However, I bore the torture well. In truth, I had so little regard for any object but the grand one of wearing a sword and epaulette, that if Mordecai had demanded the whole sum in fifths, I should have scarcely winced. But my philosophy stood me in good part, for it won a grim smile from the torturer, and even a little of his confidence.
"This," said he, running his finger down a list which looked endless, "I call my peerage book." Turning to another of equal dimensions, "there lies my House of Commons. Not quite as many words wasted in it as in the Honourable House, but rather to the purpose."
Mordecai grew facetious; the feeling that he had made a handsome morning's work of it put him into spirits, and he let me into some of the secrets of high life, with the air of a looker-on who sees the whole game, and intends to pocket the stakes of the fools on both sides. "Money, Mr Marston," said my hook-nosed and keen-eyed enlightener, "is the true business of man. It is philosophy, science, and patriotism in one; or, at least, without it the whole three are of but little service. Your philosopher dies in a garret, your man of science hawks telescopes, and your patriot starves in the streets, or gets himself hanged in honour of the 'Rights of Man.' I have known all these things, for I was born a German, and bred among the illustrissimi of a German university. But I determined not to live a beggar, or at least not to die one. I left Gottingen behind on a May morning, and trudged, fought, and begged, 'borrowed' my way to London. What I am now, you see."
Probably, the glance which I involuntarily gave round the room, did not exhibit much admiration.
"Ha," said he with a half smile, which, on his gigantic and sullen features, looked like a smile on one of the sculptures of a mausoleum, "you are young--you judge by appearances. Let me give you one piece of advice: If the Italian said, 'distrust words, they are fit only to disguise thoughts,' take a Londoner's warning, and distrust your eyes--they are only fit to pretend to see." He paused a moment, and turned over some memorandums. "I find," said he, "by these papers, that I shall have occasion to leave town in the beginning of next week. You shall then see how I live. If I am to be found in this den, it is not for want of a liking for light and air. I am a German. I have seen plains and mountains in my time. If I had been a fool, there I should have remained a bear-shooter; if I were a fool here, I should act like others of the breed, and be a fox-hunter. But I had other game in view, and now I could sell half the estates in England, call half the 'Honourable House' to my levee, brush down an old loan, buy up a new one, and shake the credit of every thing but the Bank of England."