of late, and cannot afford to part with a friend like
you at the present moment; it is an unexpected piece of good fortune to
have met you; and I have not been very fortunate of late," he added,
sighing.

"Well," said I, "I am glad to see you once more, whether fortunate, or
not; where is your baggage?"

"Yon trunk is mine," said Francis, pointing to a trunk of black Russian
leather upon the coach.

"We will soon have it down," said I; and at a word which I gave to one of
the hangers-on of the inn, the trunk was taken from the top of the coach.
"Now," said I to Francis Ardry, "follow me, I am a person of some
authority in this house;" thereupon I led Francis Ardry into the house,
and a word which I said to a waiter forthwith installed Francis Ardry in
a comfortable private sitting-room, and his trunk in the very best
sleeping-room of our extensive establishment.

It was now about one o'clock: Francis Ardry ordered dinner for two, to be
ready at four, and a pint of sherry to be brought forthwith, which I
requested my friend the waiter might be the very best, and which in
effect turned out as I requested; we sat down, and when we had drunk to
each other's health, Frank requested me to make known to him how I had
contrived to free myself from my embarrassments in London, what I had
been about since I quitted that city, and the present posture of my
affairs.

I related to Francis Ardry how I had composed the Life of Joseph Sell,
and how the sale of it to the bookseller had enabled me to quit London
with money in my pocket, which had supported me during a long course of
ramble in the country, into the particulars of which I, however, did not
enter with any considerable degree of fulness. I summed up my account by
saying that "I was at present a kind of overlooker in the stables of the
inn, had still some pounds in my purse, and, moreover, a capital horse in
the stall."

"No very agreeable posture of affairs," said Francis Ardry, looking
rather seriously at me.

"I make no complaints," said I, "my prospects are not very bright, it is
true, but sometimes I have visions both waking and sleeping, which,
though always strange, are invariably agreeable. Last night, in my
chamber near the hayloft, I dreamt that I had passed over an almost
interminable wilderness--an enormous wall rose before me, the wall,
methought, was the great wall of China:--strange figures appeared to be
beckoning to me from the top of the wall; su