had come so near to Victor Radnor's apprehensions of a possible, if not
an impending, consummation, that the ghastly vision of the Jew Dominant
in London City, over England, over Europe, America, the world (a picture
drawn in literary sepia by Colney: with our poor hang neck population
uncertain about making a bell-rope of the forelock to the Satyr-snouty
master; and the Norman Lord de Warenne handing him for a lump sum son and
daughter, both to be Hebraized in their different ways), fastened on the
most mercurial of patriotic men, and gave him a whole-length plunge into
despondency.

It lasted nearly a minute. His recovery was not in this instance due to
the calling on himself for the rescue of an ancient and glorious country;
nor altogether to the spectacle of the shipping, over the parapet, to his
right: the hundreds of masts rising out of the merchant river; London's
unrivalled mezzotint and the City' rhetorician's inexhaustible argument:
he gained it rather from the imperious demand of an animated and thirsty
frame for novel impressions. Commonly he was too hot with his business,
and airy fancies above it when crossing the bridge, to reflect in
freshness on its wonders; though a phrase could spring him alive to them;
a suggestion of the Foreigner, jealous, condemned to admire in despair of
outstripping, like Satan worsted; or when a Premier's fine inflation
magnified the scene at City banquets--exciting while audible, if a
waggery in memory; or when England's cherished Bard, the Leading Article,
blew bellows, and wind primed the lieges.

That a phrase on any other subject was of much the same effect, in
relation to it, may be owned; he was lightly kindled. The scene,
however, had a sharp sparkle of attractiveness at the instant. Down went
the twirling horizontal pillars of a strong tide from the arches of the
bridge, breaking to wild water at a remove; and a reddish Northern cheek