better--was I richer--was I handsomer--was I cleverer, than my kind? No,
no;--(and here Russelton ground his teeth with a strong and wrathful
expression of scorn);--and had I been all--had I been a very
concentration and monopoly of all human perfections, they would not have
valued me at half the price they did set on me. It was--I will tell you
the simple secret, Mr. Pelham--it was because I trampled on them, that,
like crushed herbs, they sent up a grateful incense in return.

"Oh! it was balm to my bitter and loathing temper, to see those who would
have spurned me from them, if they dared, writhe beneath my lash, as I
withheld or inflicted it at will. I was the magician who held the great
spirits that longed to tear me to pieces, by one simple spell which a
superior hardihood had won me--and, by Heaven, I did not spare to exert
it.

"Well, well, this is but an idle recollection now; all human power, says
the proverb of every language, is but of short duration. Alexander did
not conquer kingdoms for ever; and Russelton's good fortune deserted him
at last. Napoleon died in exile, and so shall I; but we have both had our
day, and mine was the brightest of the two, for it had no change till the
evening. I am more happy than people would think for--Je ne suis pas
souvent ou mon corps est--I live in a world of recollections, I trample
again upon coronets and ermine, the glories of the small great! I give
once more laws which no libertine is so hardy not to feel exalted in
adopting; I hold my court, and issue my fiats; I am like the madman, and
out of the very straws of my cell, I make my subjects and my realm; and
when I wake from these bright visions, and see myself an old, deserted
man, forgotten, and decaying inch by inch in a foreign village, I can at
least summon sufficient of my ancient regality of spirit not to sink
beneath the reverse. If I am inclined to be melancholy, why, I extinguish