speculator in perpetual motion to
do. I am too much a pessimist to respect my own affections. Do you know
what a pessimist is?"

"A man who thinks everybody as nasty as himself, and hates them for it."

"So, or thereabout. Modern English polite society, my native sphere,
seems to me as corrupt as consciousness of culture and absence of
honesty can make it. A canting, lie-loving, fact-hating, scribbling,
chattering, wealth-hunting, pleasure-hunting, celebrity-hunting mob,
that, having lost the fear of hell, and not replaced it by the love of
justice, cares for nothing but the lion's share of the wealth wrung by
threat of starvation from the hands of the classes that create it. If
you interrupt me with a silly speech, Hetty, I will pitch you into the
canal, and die of sorrow for my lost love afterwards. You know what I
am, according to the conventional description: a gentleman with lots of
money. Do you know the wicked origin of that money and gentility?"

"Oh, Sidney; have you been doing anything?"

"No, my best beloved; I am a gentleman, and have been doing nothing.
That a man can do so and not starve is nowadays not even a paradox.
Every halfpenny I possess is stolen money; but it has been stolen
legally, and, what is of some practical importance to you, I have no
means of restoring it to the rightful owners even if I felt inclined to.
Do you know what my father was?"

"What difference can that make now? Don't be disagreeable and full of
ridiculous fads, Sidney dear. I didn't marry your father."

"No; but you married--only incidentally, of course--my father's fortune.
That necklace of yours was purchased with his money; and I can almost
fancy stains of blood."

"Stop, Sidney. I don't like this sort of romancing. It's all nonsense.
DO be nice to me."

"There are stains of sweat on it, I know."

"You nasty wretch!"

"I am thinking, not of you, my dainty one, but of the unfortunate people
who slave that we may live idly. Let me explain to you why we are so
rich. My father was a shrewd, energetic, and ambitious Manchester man,
who understood an exchange of any sort as a transaction by which one man
should lose and the other gain. He made it his object to make as many
exchanges as possible, and to be always the gaining party in them. I do
not know exactly what he was, for he was ashamed both of his antecedents
and of his relatives, from which I can only infer that they were honest,
and, therefore, unsuccessful