Markworth’s death released him from all his liabilities! It can be imagined what a wail went up in Jewry when the knowledge that he had escaped them became fully known to those modern Shylocks, Solomonson and Isaacs. They tore their beards, they wept, they cursed by their gods the Gentile who had out-witted them; but it was of no use, they could not get their money back. Death is regardless of human bonds and obligations, and although the Shylocks got much additional avoirdupois weight of flesh beyond their original pound, the Jews thought themselves sadly victimised. They got no pecuniary satisfaction for the large sums they had advanced their former client; even the change which had been left out of Mrs Martin’s five pound note did not come to them: it was taken out of the pockets of the dead man by the Cerberus of the sponging-house, who thought it better to appropriate the said moneys to his own use rather than leave them to be a source of wrangling to others.
Seeing that nothing could be got out of him now, the harpies left Markworth’s body to its fate. An inquest was held, a verdict given, “Died by the visitation of God,” and the unfortunate schemer would have been buried at the expense of the parish, had it not been for Mr Trump, who defrayed the cost out of his own pocket.
Thus ended Markworth’s life. He had schemed and planned, it is true, to enrich himself at the expense of others, but he was not, perhaps, so bad altogether, as one would, perhaps, at the first blush suppose. If we were to analyse the men around us, and enquire into the motives which plan their actions, independently of the actions themselves, we might find many whose principles are like those of the man who has been depicted in these pages—many, perhaps, far worse.
Volume Three—Chapter Fourteen.
“See the Conquering Hero comes.”
The Abyssinian war was ended! that gallant exploit of British arms, however marvellous in its inception, and second only to the march of Cyrus to the Sea that we read of in Xenophon, was actually un fait accompli! The captives were rescued, and the host returned, leaving Abyssinia pretty much as it was before it set out, with the exception of King Theodore being no longer in the land of the living. Peace to the bones of his sable majesty, who deserves some credit for his pluck, even if his ideas on the subject of diplomacy were at fault.
Although we have been saddled with a debt of some ten millions more or less—probably more, on account of the expedition—still it was a glorious feat for our country.
That “Britons never will be slaves,” or allow their fellow-countrymen to remain in captivity, is a remarkably comfortable axiom to hug to one’s heart cannot be denied; and beyond the credit we have gained from the successful termination of the “war,” and the kudos for the manner in which it was carried through from first to last, in spite of apparently insurmountable difficulties, the Abyssinian mission has done much to restore our old Continental reputation.