"There ain't a single one," said Scadder. "Mark," whispered Martin, pulling him by the sleeve, "do you hear that? But whose work is all this before us, then?" he asked aloud. "The soil being very fruitful, public buildings grows spontaneous, perhaps," said Mark. He was on the agent's dark side as he said it; but Scadder instantly changed his place, and brought his active eye to bear upon him. "Feel of my hands, young man," he said. "What for?" asked Mark: declining. "Air they dirty, or air they clean, sir?" said Scadder, holding them out. In a physical point of view they were decidedly dirty. But it being obvious that Mr. Scadder offered them for examination in a figurative sense, as emblems of his moral character, Martin hastened to pronounce them pure as the driven snow. "Yes." He turned towards it, and reflected for a short time, as if, having been put upon his mettle, he was resolved to be particular to the very minutest hair's breadth of a shade. At length, after wheeling his toothpick slowly round and round in the air, as if it were a carrier pigeon just thrown up, he suddenly made a dart at the drawing, and pierced the very centre of the main wharf, through and through. "There!" he said, leaving his knife quivering in the wall; "that's where it is!" Martin glanced with sparkling eyes upon his Co., and his Co. saw that the thing was done. The bargain was not concluded as easily as might have been expected though, for Scadder was caustic and ill-humoured, and cast much unnecessary opposition in the way: at one time requesting them to think of it, and call again in a week or a fortnight; at another, predict"I entreat, Mark," he said, with some irri-ing that they would n't like it: at another, of tation, "that you will not obtrude remarks offering to retract and let them off, and muttering that nature, which, however harmless and wellintentioned, are quite out of place, and cannot be expected to be very agreeable to strangers. I am quite surprised. "The Co.'s a putting his foot in it already," thought Mark. He must be a sleeping partner -fast asleep and snoring-Co. must: I see." Mr. Scadder said nothing, but he set his back against the plan, and thrust his toothpick into the desk some twenty times: looking at Mark all the while as if he were stabbing him in effigy. "You have n't said whose work it is," Martin ventured to observe, at length, in a tone of mild propitiation. "Well, never mind whose work it is, or is n't," said the agent sulkily. "No matter how it did eventuate. P'raps he cleared off, handsome, with a heap of dollars; p'rhaps he was n't worth a cent. P'raps he was a loafin' rowdy; p'raps a ring-tailed roarer. Now!" "All your doing, Mark!" said Martin. "P'raps," pursued the agent, "them an't plants of Eden's raising. No! P'raps that desk and stool ain't made from Eden lumber. No! P'raps no end of squatters ain't gone out there. No! P'raps there ain't no such lo-cation in the territoary of the Great U-nited States. Oh, no!" "I hope you're satisfied with the success of your joke, Mark," said Martin. But here, at a most opportune and happy time, the General interposed, and called out to Scadder from the doorway to give his friends the particulars of that little lot of fifty acres with the house upon it; which, having belonged to the company formerly, had lately lapsed again into their hands. "You air a deal too open handed, Gen'ral," was the answer. It is a lot as should be rose in price. It is." He grumblingly opened his books notwithstanding, and always keeping his bright side towards Mark, no matter at what amount of inconvenience to himself, displayed a certain leaf for their perusal. Martin read it greedily, and then inquired: "Now where upon the plan may this place be?" Upon the plan?" said Scadder. strong imprecations upon the folly of the Ge¦ neral. But the whole of the astoundingly small sum total of purchase money-it was only one hundred and fifty dollars, or something more than thirty pounds of the capital brought by Co. into the architectural concern was ultimate y paid down; and Martin's head was two inches nearer the roof of the little wooden office, with the consciousness of being a landed proprietor in the thriving city of Eden. "If it shouldn't happen to fit," said Scadder, as he gave Martin the necessary credentials on receipt of his money, "don't blame me "No, no," he replied merrily. "We'll not blame you. General, are you going?" "I am at your service, sir; and I wish you." said the General, giving him his hand with grave cordiality, "joy of your po-session. You air now, sir a denizen of the most powerful and highly-civilised do-minion that has ever graced the world; a do-minion, sir, where man is bound to man in one vast bond of equal love and truth. May you, sir, be worthy of your a-dopted country!" Martin thanked him, and took leave of Mr. Scadder; who had resumed his post in the rocking-chair, immediately on the General's rising from it, and was once more swinging away as if he had never been disturbed. Mark looked back several times as they went down the road towards the National Hotel, but now his blighted profile was towards them, and nothing but attentive thoughtfulness was written on it. Strangely different to the other side! He was not a man much given to laughing, and never laughed outright; but every line in the print of the crow's foot, and every little wiry vein in that division of his head, was wrinkled up into a grin! The compound figure of Death and the Lady at the top of the old ballad was not divided with a greather nicety, and hadn't halves more montrously unlike each other, than the two profiles of Zephaniah Scadder. The General posted along at a great rate, for the clock was on the stroke of twelve; and at that hour precisely, the Great Meeting of the Watertoast Sympathisers was to he holden in | the public room of the National Hotel. Being very curious to witness the demonstration, and know what it was all about, Martin kept close to the General: and, keeping closer than ever when they entered the Hall, got by that means upon a little platform of tables at the upper end: where an arm-chair was set for the General, and Mr. La Fayette Kettle, as secretary, was making a great display of some foolscap documents-Screamers, no doubt. "Well, sir!" he said, as he shook hands with Martin, "here is a spectacle calc'lated to make the British Lion put his tail between his legs, and howl with anguish, I expect!" Martin certainly thought it possible that the British Lion might have been rather out of his element in that Ark: but he kept the idea to himself. The General was then voted to the chair, on the motion of a pallid lad of the Jefferson Brick school: who forthwith set in for a high-spiced speech, with a good deal about hearts and homes in it, and unriveting the chains of Tyranny. Oh but it was a clincher for the British Lion, it was! The indignation of the glowing young Columbian knew no bounds. If he could only have been one of his own forefathers, he said, wouldn't he have peppered that same Lion, and been to him as another Brute Tamer with a wire whip, teaching him lessons not casily forgotten. "Lion! (cried that young Columbian) where is he? Who is he? What is he? Show him to me. Let me have him here. Here!" said the young Columbian, in a wrestling attitude, upon this sacred altar. Here!" cried the young Columbian, idealising the dinningtable, "upon ancestral ashes, cemented with the glorious blood poured out like water on our native plains of Chickabiddy Lick! Bring forth that Lion!" said the young Columbian. "Alone, I dare him! I taunt that Lion. I tell that Lion, that Freedom's hand once twisted in his mane, he rolls a corse before me, and the Eagles of the Great Republic laugh ha, ha!" 66 When it was found that the Lion didn't come, but kept out of the way; that the young Columbian stood there, with folded arms, alone in his glory and consequently that the Eagles were no doubt laughing wildly on the mountain tops, such cheers arose as might have shaken the hands upon the Horse-Guards' clock, and changed the very mean time of the day in England's capital. "Who is this?" Martin telegraphed to La Fayette. The Secretary wrote something, very gravely, on a piece of paper, twisted it up, and had it passed to him from hand to hand It was an improvement on the old sentiment: "Perhaps as remarkable a man as any in our country.' This young Columbian was succeeded by another, to the full as eloquent as he, who drew down storms of cheers. But both remarkable youths, in their great excitement (for your true poetry can never stoop to details), forgot to say with whom or what the Watertoasters sympathised, and likewise why or wherefore they were sympathetic. Thus, Martin remained for a long time as completely in the dark as ever; until at length a ray of light broke in upon him through the medium of the Secretary, who, by VOL. I. reading the minutes of their past proceedings, made the matter somewhat clearer. He then learned that the Watertoast Association sympathised with a certain Public Man in Ireland; who held a contest upon certain points with England: and that they did so, because they didn't love England at all-not by any means because they loved Ireland much: being indeed horribly jealous and distrustful of its people always, and only tolerating them because of their working hard, which made them very useful; labour being held in greater indignity in the simple republic than in any other country upon earth. This rendered Martin curious to see what grounds of sympathy the Watertoast Association put forth; nor was he long in suspense, for the General rose to read a letter to the Public Man, which with his own hands he had written. "Thus," said the General, "thus, my friends and fellow-citizens, it runs: "SIR, "I addressed you on behalf of the Watertoast Association of United Sympathisers. It is founded, sir, in the great republic of America! and now holds its breath, and swells the blue veins in its forehead nigh to bursting, as it watches, sir, with feverish intensity and sympathetic ardour your noble efforts in the cause of Freedom.' At the name of Freedom, and at every repetition of that name, all the Sympathisers roared aloud; cheering with nine times nine, and nine times over. "In Freedom's name, sir-holy Freedom-I address you. In Freedom's name, I send herewith a contribution to the funds of your Society. In Freedom's name, sir, I advert with indignation and disgust to that accursed animal, with gore-stained whiskers, whose rampant cruelty and fiery lust have ever been a scourge, a torment, to the world. The naked visitors to Crusoe's Island, sir; the flying wives of Peter Wilkins; the fruit-smeared children of the tangled bush; nay, even the men of large stature, anciently bred in the mining districts of Cornwall; alike bear witness to its savage nature. Where, sir, are the Cormorans, the Blunderbores, the Great Feefofums, named in History? all, all, exterminated by its destroying hand. "I allude, sir, to the British Lion. "Devoted, mind and body, heart and soul, to Freedom, sir-to Freedom, blessed solace to the snail upon the cellar-door, the oyster in his pearly bed, the still mite in his home of cheese, the very winkle of our country in his shelly lair-in her unsullied name, we offer you our sympathy. Oh, sir, in this our cherished and our happy land, her fires burn bright and clear and smokeless: once lighted up in yours, the lion shall be roasted whole. "I am, sir in Freedom's name, "General, U. S. M."" It happened that just as the General began to read this letter, the railroad train arrived, bringing a new mail from England; and a packet had been handed in to the Secretary, which during its perusal and the frequent cheerings in homage to freedom, he had opened. Now, its contents disturbed him very much, and the moment the General sat down, he hurried to his side, and placed in his hand a letter and several printed extracts from English newspapers; to which, in a state of infinite excitement he called his immediate attention. The General, being greatly heated by his own composition, was in a fit state to receive any inflammable influence; but he had no sooner possessed himself of the contents of these documents, than a change came over his face, involving such a huge amount of choler and passion, that the noisy concourse were silent in a moment, in very wonder at the sight of him. "My friends!" cried the General, rising; "my friends and fellow-citizens, we have been mistaken in this man." "In what man?" was the cry. "In this," panted the General, holding up the letter he had read aloud a few minutes before. "I find that he has been, and is, the advocate -consistent in it always too-of Nigger emancipation!" If anything beneath the sky be real, those Sons of Freedom would have pistolled, stabbed -in some way slain-that man by coward hands and murderous violence, if he had stood among them at that time. The most confiding of their own countrymen, would not have wagered then; no, nor would they ever peril; one dunghill straw, upon the life of any man in such a strait. They tore the letter, cast the fragments in the air, trod down the pieces as they tell; and yelled, and groaned, and hissed, till they could cry no longer. "I shall move," said the General, when he could make himself heard, "that the Watertoast Association of United Sympathisers be immediately dissolved!" Down with it! Away with it! Don't hear of it! Burn its records! Pull the room down! Blot it out of human memory! "But, my fellow countrymen!" said the General, "the contributions. We have funds. What is to be done with the funds?" It was hastily resolved that a piece of plate should be presented to a certain constitutional Judge, who had laid down from the Bench the noble principle, that it was lawful for any white mob to murder any black man; and that another piece of plate, of similar value, should be presented to a certain Patriot, who had declared from his high place in the Legislature, that he and his friends would hang, without trial, any Abolitionist who might pay them a visit. For the surplus, it was agreed that it should be devoted to aiding the enforcement of those free and equal laws, which render it incalculably more criminal and dangerous to teach a negro to read and write, than to roast him alive in a public city. These points adjusted, the meeting broke up in great disorder: and there was an end of the Watertoast Sympathy. As Martin ascended to his bedroom, his eye was attracted by the Republican banner, which had been hoisted from the house-top in honour of the occasion, and was fluttering before a window which he passed. "Tut! said Martin. "You're a gay flag in the distance. But let a man be near enough to get the light upon the other side, and see through you; and you are but sorry fustian!" CHAPTER XXII. FROM WHICH IT WILL BE SEEN THAT MARTIN BECAME A LION ON HIS OWN ACCOUNT. As soon as it was generally known in the National Hotel, that the young Englishman, Mr. Chuzzlewit, had purchased "a lo-cation" in the Valley of Eden, and intended to betake himself to that earthly Paradise by the next Steamboat: he became a popular character. Why this should be, or how it had come to pass, Martin no more knew than Mrs. Gamp of Kingsgatestreet, High Holborn, did; but that he was for the time being, the lion, by popular election, of the Watertoast community, and that his society was in rather inconvenient request, there could be no kind of doubt. TOGETHER WITH "Private. "No. 47, Bunker Hill Street, "Sir, "A what?" cried Martin. "A muniment," rejoined the Captain. Martin looked despairingly at Mark, who informed him that the Captain meant a written notice that Mr. Chuzzlewit would receive the Watertoasters that day, at and after two o'clock: which was, in effect, then hanging in the bar, as Mark from ocular inspection of the same could testify. "I am young, and ardent. For there is a poetry in wildness, and every alligator basking in the slime is in himself an Epic, self-contained. I aspirate for fame. It is my yearning and my "You wouldn't be unpop'lar, I know," said thirst. the Captain, paring his nails. "Our citizens "Are you, sir, aware of any member of Con-an't long of riling up, I tell you; and our Gagress in England, who would undertake to pay zette could flay you like a wild cat.' my expenses to that country, and for six months after my arrival? Martin was going to be very wroth, but he thought better of it, and said: "In Heaven's name let them come, then." "Oh, they'll come," returned the Captain. have seen the big room fixed a'purpose, with my eyes." "There is something within me which gives me the assurance that this enlightened patronage would not be thrown away. In litera-"I ture or art; the bar, the pulpit, or the stage; in one or other, if not all, I feel that I am certain to succeed. "If too much engaged to write to any such yourself, please let me have a list of three or four of those most likely to respond, and I will address them through the Post Office. May I also ask you to favour me with any critical observations that have ever presented themselves to your reflective faculties, on 'Cain, a Mystery, by the Right Honourable Lord Byron? "I am, Sir, "Yours (forgive me if I add, soaringly), "PUTNAM SMIF. "P. S. Address your answer to America Junior, Messrs. Hancock & Floby, Dry Goods Store, as above." Both of which letters, together with Martin's reply to each, were, according to a laudable custom, much tending to the promotion of gentlemanly feeling and social confidence, published in the next number of the Watertoast Gazette. He had scarcely got through his correspondence, when Captain Kedgick, the landlord, kindly came up stairs to see how he was getting on. The Captain sat down upon the bed before he spoke; and finding it rather hard, moved to the pillow. "Well, sir!" said the Captain, putting his hat a little more on one side, for it was rather tight in the crown: "You're quite a public man, I calc'late." "So it seems," retorted Martin, who was very tired. "Our citizens, sir," pursued the Captain, "intend to pay their respects to you. You will have to hold a sort of le-vee, sir, while you're here." "Powers above!" cried Martin, "I couldn't do that, my good fellow!" "I reckon you must then," said the Captain. "Must is not a pleasant word, Captain," urged Martin. "Well! I didn't fix the mother language, and I can't unfix it," said the Captain, coolly: "else I'd make it pleasant. You must re-ceive. That's all." "But why should I receive people who care as much for me as I care for them?" asked Martin. "But will you," said Martin, seeing that the Captain was about to go; "will you at least tell me this. What do they want to see me for? what have I done? and how do they happen to have such a sudden interest in me?" Captain Kedgick put a thumb and three fingers to each side of the brim of his hat; lifted it a little way off his head; put it on again carefully; passed one hand all down his face, beginning at the forehead and ending at the chin; looked at the ceilin; looked at Martin; then at Mark; then at Martin again; winked; and walked out. "Upon my life, now!" said Martin, bringing his hand heavily upon the table; “such a perfectly unaccountable fellow as that, I never saw. Mark, what do you say to this?" "Why, sir," returned his partner, "my opinion is that we must have got to the MOST remarkable man in the country, at last. So I hope there's an end of the breed, sir." Although this made Martin laugh, it couldn't keep off two o'clock. Punctually, as the hour struck, Captain Kedgick returned to hand him to the room of state: and he had no Sooner got him safe there, than he bawled down the staircase to his fellow-citizens below, that Mr. Chuzzlewit was “receiving.” Up they came with a rush. Up they came until the room was full, and, through the open door, a dismal perspective of more to come was shown upon the stairs. One after another, one after another, dozen after dozen, score after score, more, more, more, up they came: all shaking hands with Martin. Such varieties of hands, the thick, the thin, the short, the long, the fat, the lean, the coarse, the fine; such differences of temperature, the hot, the cold, the dry, the moist, the flabby; such diversities of grasp, the tight, the loose, the shortlived, and the lingering! Still up, up, up, more, more, more: and ever and anon the Captain's voice was heard above the crowd "There's more below. Now, gentlemen, you that have been introduced to Mr. Chuzzlewit, will you clear, gentlemen? Will you clear? Will you be so good as clear, gentlemen, and make a little room for more?" - Regardless of the Captain's cries, they didn't "Well! I have had a muniment put up in clear at all, but stood there, bolt upright and the bar," returned the Captain. staring. Two gentlemen connected with the Watertoast Gazette had come express to get - SO derly gentleman entered: bringing with him a lady who certainly could not be considered young- that was matter of fact; and probably could not be considered handsome but that was matter of opinion. She was very straight, very tall, and not at all flexible in face or figure. On her head she wore a great straw bonnet, with trimmings of the same, in which she looked as if she had been thatched by an unskilful labourer; and in her hand she held a most enormous fan. "Mr. Chuzzlewit, I believe?" said the gen- | tleman That is my name." "Sir," said the gentleman. "I am pressed for time." "Thank God!" thought Martin. "I go back Toe my home, sir," pursued the gentleman, "by the return train, which starts immediate. Start is not a word you use in your country, sir." "Oh yes, it is," said Martin. "You air mistaken, sir," returned the gentleman, with great decision: "but we will not pursue the subject, lest it should awake your prejudice. Sir, Mrs. Hominy." Martin bowed. "Mrs. Hominy, sir, is the lady of Major Hominy, one of our chicest spirits; and belongs Toe one of our most aristocratic families. You air, p'raps, acquainted, sir, with Mrs. Hominy's writings?" Martin couldn't say he was. "You have much Toe learn, and Toe enjoy, sir," said the gentleman. "Mrs. Hominy is going Toe stay until the end of the Fall, sir, with her married daughter at the settlement of New Thermopylae, three days this side of Eden. Any attention, sir, that you can show Toe Mrs. Hominy upon the journey, will be very grateful Toe the Major and our fellow-citizens. Mrs. Hominy, I wish you good night, ma'am, and a pleasant pro-gress on your rout!” Even when they began to clear, it was no better; for then a stream of gentlemen, every one with a lady on each arm (exactly like the chorus to the National Anthem when Royalty goes in state to the play), came gliding in every new group fresher than the last, and bent on staying to the latest moment. If they spoke to him, which was not often, they invariably asked the same questions, in the same tone; with no more remorse, or delicacy, or consideration, than if he had been a figure of stone, purchased, and paid for, and set up there, for their delight. Even when, in the slow course of time, these died off, it was as bad as ever, if not worse; for then the boys grew bold, and came in as a class of themselves, and did every-gone, and Mrs. Hominy was drinking the milk. thing that the grown-up people had done. Uncouth stragglers too appeared; men of a ghostly kind, who being in, didn't know how to get out again: insomuch that one silent gentleman with glazed and fishy eyes, and only one button on his waistcoat (which was a very large metal one, and shone prodigiously), got behind the door, and stood there, like a Clock, long after everybody else was gone. Martin felt, from pure fatigue, and heat, and worry, as if he could have fallen on the ground and willingly remained there, if they would but have had the mercy to leave him alone. But as letters and messages threatening his public denouncement if he didn't see the senders, poured in like hail; and as more visitors came while he took his coffee by himself; and as Mark, with all his vigilance, was unable to keep them from the door; he resolved to go to bed --not that he felt at all sure of bed being any protection, but that he might not leave a forforn hope untried. Martin could scarcely believe it; but he had "A'most used-up I am, I do declare!" she observed. "The jolting in the cars is pretty nigh as bad as if the rail was full of snags and sawyers." 66 Snags and sawyers, ma'am?" said Martin. Well, then, I do suppose you'll hardly realise my meaning, sir," said Mrs. Hominy. "My! Only think! Do tell!" It did not appear that these expressions, although they seemed to conclude with an urgent entreaty, stood in need of any answer; for Mrs. Hominy, untying her bonnet strings, ob served that she would withdraw to lay that article of dress aside, and would return imme diately. "Mark!" said Martin. "Touch me, will you. Am I awake?" "Hominy is, sir," returned his partner"Broad awake! Just the sort of woman, sir, as would be discovered with her eyes wide open, and her mind a-working for her country's good, at any hour of the day or night." He had communicated this design to Mark, They had no opportunity of saying more, for and was on the eve of escaping, when the door Mrs. Hominy stalked in again-very erect, in was thrown open in a great hurry, and an el-proof of her aristocratic blood; and holding in |