He paused a moment, and as Leonard stood silent, added with more kindness
than most public men so accosted would have shown,

"You say you are friendless,--poor fellow! In early life that happens to
many of us, who find friends enough before the close. Be honest, and
well-conducted: lean on yourself, not on strangers; work with the body if
you can't with the mind; and, believe me, that advice is all I can give
you, unless this trifle"--and the minister held out a crown-piece.

Leonard bowed, shook his head sadly, and walked away. Egerton looked
after him with a slight pang.

"Pooh!" said he to himself, "there must be thousands in the same state in
these streets of London. I cannot redress the necessities of
civilization. Well educated! It is not from ignorance henceforth that
society will suffer,--it is from over-educating the hungry thousands who,
thus unfitted for manual toil, and with no career for mental, will some
day or other stand like that boy in our streets, and puzzle wiser
ministers than I am."

As Egerton thus mused, and passed on to the bridge, a bugle-horn rang
merrily from the box of a gay four-in-hand. A drag-coach with superb
blood-horses rattled over the causeway, and in the driver Egerton
recognized his nephew, Frank Hazeldean.

The young Guardsman was returning with a lively party of men from dining
at Greenwich, and the careless laughter of these children of pleasure
floated far over the still river; it vexed the ear of the careworn
statesman,--sad, perhaps, with all his greatness, lonely amidst all his