A man after a great catastrophe
commonly sleeps pretty well. It is the waking in the morning which is
sometimes queer and unpleasant. Last night you proposed to Miss Brown:
you quarrelled over your cups with Captain Jones, and valorously pulled
his nose: you played at cards with Colonel Robinson, and gave him--oh,
how many I O U's! These thoughts, with a fine headache, assail you
in the morning watches. What a dreary, dreary gulf between to-day and
yesterday! It seems as if you are years older. Can't you leap back over
that chasm again, and is it not possible that Yesterday is but a dream?
There you are, in bed. No daylight in at the windows yet. Pull your
nightcap over your eyes, the blankets over your nose, and sleep away
Yesterday. Psha, man, it was but a dream! Oh no, no! The sleep won't
come. The watchman bawls some hour--what hour? Harry minds him that he
has got the repeating watch under his pillow which he had bought for
Hester. Ting, ting, ting! the repeating watch sings out six times in
the darkness, with a little supplementary performance indicating the
half-hour. Poor dear little Hester!--so bright, so gay, so innocent! he
would have liked her to have that watch. What will Maria say? (Oh, that
old Maria! what a bore she is beginning to be! he thinks.) What will
Madam Esmond at home say when she hears that he has lost every shilling
of his ready money--of his patrimony? All his winnings, and five
thousand pounds besides, in three nights. Castlewood could not have
played him false? No. My lord knows piquet better than Harry does, but
he would not deal unfairly with his own flesh and blood. No, no. Harry
is glad his kinsman, who wanted the money, has got it. And for not one
more shilling than he possessed, would he play. It was when he counted
up his losses at the gaming-table, and found they would cover all the
remainder of his patrimony, that he passed the box and left the table.
But, O cursed bad company! O extravagance and folly! O humiliation and
remorse! "Will my mother at home forgive me?" thinks the young prodigal.
"Oh, that I were there, and had never left it!"

The dreary London dawn peeps at length through shutters and curtains.
The housemaid enters to light his honour's fire and admit the dun
morning into his windows. Her Mr. Gumbo presently follows, who warms his
master's dressing-gown and sets out his shaving-plate and linen. Then
arrives the hairdresser to curl and powder his honour, whilst he re