tle might be within his power. At least he went to see.

Had a man an income of a million he could not relieve the want of
London; the wretch relieved to-day needs again to-morrow. But Alere went
to see.

Ten pounds did much in the shaky hands of a man without ambition, and
without business-avarice, who went to see the unfortunate.

His own palsied mother, at the verge of life, looked to Alere for all
that the son can do for the parent. Other sons seemed more capable of
such duty; yet it invariably fell upon Alere. He was the Man. And for
those little luxuries and comforts that soothe the dull hours of
trembling age she depended entirely upon him.

So you see the ten-pound notes that satisfied him were not all spent in
drink.

But alas! once now and then the rats began to run up the wall in broad
daylight, and foolish Alere, wise in this one thing, immediately began
to pack his carpet-bag. He put in his collars, his slippers, his
sketch-books and pencils, some of his engraving tools, and a few blocks
of boxwood, his silver-mounted flute, and a book for Amaryllis. He
packed his carpet-bag and hastened away to his Baden-Baden, to Coombe
Oaks, his spa among the apple-bloom, the song of finches, and rustle of
leaves.

They sat and talked in the round summer-house in Iden's garden, with the
summer unfolding at their knees; Amaryllis, Amadis, Iden, and Flamma.

By Flamma's side there stood a great mug of the Goliath ale, and between
his lips there was a long churchwarden pipe.

The Goliath ale was his mineral water; his gaseous, alkaline, chalybeate
liquor; better by far than Kissingen, Homburg, Vichy; better by far than
mud baths and hot springs. There is no medicine in nature, or made by
man, like good ale. He who drinks ale is strong.

The bitter principle of the aromatic hops went to his nervous system, to
the much-suffering liver, to the clogged and weary organs, bracing and
stimulating, urging on, vitalizing anew.

The spirit drawn from the joyous barley warmed his heart; a cordial
grown on the sunny hill-side, watered with dew and sweet rain, coloured
by the light, a liquor of sunshine, potable sunbeam.

Age mingling hops and barley in that just and equitable proportion, no
cunning of hand, no science can achieve, gave to it the vigour of years,
the full manhood of strength.

There was in it an alchemic power analysis cannot define. The chemist
analyzes, and he finds of ten parts, there are this and there