Did he believe in all this? Heaven knows. He talked and acted as if he did; and though, when I last saw him, he had smashed his banker, ruined his company, and beggared the shareholders, he was high-hearted, hopeful, and buoyant as ever. It was a general who had lost a battle, but he meant to recruit another army. It was some accidental rumour of a war--some stupid disturbance on the Danube or the Black Sea--that had frightened capital and made “money tight.” The scheme itself was a glorious project--an unrivalled investment. Never was there such a paying line--innumerable towns, filled with a most migratory population, ever on the move, and only needing to learn the use of certain luxuries to be constantly in demand of them. With a good harvest, however, and money easy, if Lord Russell could only be commonly civil to the Continental Cabinets, all would go well yet. The bounties of Providence would be diffused over the earth--food would be cheap, taxation reduced, labour plenty, and “then, sir, these worthy people shall have their line, if I die for it.” I find it very hard to believe in Borneo’s love or Othello’s jealousy. I cannot, let me do all that I will, accept them as real, even in their most impassioned moments, and yet this other man holds me captive. If I had a hundred pounds in the world, I’d put it into his scheme, and I really feel that, in not borrowing the money to make a venture, I am a poor-spirited creature that has not the courage to win his way to fortune. And yet these fellows have no aid from dress or make-up. They are not surrounded with all the appliances that aid a deception. They come to us in their everyday apparel, and, mayhap, at inopportune moments, when we are weary, or busy, or out of sorts, to talk of what we are not interested in, and have no relish for. With their marvellous tact they conquer apathy and overcome repugnance; they gain a hearing, and they obtain at least time for more. There is much in what they say that we feel no interest in; but now and then they _do_ touch a chord that vibrates within us; and when they do so, it is like magic the instinct with which they know it. It was that Roman camp, that lead-mine, that trout-stream, or that paper-mill, did the thing; and the rogue saw it as plainly as if he had a peep into our brain, and could read our thoughts like a printed book. These then, I say, are the truly great actors, who walk the boards of life with unwritten parts, who are the masters of our emotions, even to the extent of taking away our money, and who demand our trustfulness as a right not to be denied them.