To be dunned for money was more than the young man could endure with any kind of patience.  But creditor tradesmen had no nice scruples in regard to these matters, and duns came, consequently, thick and fast, until poor Charles was irritated beyond measure.  Cold, and sometimes impatient, and half insulting answers to applications for money, were not to be endured by the eager applicants for what was justly their own.  Warrants soon followed, as a matter of course, which had to be answered by a personal appearance before city magistrates, thus causing the infliction of a deeper mortification than had yet assailed him.  Added to these came the importunities of his landlord, which was met by a response which was deemed insulting, and then came a distraint for rent.  The due bill of the father, saved the son this utter prostration and disgrace.

The effect of all this, was to drive far away from their dwelling the sweet angel of peace and contentment.  Fretted and troubled deeply in regard to his present condition and future prospects, Charles had no smiling words for his wife.  This, of course, pained her deeply.  But she readily found relief from present reality in the world of pure romance.  The more powerful fictions of the day, especially the highly wrought idealities of Bulwer, and those of his class, introduced her into a world above that in which she dwelt,—­and there she lingered the greatest portion of her time, unconscious of the calls of duty, or the claims of affection.

A single year sufficed to break them up entirely.  Expenses far beyond their income, which rose to about three hundred dollars during the first year of Charles’ practice at the bar, brought warrants and executions, which the father had no power to stay.  To satisfy these, furniture and library had to be sold, and Charles and his wife, child and nurse, which latter Adelaide would retain, were thrown upon old Mr. Fenwick, for support.

For four years did they remain a burden upon the father, during which time, unstimulated to exertion by pressing necessities, Charles made but little progress as a lawyer.  Petty cases he despised, and generally refused to undertake, and those of more importance were not trusted to one who had yet to prove himself worthy of a high degree of legal confidence.  At the end of that time both his father and mother were suddenly removed to the world of spirits, and he was again thrown entirely upon his own resources.

With no one now to check them in any thing Charles and his wife, after calculating the results of the next year’s legal efforts, felt fully justfied in renting a handsome house, and furnishing it on credit.  The proceeds of the year’s practice rose but little above four hundred dollars, and at its conclusion they found themselves involved in a new debt of three thousand dollars.  Then came another breaking up, with all of its harrowing consequences—­consequences which to persons of their habits and mode of thinking, are so deeply mortifying,—­followed by their shrinking away, with a meagre remnant of their furniture, into a couple of rooms, in an obscure part of the town.