They leave the hospitable mansion, and we next see them passing down
State Street. The clock on the old State House points to high noon,
when the Exchange should be in its glory and present the liveliest
emblem of what was the sole business of life, as regarded a
multitude of the foregone worldlings. It is over now. The Sabbath
of eternity has shed its stillness along the street. Not even a
newsboy assails the two solitary passers-by with an extra penny-
paper from the office of the Times or Mail, containing a full
account of yesterday's terrible catastrophe. Of all the dull times
that merchants and speculators have known, this is the very worst;
for, so far as they were concerned, creation itself has taken the
benefit of the Bankrupt Act. After all, it is a pity. Those mighty
capitalists who had just attained the wished-for wealth! Those
shrewd men of traffic who had devoted so many years to the most
intricate and artificial of sciences, and had barely mastered it
when the universal bankruptcy was announced by peal of trumpet! Can
they have been so incautious as to provide no currency of the
country whither they have gone, nor any bills of exchange, or
letters of credit from the needy on earth to the cash-keepers of
heaven?

Adam and Eve enter a Bank. Start not, ye whose funds are treasured
there! You will never need them now. Call not for the police. The
stones of the street and the coin of the vaults are of equal value
to this simple pair. Strange sight! They take up the bright gold
in handfuls and throw it sportively into the air for the sake of
seeing the glittering worthlessness descend again in a shower. They
know not that each of those small yellow circles was once a magic
spell, potent to sway men's hearts and mystify their moral sense.
Here let them pause in the investigation of the past. They have