sinews, muscles, flesh; I feel hunger, thirst, pain, as acutely: why
should I endure more than he can? Perhaps he had a wife, a child, and
he saw them starving inch by inch, and he felt that he ought to be
their protector; and so he sinned. And I--I--can I not sin too for
mine? can I not dare what the wild beast, and the vulture, and the
fierce hearts of my brethren dare for their mates and young? One
gripe from this hand, one cry from this voice, and my board might be
heaped with plenty, and my child fed, and she smile as she was wont to
smile,--for one night at least."

And as these thoughts broke upon him, Glendower rose, and with a step
firm, even in weakness, he strode unconsciously onward.

A figure appeared; Glendower's heart beat thick. He slouched his hat
over his brows, and for one moment wrestled with his pride and his
stern virtue: the virtue conquered, but not the pride; the virtue
forbade him to be the robber; the pride submitted to be the suppliant.
He sprang forward, extended his hands towards the stranger, and cried
in a sharp voice, the agony of which rang through the long dull street
with a sudden and echoless sound, "Charity! food!"

The stranger paused; one of the boldest of men in his own line, he was
as timid as a woman in any other. Mistaking the meaning of the
petitioner, and terrified by the vehemence of his gesture, he said, in
a trembling tone, as he hastily pulled out his purse,--

"There, there! do not hurt me; take it; take all!" Glendower knew the
voice, as a sound not unfamiliar to him; his pride returned in full
force. "None," thought he, "who know me, shall know my full
degradation also." And he turned away; but the stranger, mistaking