ed clerks; and in all the large and little houses
of the city, in all the spacious and narrow streets, there were women
cooking, washing, sweeping, scouring, rubbing, lifting, carrying, sewing,
reading, sleeping--tens and twenties and fifties and hundreds and
thousands of men, women, and children. More than two hundred thousand of
them were toiling, suffering, struggling, enjoying, dreaming, despairing
on a summer day, doing their share of the world's work. The eye was full
of the city's activity; the ear was tired with its noise; the heart was
sick with the thought of it; the streets and houses swarmed with people,
but the world was out of town. There was nobody at home.

In the mighty stream, of which men and women are the waves, that poured
ceaselessly along its channels, friends met surprised--touched each
other's hands.

"Came in this morning--off to-night--droll it looks--nobody in town--"

And the tumultuous throng bore them apart.

In the evening the Park Theatre is jammed to hear Mr. Forrest, who made
his first appearance in Philadelphia nine or ten years ago, and is
already a New York favorite. Contoit's garden flutters with the cool
dresses of the promenaders, who move about between the arbors looking for
friends and awaiting ices. The click of billiard balls is heard in the
glittering cafe at the corner of Reade Street, and a gay company smokes
and sips at the Washington Hotel. Life bursts from every door, from every
window, but there is nobody in town.

More than two hundred thousand men, women, and children go to their beds
and wake up to the morrow, but there is nobody in town. Nobody in town,
because Mrs. Boniface Newt & Co. have gone to Saratoga--no cathedral
left, because some plastering has tumbled off an upper stone--no forest
left, because a few leaves have whirled away. Nobody in town, because
Mrs. Boniface Newt & Co. have gone to Saratoga, and are doing their part
of the world's work there.

Mr. Alfred Dinks, Mr. Zephyr Wetherley, and Mr. Bowdoin Beacon, were
slowly sauntering down Broadway, when, they were overtaken and passed by
a young woman walking rapidly for so warm a morning.

There was an immense explosion of adjectives expressing surprise when
the three young, gentlemen discovered that the young lady who was passing
them was Miss Amy Waring.

"Why, Miss Waring!" cried they, simultaneously.

She bowed and smiled. They lifted their hats.

"You in town!" said Mr. Beacon.

"In to