in two hours, and some forty paragraphs might have been collected in which the transaction was described in various terms as a gross swindle.  A good shot was killing pigeons—­gallant sport—­and the wealthy schoolboy was betting.  When a sign was given by a bookmaker the shooting-man obeyed, and won or lost according to orders; and every man in the assembly knew what foul work was being carried on.  Did one man warn the victim?  The next day the whole country knew what had happened, and the names of the thieves were given in almost every sporting print; but the mischief was done, and the lookers-on contented themselves with cheap wrath.  A few brief months flew by, and every day saw the usual flock of tributes to the mad boy’s vanity; and now the end has come—­a colossal fortune, amassed by half a century’s toil, has gone into the pockets of all sorts of knaves, and the fatal Gazette showed the end.  The princely fortune that might have done so much good in the world has gone to fatten the foulest flock of predatory birds that ever cumbered the earth.  Where are the glib parasites who came to fawn on the poor dolt?  Where are the swarms of begging dandies who clustered around him?  Where are the persons who sold him useless horses?  Any one who has eyes can see that they point their fingers and shrug.  Another victim gone—­that is all.

And now our daily moralizers declare that bad company alone brought our unhappy subject down.  Yes, bad company!  The boy might have grown up into beneficent manhood; he might have helped to spread comfort and culture and solid happiness among the people; but he fell into bad company, and he is now pitied and scorned by the most despicable of the human race; and I observe that one of his humorous Press patrons advises him to drive a cab.  Think of Gordon nobly spending his pittance among the poor mudlarks; think of the good Lord Shaftesbury ekeing out his scanty means among the poor; think of all the gallant souls that made the most of poverty; and then think of that precious half-million gone to light fresh fuel under the hotbeds of vice and villainy!  Should I be wrong if I said that the contrast rouses me to indignation and even horror?  And now let us consider what bad company means.  Paradoxical as it may seem, I do not by any means think that bad company is necessarily made up of bad men.  I say that any company is bad for a man if it does not tempt him to exert his higher faculties.  It is as certain as death that a bodily member which is left unused shrinks and becomes aborted.  If one arm is hung for a long time in a sling, the muscles gradually fade until the skin clings closely round the bone.  The wing of the huge penguin still exists, but it is no bigger than that of a wren, and it is hidden away under the skin.  The instances might be multiplied a thousandfold.  In the same way then any mental faculty becomes atrophied if it is unused.  Bad company is that which produces this atrophy of the finer powers; and it is strange