hat is the extent of my knowledge. I hope
it doesn't disgust you with your neighborhood?"

"By no means. May you find as pleasant a one, wherever you settle!"

"Thank you. Well, it is nearly train-time, and I suppose I must leave
you and my old place. I wish you every happiness in it."

And so the old proprietor sighingly departed, leaving the new one
smiling on the doorstep. I was just thinking how nicely the world is
arranged, so that one man's trouble may turn out another man's blessing,
(the illness in this gentleman's family, for instance, being the cause
of my getting a neat country-house cheap,) when my attention was
arrested by the appearance of a thin, feeble-looking, white-bearded old
man, who passed down the street with head bent and hands joined behind
him. I stared at him till he got by; then I ran down to the gate and
looked after him earnestly; and at last I darted forward, hatless, in
eager pursuit. He heard my approaching steps, and put his snowy beard
against his right shoulder in the act of taking a glance rearward. I now
recognized the profile positively, and began conversation.

"Is it possible? My dear Doctor Potter, how are you? Don't you know me?
Your old friend Elderkin."

"Sir? Elderkin? Oh!--ah!--yes! How do you do, Mr. Elderkin?" he
stammered, seeming very awkward, and hardly responding at all to my
vigorous hand-shaking.

"I am delighted to see you again," I continued. "I have had no news of
you these five years. Do you live in this neighborhood?"

"I--I reside in the next house, Sir," he replied, not looking me in the
face, but glancing around uneasily, as if he wanted to run away.

"What! are you the prophet?" I blurted out before I could stop myself.

"I am, Mr. Elderkin," he said, blushing until I thought his white hair
would turn crimson.

We stared at each other in silence for ten seconds, each wishing himself
or his interlocutor at the antipodes.

"I congratulate you on your gift," I remarked, as soon as I could speak.
"I will see you again soon, and have a talk on the subject. We have
discussed similar matters before. Good day, Doctor."

"Good day, Mr. Elderkin," he replied, drawing himself up with a poor
pretence at self-respect.

He was greatly changed. Heterodoxy had not been so fattening to him as
Orthodoxy. When I knew him, six years before, as pastor of a flourishing
church, Doctor of Divinity, and staunch Calvinist, he had a plump and
rosy face, a portly form, a