you to him, as the greatest, slight and injury
that could be done to the many far better men
who admire you, and to the few who truly love
you. Among those few, there may be one who
loves you even as dearly, though he has not
loved you as long, as I. Take him, and I can
bear it better, for your sake!"

My earnestness awoke a wonder in her that
seemed as if it would have been touched with
compassion, if she could have rendered me at all
intelligible to her own mind.

"I am going," she said again, in a gentler
voice, "to be married to him. The preparations
for my marriage are making, and I shall be
married soon. Why do you injuriously introduce
the name of my mother by adoption? It is
my own act."

"Your own act, Estella, to fling yourself
away upon a brute?"

"On whom should I fling myself away?"
she retorted, with a smile. "Should I fling
myself away upon the man who would the soonest
feel (if people do feel such things) that I took
nothing to him? There! It is done. I shall
do well enough, and so will my husband. As to
leading me into what you call this fatal step,
Miss Havisham would have had me wait, and
not marry yet; but I am tired of the life I
have led, which has very few charms for me,
and I am willing enough to change it. Say no
more. We shall never understand each other."

"Such a mean brute, such a stupid brute!"
I urged in despair.

"Don't be afraid of my being a blessing to
him," said Estella; "I shall not be that. Come!
Here is my hand. Do we part on this, you
visionary boy—or man?"

"O Estella!" I answered, as my bitter tears
fell fast on her hand, do what I would to restrain
them; "even if I remained in England and
could hold my head up with the rest, how could
I see you Drummle's wife!"

"Nonsense," she returned, "nonsense. This
will pass in no time."

"Never, Estella!"

"You will get me out of your thoughts in a
week."

"Out of my thoughts! You are part of my
existence, part of myself. You have been in
every line I have ever read since I first came
here, the rough common boy whose poor heart
you wounded even then. You have been in
every prospect I have ever seen since—
on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes,
in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in
the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the
streets. You have been the embodiment of every
graceful fancy that my mind has ever become
acquainted with. The stones of which the
strongest London buildings are made, are not
more real, or more impossible to be displaced by
your hands, than your presence and influence
have been to me, there and everywhere, and will
be. Estella, to the last hour of my life, you
cannot choose but remain part of my character,
part of the little good in me, part of the evil.
But, in this separation I associate you only with
the good, and I will faithfully hold you to that
always, for you must have done me far more
good than harm, let me feel now what sharp
distress I may. O God bless you, God forgive you!"

In what ecstasy of unhappiness I got these
broken words out of myself, I don't know. The
rhapsody welled up within me, like blood from
an inward wound, and gushed out. I held her
hand to my lips some lingering moments, and so
I left her. But ever afterwards, I remembered—
and soon afterwards with stronger reason—that
while Estella looked at me merely with incredulous
wonder, the spectral figure of Miss Havisham,
her hand still covering her heart, seemed all
resolved into a ghastly stare of pity and remorse.

All done, all gone! So much was done and
gone, that when I went out at the gate, the light
of the day seemed of a darker colour than
when I went in. For a while, I hid myself
among some lanes and by-paths, and then struck
off to walk all the way to London. For, I
had by that time come to myself so far, as to
consider that I could not go back to the inn
and see Drummle there; that I could not bear
to sit upon the coach and be spoken to; that
I could do nothing half so good for myself as
tire myself out.

It was past midnight when I crossed London
Bridge. Pursuing the narrow intricacies
of the streets which at that time tended westward
near the Middlesex shore of the river,
my readiest access to the Temple was close by
the river-side, through Whitefriars. I was not
expected till to-morrow, but I had my keys,
and, if Herbert were gone to bed, could get to
bed myself without disturbing him.

As it seldom happened that I came in at that
Whitefriars gate after the Temple was closed,
and as I was very muddy and weary, I did not
take it ill that the night-porter examined me with
much attention as he held the gate a little way
open for me to pass in. To help his memory,
I mentioned my name.

"I was not quite sure, sir, but I thought so.
Here's a note, sir. The messenger that brought
it, said would you be so good as read it by my
lantern."

Much surprised by the request, I took the
note. It was directed to Philip Pip, Esquire,
and on the top of the superscription were the
words, "PLEASE READ THIS, HERE." I opened
it, the watchman holding up his light, and read
inside, in Wemmick's writing:

"DON'T GO HOME."

AFTER THE LEBANON MASSACRES.

I TOOK my departure from Beyrout last
summer, for the purpose of spending a couple
of days with the hospitable owner of the silk-
reeling factory of Ein-Hamade, situated in one
of the most beautiful valleys of the Lebanon.
Although only two months had elapsed since
the fearful massacres by the Druses, which so
horrified Europe, and although no native Christian
would have dared to go alone to any district
in Lebanon where the Druses abound, a French