ecorum
spun out of the flimsy sophisms by which he has been deceiving his
friends, and partially deceiving himself, into the belief that his
previous purchases were necessary, or, at all events, serviceable for
professional and literary purposes. He now becomes shameless and
hardened; and it is observable in the career of this class of
unfortunates, that the first act of duplicity is immediately followed by
an access of the disorder, and a reckless abandonment to its
propensities. The Archdeacon had long passed this stage ere he crossed
my path, and had become thoroughly hardened. He was not remarkable for
local attachment; and in moving from place to place, his spoil, packed
in innumerable great boxes, sometimes followed him, to remain unreleased
during the whole period of his tarrying in his new abode, so that they
were removed to the next stage of his journey through life with modified
inconvenience.

Cruel as it may seem, I must yet notice another and a peculiar vagary of
his malady. He had resolved, at least once in his life, to part with a
considerable proportion of his collection--better to suffer the anguish
of such an act than endure the fretting of continued restraint. There
was a wondrous sale by auction accordingly; it was something like what
may have occurred on the dissolution of the monasteries at the
Reformation, or when the contents of some time-honoured public library
were realised at the period of the French Revolution. Before the affair
was over, the Archdeacon himself made his appearance in the midst of the
miscellaneous self-invited guests who were making free with his
treasures,--he pretended, honest man, to be a mere casual spectator,
who, having seen, in passing, the announcement of a sale by auction,
stepped in like the rest of the public. By degrees he got excited,
gasped once or twice as if mastering some desperate impulse, and at
length fairly bade. He could not brazen out the effect of this escapade,
however, and disappeared from the scene. It was remarked by the
observant, that an unusual number of lots were afterwards knocked down
to a military gentleman, who seemed to have left portentously large
orders with the auctioneer. Some curious suspicions began to arise,
which were settled by that presiding genius bending over his rostrum,
and explaining in a confidential whisper that the military hero was in
reality a pillar of the Church so disguised.

The Archdeacon lay under what, among a