serial tale on as many slips as there were to be green
monthly numbers; now of his elaborately corrected and recorrected
manuscripts; now of the proof-sheets lying about, for revision at any
and every spare moment, during the month immediately before publication.
Or, when, on the other hand, in his capacity as a Reader, regard was had
to the scrupulous exactitude with which the seemingly trivial minutiae
of what one might call the mere accompaniments, were systematically
cared for or methodised. Announced to read, for instance, for the first
time in some town he had never before visited for that purpose, or in
some building in which his voice had never before been raised, he
would go down to the empty hall long before the hour appointed for the
Reading, to take the bearings, as he would say, or, in other words,
to familiarise himself with the place beforehand. His interest in his
audience, again, was something delightful. He was hardly less keenly
observant of them than they of him. Through a hole in the curtain at
the side, or through a chink in the screen upon the platform, he would
eagerly direct your attention to what never palled upon his own, namely,
the effect of the suddenly brightened sea of faces on the turning up
of the gas, immediately before the moment of his own appearance at the
reading-desk.

The evening at length came for his very last appearance at that familiar
little reading-desk, on Tuesday, the 15th of March, 1870, on the
platform of the St. James's Hall, Piccadilly. The largest audience ever
assembled in that immense building, the largest, as already intimated,
that ever can be assembled there for purely Reading purposes, namely,
when the orchestra and the upper end of the two side-galleries have
necessarily to be barred or curtained off from the auditorium, were
collected together there under the radiant pendants of the glittering
ceiling, every available nook and corner, and all the ordinary gangways
of the Great Hall being completely occupied. The money value of the
house that night was L422. Crowds were unable to obtain admittance at
the entrances in the Quadrant and in Piccadilly, long before the hour
fixed for the Farewell Reading. Inside the building 2034 persons were
seated there, eagerly awaiting the Novelist's appearance. The enthusiasm
of his reception when eight o'clock came, and he advanced to the centre
of the platform, of itself told plainly enough, as plainly as the
printed hills