in one of the many mansions of the “west end” of london, a lady reclined one morning on a sofa wishing that it were afternoon. she was a middle-aged, handsome, sickly lady. if it had been afternoon she would have wished that it were evening, and if it had been evening she would have wished for the morning; for mrs stoutley was one of those languid invalids whose enjoyment appears to be altogether in the future or the past, and who seem to have no particular duties connected with the present except sighing and wishing. it may be that this unfortunate condition of mind had something to do with mrs stoutley’s feeble state of health. if she had been a little more thoughtful about others, and less mindful of herself, she might, perhaps, have sighed and wished less, and enjoyed herself more. at all events her doctor seemed to entertain some such opinion, for, sitting in an easy chair beside her, and looking earnestly at her handsome, worn-out countenance, he said, somewhat abruptly, being a blunt doctor.

“you must go abroad, madam, and try to get your mind, as well as your body, well shaken up.”

“why, doctor,” replied mrs stoutley, with a faint smile; “you talk of me as if i were a bottle of physic or flat ginger-beer.”

“you are little better, silly woman,” thought the doctor, but his innate sense of propriety induced him only to say, with a smile, “well, there is at least this much resemblance between you and a bottle of flat ginger-beer, namely, that both require to be made to effervesce a little. it will never do to let your spirits down as you have been doing. we must brighten up, my dear madam—not brighton up, by the way, we’ve had enough of brighton and bath, and such places. we must get away to the continent this summer—to the pyrenees, or switzerland, where we can breathe the fresh mountain air, and ramble on glaciers, and have a thorough change.”

mrs stoutley looked gently, almost pitifully at the doctor while he spoke, as if she thought him a well-meaning and impulsive, but rather stupid maniac.

“impossible, my dear doctor,” she said; “you know i could not stand the fatigues of such a journey.”

“well, then,” replied the doctor, abruptly, “you must stop at home and die.”

“oh! what a shocking naughty man you are to talk so.”

mrs stoutley said this, however, with an easy good-natured air, which showed plainly that she did not believe her illness likely to have such a serious termination.

“i will be still more naughty and shocking,” continued the doctor, resolutely, but with a twinkle in his eyes, “for i shall prescribe not only a dose of mountain air, but a dose of mountain exercise, to be taken—and the patient to be well shaken while taken—every morning throughout the summer and autumn. moreover, after you return to england, you must continue the exercise during the winter; and, in addition to that, must have an object at the end of your walks and drives—not shopping, observe, that is not a sufficiently out-of-door object; nor visiting your friends, which is open to the same objection.”

mrs stoutley smiled again at this, and said that really, if visiting and shopping were forbidden, there seemed to be nothing left but museums and picture-galleries.

to this the doctor retorted that although she might do worse than visit museums and picture-galleries, he would prefer that she should visit the diamond and gold fields of the city.

“did you ever hear of the diamond and gold fields of london, miss gray?” he said, turning to a plain yet pretty girl, who had been listening in silence to the foregoing conversation.

“never,” answered miss gray, with a look of surprise.

now, miss gray’s look of surprise induces us to state in passing that this young lady—niece, also poor relation and companion, to mrs stoutley—possessed three distinct aspects. when grave, she was plain,—not ugly, observe; a girl of nineteen, with a clear healthy complexion and nut-brown hair, cannot in any circumstances be ugly; no, she was merely plain when grave. when she smiled she was decidedly pretty, and when she laughed she was captivating—absolutely irresistible! she seldom laughed, occasionally smiled, and was generally grave. there was something quite incomprehensible about her, for she was not an unusually good girl, and by no means a dashing girl, neither was she an intensely modest girl—and yet, plain emma gray had perhaps driven more young men into a condition of drivelling imbecility than any acknowledged beauty of the metropolis.

observe, we say “perhaps,” because we lay claim to no superhuman knowledge in regard to such matters.

“they are rather extensive fields,” continued the doctor, “scattered here and there about the metropolis, but lying chiefly in the city and on the banks of the thames. they comprise many picture-galleries, too, and museums; the latter containing wonderful specimens of old bones and fossil remains, filth, and miscellaneous abominations, in which the gold and diamonds are imbedded—sometimes buried,—and the former being hung with subjects—chiefly interiors—incomparably superior, in respect of graphic power, to the works of hogarth.”

“oh! i know what you mean,” said miss gray, with a little smile.

“your wits are sharper than mine, emma,” said mrs stoutley, with a sigh and a placid look. “what do you refer to, doctor tough?”

“i refer to those districts, madam, chiefly inhabited by the poor, where there are innumerable diamonds and gold nuggets, some of which are being polished, and a good many are glittering brightly, though not yet fixed in their proper setting, while by far the greater number of them are down in the earth, and useless in the meantime, and apt to be lost for want of adventurous diggers. they are splendid fields those of london, and digging is healthful occupation—though it might not seem so at first sight. did you ever visit the poor, mrs stoutley?”

with a slight elevation of her eyebrows, and the application of a scent-bottle to her delicate nose, as if the question had suggested bad smells, the lady said that—well, yes, she had once visited a poor old gardener who had been a faithful creature in the family of a former friend, but that her recollection of that visit did not tend to induce a wish for its repetition.

“h’m!” coughed the doctor, “well, the taste of physic is usually bad at first, but one soon gets used to it, and the after effects, as you know, are exceedingly beneficial. i hope that when you visit the london diggings you may find the truth of this; but it will be time enough to speak of that subject when you return from rambling on the glaciers of switzerland, where, by the way, the dirt, rubbish, and wrack, called moraines, which lie at the foot of the glaciers, will serve to remind you of the gold-fields to which i have referred, for much of what composes those moraines was once solid rock in a fixed position on the heights, or glittering ice which reflected the sun’s dazzling rays on surrounding high life, though it lies low in the earth now. to a lady of your intelligence, madam, i need not expound my parable. there are many avalanches, great and small, in english society as well as among the swiss mountains; and, whether by gradual subsidence or a tremendous rush, we must all find our places in the moraine at last.”

“really, doctor,” said mrs stoutley, with a light laugh, “you seem to have already wandered much among these moral moraines, and to have acquired some of their ruggedness. how can you talk of such dismal things to a patient? but are you really in earnest about my going abroad?”

“indeed i am,” replied the doctor, firmly, “and i advise you to begin your preparations at once, for you must set out on your travels in less than a month. i lay the responsibility of seeing my orders carried into effect on your shoulders, miss gray.”

so saying, the doctor rose and took his leave. mrs stoutley and her niece immediately began to discuss the subject of switzerland—the one languidly, the other with animation. it was plain enough that, although the invalid protested to the doctor her inability to travel, she really had no objection, perhaps felt some desire, to go abroad, for when miss gray mentioned the fact that there was a difficulty in the shape of insufficient funds, she replied with more warmth than usual—

“now, emma, what is the use of always bringing up that ridiculous idea?”

“no doubt, auntie,” the maiden replied, “it is a little ridiculous to run short of ready money, considering the style in which we live; but it would be still more ridiculous, you know, to go to switzerland without the means of paying our expenses while there.”

“what’s that you say about expenses, cousin?” exclaimed a tall handsome stripling who entered at the moment, and seated himself on the sofa at his mother’s feet.

“oh, bother the expense!” he exclaimed, when the difficulty had been explained to him, “it can’t cost so much to spend a few months in switzerland,—besides, we can do it cheap, you know. didn’t mr what’s-his-name, our man of business, say that there was a considerable balance at the banker’s, and that if the what-d’ee-call-’em mines paid a reasonable dividend, we should easily get over our difficulties?”

“he said something of that sort, i believe,” replied mrs stoutley, with a sigh.

“i rather think, cousin lewis,” said emma, endeavouring to repress a smile, “that he said there was an inconsiderable balance at the bankers, and that unless the gorong mine paid a reasonable dividend, we shouldn’t easily get over our difficulties.”

both lewis and his mother laughed at the quiet way in which this was said, but, while both admitted that emma’s view of the matter might perhaps be correct, lewis held that there was no good reason for supposing there would be any difficulty in the meantime in obtaining from their “man-of-business” the paltry sum that was required for a short tour on the continent. indeed mrs stoutley regarded this man-of-business as a mere sponge, who required only to be squeezed in order to the production of what was desired, and the man-of-business himself found it no easy matter to convince her that she held erroneous views on this subject, and that at her present rate of progress, she would, to use the doctor’s glacial simile, very soon topple from the pinnacle of fashion, on which she sat, and fall with the crash of a social avalanche into the moraine of ruin.

“what a wise little woman you are, cousin emma,” said lewis, gaily. “you ought to have been bred to the law, or trained an accountant. however, we won’t be guided by your advice just now, first, because the doctor has ordered mother abroad for her health, which is our chief consideration; and, second, because i wish of all things to see switzerland, and climb mont blanc. besides, we are not so poor as you think, and i hope to add a little to our general funds in a day or two. by the way, can you lend me ten pounds just now, mother?”

“why do you want it?” asked mrs stoutley, sternly, as if she meant to refuse, but at the same time opening her purse.

“don’t ask me just now. i will repay you tomorrow, with interest and shall then explain.”

with an easy, languid smile, the carelessly amiable invalid handed her last ten-pound note to her hopeful son, who had just transferred it to his pocketbook, when a footman entered and presented a scrap of dirty paper, informing his lady that the person who sent up the “card” desired to see her.

“what is this?” said mrs stoutley, holding the paper gingerly with the tips of her fingers, “wip—wap—wopper! what is wopper? is the person a man or a woman?”

the footman, who, although well-bred, found it difficult to restrain a smile, intimated that the person was a man, and added, that he said he had come from california, and wanted to see mrs stoutley very particularly.

on hearing this, the lady’s manner changed at once, and, with more animation than she had yet exhibited, she desired that he should be shown in.

with his large wide-awake in one hand, and a canvas bag in the other, captain wopper entered the drawing-room, and looked around him with a beaming and rather bashful smile.

“mrs stoutley, i believe,” he said, advancing, “and miss emma gray, i suppose,” he added, turning with a beaming glance towards the young lady.

mrs stoutley admitted that he was right, and expressed some surprise that he, a perfect stranger, should be so well acquainted with their names.

“i am indeed a stranger personally, ma’am,” said captain wopper, smoothing the hair down on his rugged brow, “but i may be said to know you pretty well, seeing that i have for many years been the friend and messmate of your late husband’s brother in californy.”

“indeed!” exclaimed mrs stoutley, with increasing animation, as she rose and held out her hand; “any friend of my brother-in-law is heartily welcome. be seated, mr wopper, and let me hear about him. he was very kind to my dear husband during his last illness—very kind. i shall never forget him.”

“no doubt he was,” said the captain, accepting the chair which emma gray handed to him, with looks of great interest. “thank ’ee, miss. willum stout—excuse my familiarity, ma’am, i always called him willum, because we was like brothers—more than brothers, i may say, an’ very friendly. yes, willum stout was kind to his brother in his last days. it would have bin shame to him if he hadn’t for your husband, ma’am, was kind to willum, an’ he often said to me, over the camp-fires in the bush, that he’d never forget his kindness. but it’s over now,” continued the seaman in a sad tone, “an’ poor willum is left alone.”

“is my uncle very poor?” asked lewis, who had been paying more attention to the appearance of their rugged visitor than to what he had said.

“ay, very poor,” replied the seaman, “as regards near relations, leastwise such as he has seen and known in former days, but he an’t poor as regards gold. he’s got lots of that. he and i worked not far from each other for years, an’ he used to hit upon good claims somehow, and shovelled up the nuggets like stones.”

“indeed! i wish he’d send a few of them this way,” exclaimed lewis, with a careless laugh.

“no doubt he might do so, young man, if he knew you were in need of ’em, but your father gave him to understand that his family was rich.”

“rich!” exclaimed lewis, with a smile, in which there was a touch of contempt. “well, yes, we were rich enough once, but when my father was away these wretched mines became—”

“lewie!” exclaimed his mother, hastily, “what nonsense you do talk! really, one would think from your account that we were paupers.”

“well, mother, so we are—paupers to this extent at least, that we can’t afford to take a run to switzerland, though ordered to do so for your health, because we lack funds.”

lewis said this half petulantly, for he had been a “spoilt child,” and might probably have been by that time a ruined young man, but for the mercy of his creator, who had blessed him with an amiable disposition. he was one of those youths, in short, of whom people say that they can’t be spoiled, though fond and foolish parents do their best to spoil them.

“you mis-state the case, naughty boy,” said mrs stoutley, annoyed at being thus forced to touch on her private affairs before a stranger. “no doubt our ready cash is what our man-of-business calls ‘locked up,’ but that, you know, is only a matter of temporary inconvenience, and cannot last long.”

as mrs stoutley paused and hesitated, their visitor placed on the table a canvas bag, which, up to this point he had rested on one knee.

“this bag,” he said, “of nuggets, is a gift from willum. he desired me to deliver it to you, miss gray, as a small acknowledgment of your kindness in writin’ so often to him. he’d have bought you a silk gown, or a noo bonnet, so he said, but wasn’t sure as to your taste in such matters, and thought you’d accept the nuggets and buy it for yourself. leastwise, that’s somethin’ like the speech willum tried to tell me to deliver, but he warn’t good at speech-makin’ no more than i at remembrin’, and hoped you’d take the will for the deed.”

with a flush of surprise and pleasure, emma gray accepted both the will and the deed, with many expressions of gratitude, and said, that as she did not require either a silk dress or a bonnet just then, she would invest her little fortune; she would lend it at high interest, to a lady under temporary inconvenience, who was ordered by her doctor to switzerland for the benefit of her health. to this mrs stoutley protested very earnestly that the lady in question would not accept the loan on any consideration; that it must not be diverted from its destined use, but be honestly expended on silk-dresses and new bonnets. to which emma replied, that the destiny of the gift, with interest (she was very particular on that head), should be fulfilled in good time, but that meanwhile it must be lent out.

in the midst of a cross-fire of this kind the bag was opened, and its contents poured on the table, to the immense admiration of all the company, none of whom had, until that day, beheld gold in its native condition.

“how much may it be worth, mr wopper?” asked lewis, weighing one of the largest lumps.

“about two hundred pound, i should say, more or less,” replied the seaman.

“indeed!” exclaimed the youth in surprise—an exclamation which was echoed by his mother and cousin in modified tones.

while they sat thus toying with the lumps of gold, the conversation reverted to the sender of it, and the captain told such entertaining anecdotes of bush life, in all of which “uncle willum” had been an actor, that the afternoon arrived before mrs stoutley had time to wish for it. they also talked of the last illness of the deceased father of the family; and when it came out that captain (they had found out by that time that their visitor had been a skipper, and, by courtesy, a captain), had assisted “willum” in nursing mr stoutley, and had followed him to the grave, mrs stoutley’s gratitude was such that she insisted on her visitor staying to dinner.

“thank ’ee, ma’am,” he said, “i’ve dined. i always dines at one o’clock if i can manage it.”

“but we don’t dine till eight,” said the lady, “so it will just suit for your supper.”

“do come,” said emma gray, “we shall be quite alone, and shall have a great spinning of yarns over uncle william and the gold-fields.”

“well, i don’t mind if i do,” said the captain, “but before supper i must go to the docks for my kit and settle my lodgings.”

“i am going to the strand, and shall be happy to give you a lift,” said lewis.

the captain accepted the offer, and as they drove along, he and his young friend became very intimate, insomuch that lewis, who was lighthearted, open, and reckless, let him into his confidence, and spoke quite freely about his mother’s difficulties. it is only justice to add that the captain did not encourage him in this. when, however, the youth spoke of himself, he not only encouraged him, but drew him out. among other things, he drew out of him the fact that he was in the habit of gambling, and that he fully expected—if his usual luck attended him—to assist in adding to the fund which was to take the family abroad.

the captain looked at the handsome stripling for a few seconds in silent surprise.

“you don’t mean to tell me,” he said slowly, “that you gamble?”

“indeed i do,” replied lewis, with a bland smile, and something of a twinkle in his eye.

“for money?” asked the captain.

“for money,” assented the youth; “what have you to say against it?”

“why, i’ve to say that it’s mean.”

“that’s strong language,” said lewis, flushing.

“it an’t strong enough by a long way,” returned the captain, with indignation, “it’s more than mean, it’s contemptible; it’s despicable.”

the flush on lewis’s face deepened, and he looked at his companion with the air of one who meditates knocking another down. perhaps the massive size and strength of the captain induced him to change his mind. it may be that there occurred to him the difficulty—if not impossibility—of knocking down a man who was down already, and the want of space in a cab for such violent play of muscle. at all events he did nothing, but looked “daggers.”

“look ’ee here, my lad,” continued the captain, laying his huge hand on his companion’s knee, and gazing earnestly into his face, “i don’t mean for to hurt your feelin’s by sayin’ that you are mean, or contemptible, or despicable, for i don’t suppose you’ve thought much about the matter at all, and are just following in the wake of older men who ought to know better; but i say that the thing—gambling for money—is the meanest thing a man can do, short of stealing. what does it amount to? simply this—i want another man’s money, and the other man wants mine. we daren’t try open robbery, we would be ashamed of that; we’re both too lazy to labour for money, and labour doesn’t bring it in fast enough, therefore we’ll go play for it. i’ll ask him to submit to be robbed by me on condition that i submit to be robbed by him; and which is to be the robbed, and which the robber, shall depend on the accidental turn of a dice, or something equally trifling—”

“but i don’t gamble by means of dice,” interrupted lewis, “i play, and bet, on billiards, which is a game of skill, requiring much practice, judgment, and thought.”

“that makes no odds, my lad,” continued the captain. “there is no connection whatever between the rolling of a ball and the taking away of a man’s money, any more than there is between the turning of a dice and the taking of a man’s money. both are dishonourable subterfuges. they are mere blinds put up to cover the great and mean fact, which is, that i want to get possession of my neighbour’s cash.”

“but, captain,” retorted lewis, with a smile—for he had now entered into the spirit of the argument—“you ignore the fact that while i try to win from my friend, i am quite willing that my friend should try to win from me.”

“ignore it? no!” cried captain wopper. “putt it in this way. isn’t it wrong for me to have a longing desire and itching fingers to lay hold of your cash?”

“well, put in that simple form,” said lewis, with a laugh, “it certainly is.”

“and isn’t it equally wrong for you to have a hungering and thirsting after my cash?”

“of course that follows,” assented lewis.

“well, then,” pursued the captain, “can any agreement between you and me, as to the guessing of black or white or the turning of dice or anything else, make a right out of two wrongs?”

“still,” said lewis, a little puzzled, “there is fallacy somewhere in your argument. i cannot see that gambling is wrong.”

“mark me, my lad,” returned the captain, impressively, “it is no sufficient reason for the doing of a thing that you cannot see it to be wrong. you are not entitled to do anything unless you see it to be right. but there are other questions connected with gambling which renders it doubly mean—the question, for instance, whether a man is entitled to risk the loss of money which he calls his own, but which belongs to his wife and children as much as to himself. the mean positions, too, in which a gambler places himself, are numerous. one of these is, when a rich man wins the hard-earned and much-needed gains of a poor one.”

“but one is not supposed to know anything about the affairs of those from whom one wins,” objected lewis.

“all the more reason,” replied captain wopper, “why a man should never gamble, lest, unwittingly, he should become the cause of great suffering—it might be, of death.”

still lewis “could not see” the wrong of gambling, and the discussion was cut short by the sudden stopping of the cab at a door in the strand, over which hung a lamp, on which the captain observed the word “billiards.”

“well, ta-ta, old fellow,” said lewis, gaily, as he parted from his new friend, “we’ll finish the argument another day. meanwhile, don’t forget the hour—eight, sharp.”