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claim. Snares or shot may take off the old birds foraging
without—hawks may be abroad, from which they escape or
by whom they suffer; but the young ones in the nest have a
pretty comfortable unromantic sort of existence in the down
and the straw, till it comes to their turn, too, to get on the
wing. While Becky Sharp was on her own wing in the coun-
try, hopping on all sorts of twigs, and amid a multiplicity of
traps, and pecking up her food quite harmless and success-
ful, Amelia lay snug in her home of Russell Square; if she
went into the world, it was under the guidance of the elders;
nor did it seem that any evil could befall her or that opulent
cheery comfortable home in which she was affectionately
sheltered. Mamma had her morning duties, and her daily
drive, and the delightful round of visits and shopping which
forms the amusement, or the profession as you may call it, of
the rich London lady. Papa conducted his mysterious opera-
tions in the City—a stirring place in those days, when war
was raging all over Europe, and empires were being staked;
when the ‘Courier’ newspaper had tens of thousands of
subscribers; when one day brought you a battle of Vittoria,
another a burning of Moscow, or a newsman’s horn blowing
down Russell Square about dinner-time, announced such a
fact as—‘Battle of Leipsic—six hundred thousand men en-
gaged—total defeat of the French—two hundred thousand
killed.’ Old Sedley once or twice came home with a very
grave face; and no wonder, when such news as this was agi-
tating all the hearts and all the Stocks of Europe.
Meanwhile matters went on in Russell Square, Blooms-
bury, just as if matters in Europe were not in the least

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