Then, after many years of bondage and stiffness, and accordance with the world, I found myself at ease, like a released bird; with what zest did I join in the rude jokes and the knavish tricks, the stolen feasts and the roofless nights of those careless vagabonds!" "I left my fellow-travellers at the entrance of the town where my sister lived.

Now came the contrast.

Somewhat hot, rather coarsely clad, and covered with the dust of a long summer's day, I was ushered into a little drawing-room, eighteen feet by twelve, as I was afterwards somewhat pompously informed.

A flaunting carpet, green, red, and yellow, covered the floor.

A full-length picture of a thin woman, looking most agreeably ill-tempered, stared down at me from the chimney-piece; three stuffed birds--how emblematic of domestic life!--stood stiff and imprisoned, even after death, in a glass cage.