; and
 
 310 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 when they were agreed upon lie almost 
 involuntarily exclaimed, " I've got a turn 
 of luck at last." 
 
 " Now, then, away to your friend at 
 the repository in the City, and let me 
 know what he says." 
 
 But just at this moment an incident 
 occurred which prevented Abel Barnes 
 immediately proceeding on his mission. 
 The chambers which Silvester Langdale 
 occupied in Gray's Inn consisted of two 
 rooms and a small chamber, which was 
 little better than a closet. Between this 
 closet and the chamber which was Lang- 
 dale's business office was his bedroom, so 
 that it was at some distance from the 
 chamber in which Langdale and Abel 
 Barnes then were. Just at the moment 
 when Abel Barnes said he would depart 
 on his mission to his friend at the reposi- 
 tory in the City, a splendid contralto 
 voice was heard singing the music of a
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 311 
 
 popular ballad. The voice proceeded 
 from the little closet on the other side of 
 Silvester Langdale's bedroom, and the 
 young barrister listened attentively, while 
 Abel Barnes, with a gratified smile upon 
 his countenance, watched his new master. 
 Silvester Langdale stood listening to the 
 voice, and did not speak until the popular 
 ballad had been performed; and then, 
 turning to Abel Barnes, he said, — 
 
 '' What a magnificent voice ! Where 
 can it be ? It cannot be a woman's." 
 
 " A woman's, sir !" said Abel Barnes, 
 proudly ; " no, sir, it's my Severn." 
 
 " Your son, do you mean ?" 
 
 '' Ay, sir, my son. Doesn't he sing 
 splendid ?" 
 
 Silvester Langdale said the boy had a 
 splendid voice indeed, and the young 
 man went to his room door, and called 
 the boy. 
 
 "Was that you I heard singing just
 
 312 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 now?" Silvester Langdale inquired of his 
 youiif? clerk. 
 
 " Oh, I beg your pardon, sir ; I thought 
 that both the doors were closed, and that 
 you would not hear me. I hope I have 
 not disturbed you, sir?" 
 
 " No, my boy, you have not disturbed 
 me, — you have quite delighted me ;" and 
 then turning to Abel Barnes, he said, 
 *' Away on your errand, Barnes." 
 
 And Barnes went away accordingly. 
 
 When he was gone Silvester Langdale 
 said to the boy, " Have you ever been 
 instructed in singing ?" 
 
 " I've had a few lessons, sir, from the 
 leader of the band," the boy replied, mo- 
 destly, " and I learnt the piano for a 
 short time." 
 
 " Who is the leader of the band ?" 
 
 "At the music hall or the theatre, sir?" 
 
 " The one from whom you say you 
 received lessons."
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 313 
 
 " Oh, I had lessons from both, sir, — 
 the last was at the music hall, and Jiis 
 name is Spaltok." 
 
 " And did he express any opinion about 
 your voice ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir," replied the boy diffidently ; 
 " he said that mine was the best voice 
 in the choir, and ought to be well culti- 
 vated." 
 
 Silvester Langdale mused for a moment, 
 and then said, — 
 
 " You will see the leader of the band 
 to-night, I suppose?" 
 
 "Oh yes, sir, I am sure to see him." 
 
 " Will you ask him if he can make 
 it convenient to call upon me some 
 morning ?" 
 
 "Yes, sir; and I'm sure he will be 
 very proud to do so." 
 
 " Tell him I should like to see him ; 
 or, if he would prefer it, I will wait upon 
 him."
 
 314 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 
 
 " I will be sure to do so, sir." 
 Another knock at the door ! More 
 briefs, and from the man — the old prac- 
 titioner — with the parchment cheeks and 
 the wry month. The sessions are very 
 heavy, for there has been more than the 
 usual interval since the last. 
 
 The boy clerk has returned to his little 
 closet, to wonder what on earth Mr. Lang- 
 dale can want to see Mr. Spaltok about ; 
 while Silvester Langdale paces his cham- 
 ber with the firmness of pride in his step. 
 Fortune is indeed smiling upon him, and 
 Abel Barnes's friend shall buy him the 
 best horse he can get. This young 
 Severn Barnes, too, he must not remain 
 simply a barrister's clerk. Silvester 
 Langdale has as this moment several pro- 
 jects, bright in themselves, floating about 
 in his brain. They are great and worthy 
 ones, and he will dash into them im- 
 petuously, for wealth will be at his com-
 
 THE MAN IN CHAINS. 315 
 
 mand now ; has lie not a foretaste of it 
 abeady? and is not the sun of fortune, 
 shining upon him ? 
 
 These thoughts are rushing through his 
 mind, and in that rush there is no remem- 
 brance for that moment left of Marl 
 Baskerville and the recent loan. 
 
 END OF VOL. I.
 
 lOWDON: 
 
 SIVILL AND EDWABDS, PBINTEES, 
 
 CHAKCOS-BTBEZT.