eliberation, buying
a new wig of reddish hair and selecting sundry garments, in a fashion
unlike his customary suit of brown, from a Jew's old-clothes bag. It
is accomplished: Wakefield is another man. The new system being now
established, a retrograde movement to the old would be almost as
difficult as the step that placed him in his unparalleled position.
Furthermore, he is rendered obstinate by a sulkiness occasionally
incident to his temper and brought on at present by the inadequate
sensation which he conceives to have been produced in the bosom of
Mrs. Wakefield. He will not go back until she be frightened half to
death. Well, twice or thrice has she passed before his sight, each
time with a heavier step, a paler cheek and more anxious brow, and in
the third week of his non-appearance he detects a portent of evil
entering the house in the guise of an apothecary. Next day the knocker
is muffled. Toward nightfall comes the chariot of a physician and
deposits its big-wigged and solemn burden at Wakefield's door, whence
after a quarter of an hour's visit he emerges, perchance the herald of
a funeral. Dear woman! will she die?

By this time Wakefield is excited to something like energy of feeling,
but still lingers away from his wife's bedside, pleading with his
conscience that she must not be disturbed at such a juncture. If aught
else restrains him, he does not know it. In the course of a few weeks
she gradually recovers. The crisis is over; her heart is sad, perhaps,
but quiet, and, let him return soon or late, it will never be feverish
for him again. Such ideas glimmer through the mist of Wakefield's mind
and render him indistinctly conscious that an almost impassable gulf
divides his hired apartment from his former home. "It is but in the
next street," he sometimes says. Fool! it is in another world.
Hitherto he has put off' his return from one particular day to
another; henceforward he leaves the precise time undetermined--not
to-morrow; probably next week; pretty soon. Poor man! The dead have
nearly as much chance of revisiting their earthly homes as the
self-banished Wakefield.

Would that I had a folio to write, instead of an article of a dozen
pages! Then might I exemplify how an influence beyond our control lays
its strong hand on every deed which we do and weaves its consequences
into an iron tissue of necessity.

Wakefield is spellbound. We must leave him for ten years or so to
haunt around his house w