ther he was or was not
unfortunate history does not record. A week or two later the old round
of dissipation had apparently set in. "I am now tied down neck and
heels by engagements every night this week, or most joyfully would
have trod the old pleasing road from Bond to Gerrard Street. I am
quite well, but exhausted with a roomful of company every morning till
dinner." A little later, and this momentary flash of health had died
out; and we find him writing what was his last letter to his daughter,
full, evidently, of uneasy forebodings as to his approaching end. He
speaks of "this vile influenza--be not alarmed. I think I shall get
the better of it, and shall be with you both the 1st of May;"
though, he adds, "if I escape, 'twill not be for a long period, my
child--unless a quiet retreat and peace of mind can restore me." But
the occasion of this letter was a curious one, and a little more must
be extracted from it. Lydia Sterne's letter to her father had, he
said, astonished him. "She (Mrs. Sterne) could know but little of my
feelings to tell thee that under the supposition I should survive
thy mother I should bequeath thee as a legacy to Mrs. Draper. No, my
Lydia, 'tis a lady whose virtues I wish thee to imitate"--Mrs.
James, in fact, whom he proceeds to praise with much and probably
well-deserved warmth. "But," he adds, sadly, "I think, my Lydia,
thy mother will survive me; do not deject her spirit with thy
apprehensions on my account. I have sent you a necklace and buckles,
and the same to your mother. My girl cannot form a wish that is in the
power of her father that he will not gratify her in; and I cannot in
justice be less kind to thy mother. I am never alone. The kindness of
my friends is ever the same. I wish though I had thee to nurse me, but
I am denied that. Write to me twice a week at least. God bless thee,
my child, and believe me ever, ever, thy affectionate father."

The despondent tone of this letter was to be only too soon justified.
The "vile influenza" proved to be or became a pleurisy. On Thursday,
March 10, he was bled three times, and blistered on the day after. And
on the Tuesday following, in evident consciousness that his end was
near, he penned that cry "for pity and pardon," as Thackeray calls
it--the first as well as the last, and which sounds almost as strange
as it does piteous from those mocking lips:

"The physician says I am better.... God knows, for I feel myself
sadly wrong,