The Argosy — page 330: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A Dream from Heaven. 309 Monday.—I begin the week in hope. How shallIend it? To-day I go to Lewis. Knock, knock, knock! I must put them off again. I trust for a day or two only. friday Night—Thank Heaven for the hope this day has brought forth. I could not see Lewis until this morning: he was out of town. He received me cordially. I explained all my circumstances to him, and asked for the loan of £100. He said cheerfully that he would consider of it, and see what he could do. Saturday, the next day, he should be very busy, but I might go in and see him on Mon- day morning. I feel sure of the money now: if it were not his in- tention to lend it, he would have declined at once. Thank God! thank God ! Saturday Night.—What an evening this has been! I have told them to come on Monday night or Tuesday morning, and they shall be paid. Monday Night, 12 o'clock p.M.—The clocks are tolling the knell of the departed day: would they were tolling it for me! I cannot much longer support this wretched existence—despair and disappointment, disappointment and despair! I was at Lewis's by ten o’clock, and waited some minutes before he came in, minutes to me of unut- terable agitation. A refusal I dared not comtemplate: yet, a refusal came. He had consulted his partner, he said, who was not willing to advance the loan : had I been able to propose a responsible security for its repayment, they might have entertained it. And I had told this man all my situation! this man who, independent of his large yearly gains, is worth thousands and thousands! To have given me hopes on Friday ! To make my request to him a matter of business ! Friendship such as ours has been! : And I have walked about this day foodless, and have come home penniless, dead beat both in body and mind. To-morrow must come. I promised to pay them, and they will all be here thick and threefold. I can no longer bear up against my fate. My children, my wife look to me for succour, and I cannot give it. ‘There is one thought always pressing itself upon my brain—that, if I were no more, friends would rally around my wife and children. JI have asked myself how this thought dares to come to me, and I have hitherto thrust it away ; but I will do so no longer. - It is the only course open to me. Margaret is calling to know what I am sitting up for. Tuesday Evening.—The last of my existence—Father! ‘Thou with- holdest Thy mercy from me in this world, but surely Thou wilt not in the next. Pardon, pardon if I come home to Thee before my time! I can no longer support this life, my persecutions are greater than I can bear. Surely sufferings such as mine never fell on man. My prayers have ascended in vain. J have implored for succour, and Thou CoOnniclooolkKks im