I knew it on the minute, Heaven only knows how, but I knew it, and a desperate thrill of loneliness swept over me, a spasm of comprehension of the horrible void dividing us.

Never did yearning babe stretch arms more wistfully to an unattainable mother than I at that moment to my mother earth.

All her meanness and prosaicness was forgotten, all her imperfections and shortcomings; it was home, the one tangible thing in the glittering emptiness of the spheres.

All my soul went into my eyes, and then I sneezed violently, and turning round, found that sweet damsel whose silky head nestled so friendly on my shoulder was tickling my nose with a feather she had picked up.
Womanlike, she had forgotten all about her first question, and now asked another, "Will you come to supper with me, stranger?
'Tis nearly ready, I think." "To be able to say no to such an invitation, lady, is the first thing a young man should learn," I answered lightly; but then, seeing there was nothing save the most innocent friendliness in those hazel eyes, I went on, "but that stern rule may admit of variance.

Only, as it chances, I have just supped at the public expense.