r elder son's five thousand pounds.
He had previously still further improved his pecuniary position by
an advantageous marriage; and he is now passing the close of his days
either in France or Switzerland--a widower, with one son. We shall
return to him shortly. In the meantime, I need only tell you that Andrew
and Michael never again met--never again communicated, even by writing.
To all intents and purposes they were dead to each other, from those
early days to the present time.

"You can now estimate what Andrew's position was when he left his
profession and returned to England. Possessed of a fortune, h e was
alone in the world; his future destroyed at the fair outset of life;
his mother and brother estranged from him; his sister lately married,
with interests and hopes in which he had no share. Men of firmer mental
caliber might have found refuge from such a situation as this in an
absorbing intellectual pursuit. He was not capable of the effort; all
the strength of his character lay in the affections he had wasted. His
place in the world was that quiet place at home, with wife and children
to make his life happy, which he had lost forever. To look back was more
than he dare. To look forward was more than he could. In sheer despair,
he let his own impetuous youth drive him on; and cast himself into the
lowest dissipations of a London life.

"A woman's falsehood had driven him to his ruin. A woman's love saved
him at the outset of his downward career. Let us not speak of her
harshly--for we laid her with him yesterday in the grave.

"You, who only knew Mrs. Vanstone in later life, when illness and sorrow
and secret care had altered and saddened her, can form no adequate
idea of her attractions of person and character when she was a girl
of seventeen. I was with Andrew when he first met her. I had tried
to rescue him, for one night at least, from degrading associates and
degrading pleasures, by persuading him to go with me to a ball given by
one of the great City Companies. There they met. She produced a strong
impression on him the moment he saw her. To me, as to him, she was
a total stranger. An introduction to her, obtained in the customary
manner, informed him that she was the daughter of one Mr. Blake.
The rest he discovered from herself. They were partners in the dance
(unobserved in that crowded ball-room) all through the evening.

"Circumstances were against her from the first. She was unhappy at home.
He