, exquisitely
heightened by art, but enter its spacious hall, and pass up to one
of its most luxurious chambers. How hushed and solemn the pervading
atmosphere! The inmates, few in number, are grouped around one on
whose white forehead Time's trembling finger has written the word
"Death." Over her bends a manly form. There--his face is toward you.
Ah! You recognise the wanderer--the wealth-seeker. What does he
here? What to him is the dying one? His wife! And has he, then,
forgotten the maiden whose dark lashes lay wet on her pale cheeks
for many hours after she read his parting words? He has not
forgotten, but been false to her. Eagerly sought he the prize, to
contend for which he went forth. Years came and departed; yet still
hope mocked him with ever-attractive and ever-fading illusions.
To-day he stood with his hand just ready to seize the object of his
wishes--to-morrow, a shadow mocked him. At last, in an evil hour, he
bowed down his manhood prostrate even to the dust in mammon-worship,
and took to himself a bride, rich in golden attractions, but poorer,
as a woman, than even the beggar at his father's gate. What a thorn
in his side she proved!--a thorn ever sharp and ever piercing. The
closer he attempted to draw her to his bosom, the deeper went the
points into his own, until, in the anguish of his soul, again and
again he flung her passionately from him.

Five years of such a life! Oh, what is there of earthly good to
compensate therefor? But, in this last desperate throw, did the
worldling gain the wealth, station, and honour he coveted? He had
wedded the only child of a man whose treasure might be counted by
hundreds of thousands; but, in doing so, he had failed to secure the
father's approval or confidence. The stern old man regarded him as a
mercenary interloper, and ever treated him as such. For five years,
therefore, he fretted and chafed in the narrow prison whose gilded
bars his own hands had forged. How often, during that time, had his
heart wandered back to the dear old home, and the beloved ones with
whom he had passed his early years And ah! how many, many times came
between him and the almost hated countenance of his wife, the
gentle, loving face of that one to whom he had been false! How often
her soft blue eyes rested on his own! How often he started and
looked up suddenly, as if her sweet voice came floating on the air!

And so the years moved on, the chain galling more deeply, and a
bitter s