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them; he loved the machinations that in their work he wove so wisely and so well; he foresaw what had not then come, the certain downfall of the Neapolitan Bourbons; he had the spirit of the gamester, and was happiest in the recklessness of chance; he had the ambition of a statesman, and he aspired, in the revival of nationalities and in the turmoil of new liberties, to seize the moment to advance himself to the prominence and the predominance which he coveted. Therefore he had embraced a party with which his temper had little akin, whose views his own mind disdained as chimerical, and whose cause only his thwarted ambitions induced him to embrace. As yet, though he held a great power in his hands over the lives of men whose projects and whose aspirations were all confided to his mercy, no substantial power had accrued to him; he had reaped but little, he had risked much, and his accumulated debts were very heavy. As he saw himself now—although in general, when in the full excitement of his life, the full complexity of its intrigues, he thought other- wise—he saw the truth: that in the flower of his manhood he was without a career, without a future; that with all his talents, graces, and fashion, he was no more than an adventurer; that bankruptcy,