The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 175: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE PRINCE’S DREAM 149 stood. But, recovering his balance just at the moment when he was about to give vent to a piercing shriek in the terror of falling, his Royal Highness suddenly beheld a strange and fearful spectacle. For the lake of fire had risen in a moment so high up that it appeared as if he suddenly beheld, by the aid of a micro- scope, a scene which was far distant and confused before. And that flood of flaming lava was now swarming with life, as a drop of muddy water abounds in hideous things when inspected by the magnifying power of the instrument just mentioned. | Yes, there, in that vast range of fire which stretched illimitably northward and southward, eastward and west- ward, there, in the erubescent flood of living, liquid flames which glowed with a withering, stifling heat, there, in that boundless morass of ever burning levin, writhed the millions that people Satan’s kingdom. Attired as they were when upon the earth, and retaining all their mortal lineaments, those immortal spirits of the damned tossed, heaved, and struggled with hideous convulsions amidst the tortures that enveloped them. But, oh, with what an awful shudder and with what a direful sickness at the heart did the Prince of Wales observe that amongst the doomed myriads were thousands and thousands wearing crowns, or mitres, or coronets, the em- blems of their rank on earth. Yes, and how vast was the proportion of those whose forms were decked in rich gar- ments, and who had gold chains suspended to their necks and glistening rings upon their fingers, the evidences of the luxury in which they had revelled during their lives. And then, indeed, did the horrified prince behold the fulfilment of the divine saying, that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Suddenly, while he was yet gazing upon the tremendous scene which stretched around and far away, that ocean of living fire which had no limit and which was bounded by no shore, the demon grasped him again with his sable hand, which was fashioned like the claw of a vulture; and, holding him forth at arm’s length over the candescent flood which glowed and roared below, he exclaimed, in a loud voice, “Now shalt thou receive the reward due to thy crimes. Octavia Clarendon and all thine other victims shall be ——— = (EG) mG 6)(0)©)