They looked at each other. Then they burst into tears. I thought they were natural tears such as a sister might shed over the loss of her brother. But they were not. 'Oh!' they cried. 'Oh! Oh! Oh! And now you will have the whole of that great fortune. And we thought that you would die and that Matthew would have it. What a misfortune! What a dreadful thing!' They wept and lamented, capping each other in lamentations all to the effect that the fortune had fallen to the undeserving one. 'And after all his plots and after his shameful trial before all the world! And after his highway robbery! And after the things that have been done to us! and now that people will say that Matthew died a Pauper—on the Common side! On the Poor side! We can never hold up our heads again.'

So I left these dear creatures. Never could I understand why they attributed any one of their misfortunes to me; nor of what nature were the plots to which they referred; nor why my trial was shameful.

However, I left these poor ladies. The reduction in their circumstances; their precarious condition; their having nothing but the guinea a week given by the Alderman's old friend; the uncertainty of his life; all should be considered when we think of their bitterness.

For my own part it was not until my cousins reminded me that I understood the great difference which the event made to me.

I was the survivor: and my succession came to me in less than three years after my father's death.

I was the survivor. At a single step I rose from the condition of a simple fiddler, at twenty-five or thirty shillings a week, to the possession of a fortune of over a hundred thousand pounds.

I hastened to our trusty attorney, Mr. Dewberry. I apprised him of what had happened; he undertook to present my claims and to transfer the money to my name, which he faithfully effected, and without difficulty.

Then I went on to Newgate.

'What is the matter, Will?' cried Jenny, 'you look strangely agitated.'

'Jenny'—I took her hand and held it—'you told me the other day that you were in no anxiety about money.'