ing men from their birth to an
irremediable state of contempt, from which no virtue could exalt them.
The Brahmins looked upon my Brahmin with ineffable horror. They called
_me_ the most wicked of vices; they saw no distinction between Justice
and Atheism. I uprooted their society--that was sufficient crime. But
the worst was, that the Pariahs themselves regarded me with suspicion;
they thought it unnatural in a Brahmin to care for a Pariah! And one
called me 'Madness,' another, 'Ambition,' and a third, 'The Desire to
innovate.' My poor Brahmin led a miserable life of it; when one day,
after observing, at my dictation, that he thought a Pariah's life as
much entitled to respect as a cow's, he was hurried away by the priests
and secretly broiled on the altar as a fitting reward for his sacrilege.
I fled hither in great tribulation, persuaded that in some countries
even Justice may do harm."

"As for me," said Charity, not waiting to be asked, "I grieve to say
that I was silly enough to take up my abode with an old lady in Dublin,
who never knew what discretion was, and always acted from impulse;
my instigation was irresistible, and the money she gave in her drives
through the suburbs of Dublin was so lavishly spent that it kept all
the rascals of the city in idleness and whiskey. I found, to my great
horror, that I was a main cause of a terrible epidemic, and that to give
alms without discretion was to spread poverty without help. I left the
city when my year was out, and as ill-luck would have it, just at the
time when I was most wanted."

"And oh," cried Hospitality, "I went to Ireland also. I fixed my abode
with a squireen; I ruined him in a year, and only left him because he
had no longer a hovel to keep me in."

"As for myself," said Temperance, "I entered the breast of an English
legislator, and he brought in a bill against ale-houses; the consequence
was, that the labourers took to gin; and I have been forced to confess
that Temperance may be too zealous when she dictates too vehemently to
others."

"Well," said Courage, keeping more in the background than he had ever
done before, and looking rather ashamed of himself, "that travelling
carriage I got into belonged to a German general and his wife, who were
returning to their own country. Growing very cold as we proceeded, she
wrapped me up in a polonaise; but the cold increasing, I inadvertently
crept into her bosom. Once there I could not get out, and from
t