If so, he was happy, as were the simple souls who flouted; and this reflection kept my mind serene.
Presently we turned into a wide and less poverty-stricken street, which I felt sure we could have reached by a less tortuous and malodorous path.

A few yards down we came to a dark _porte cochere_.

The dwarf halted, crossed, so as to read the number by the gas lamp, and joining me, said: "It is here.

Have you your visiting-cards ready ?" I nodded.

We proceeded down the dark entry till we came to a slovenly, ill-kept glass box lit by a small gas jet, whence emerged a slovenly, ill-kept man.