His countenance turn'd to a leaden whiteness; the ratan dropp'd from
his grasp; and his eyes, stretch'd wide open, glared as at some
monstrous spectacle of horror and death. The sweat started in great
globules seemingly from every pore in his face; his skinny lips
contracted, and show'd his teeth; and when he at length stretch'd
forth his arm, and with the end of one of his fingers touch'd the
child's cheek, each limb quiver'd like the tongue of a snake; and his
strength seemed as though it would momentarily fail him. The boy was
dead. He had probably been so for some time, for his eyes were turn'd
up, and his body was quite cold. Death was in the school-room, and
Lugare had been flogging A CORPSE.
-_Democratic Review, August, 1841._
ONE WICKED IMPULSE
That section of Nassau street which runs into the great mart of New
York brokers and stock-jobbers, has for a long time been much occupied
by practitioners of the law. Tolerably well-known amid this class some
years since, was Adam Covert, a middle-aged man of rather limited
means, who, to tell the truth, gained more by trickery than he did
in the legitimate and honorable exercise of his profession. He was
a tall, bilious-faced widower; the father of two children; and had
lately been seeking to better his fortunes by a rich marriage. But
somehow or other his wooing did not seem to thrive well, and, with
perhaps one exception, the lawyer's prospects in the matrimonial way
were hopelessly gloomy.
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