he
week, their houses by the month; who camp indifferently in regions old
and new, learning their geography in train and tram-car. Abiding
parishioners are wont to be either very poor or established in a
moderate prosperity; they lack enterprise, either for good or ill: if
comfortably off, they owe it, as a rule, to some predecessor's exertion.
And for the most part, though little enough endowed with the civic
spirit, they abundantly pride themselves on their local permanence.

Representative of this class was Mr. Archibald Jordan, a native of
Islington, and, at the age of five-and-forty, still faithful to the
streets which he had trodden as a child. His father started a small
grocery business in Upper Street; Archibald succeeded to the shop,
advanced soberly, and at length admitted a partner, by whose capital and
energy the business was much increased. After his thirtieth year Mr.
Jordan ceased to stand behind the counter. Of no very active
disposition, and but moderately set on gain, he found it pleasant to
spend a few hours daily over the books and the correspondence, and for
the rest of his time to enjoy a gossipy leisure, straying among the
acquaintances of a lifetime, or making new in the decorous bar-parlours,
billiard-rooms, and other such retreats which allured his bachelor
liberty. His dress and bearing were unpretentious, but impressively
respectable; he never allowed his garments (made by an Islington tailor,
an old schoolfellow) to exhibit the least sign of wear, but fashion
affected their style as little as possible. Of middle height, and
tending to portliness, he walked at an unvarying pace, as a man who had
never known undignified hurry; in his familiar thoroughfares he glanced
about him with a good-humoured air of proprietorship, or with a look of
thoughtful criticism for any changes that might be going forward. No one
had ever spoken flatteringly of his visage; he knew himself a very
homely-featured man, and accepted the fact, as something that had
neither favoured nor hindered him in life. But it was his conviction
that no man's eye had a greater power of solemn and overwhelming rebuke,
and this gift he took a pleasure in exercising, however trivial the
occasion.

For five-and-twenty years he had lived in lodgings; always within the
narrow range of Islington respectability, yet never for more than a
twelvemonth under the same roof. This peculiar feature of Mr. Jordan's
life had made him a subject of