"Pleasant," thought he, "when the fearful plunge has been taken, and the last struggle is over, to find yourself roused from that stupor which had been even as death, by bottles of hot water at your feet, a stomach-pump in your mouth, an old woman rubbing you down with flannel, and a respectable member of the Humane Society watching the first moment of returning consciousness, in order to point out the horror of your crime! No, no; not now, with witnesses and succour at hand; but in the dark night, when the stars alone behold what their shining records may long since have prophesied, then shall the waters, gloomy as the life they close, give me that repose—death."
Content with this determination, he gladly allowed his attention to fix on the scene before him. Nowhere are the many contrasts in the appearance of our metropolis more strikingly assembled than in the view from Waterloo Bridge. As yet the sunshine, which produces the deep shadows deeper for its own brightness, was only prophesied by the clear gray light that brought out every object in the same dim but distinct atmosphere. The large pale lamps were not yet extinguished; but they gave no light, save to the dark arches of Somerset House, whose depths they seemed vainly striving to penetrate.
Somerset House conveys the idea of a Venetian palace; its Corinthian pillars, its walls rising from the waters, its deep arches, fitting harbours for the
