as instantly scented with whisky. He was well introduced,
and I said, "Are you the Doctor ---- who wrote the 'History of ----'?"

"I am, sir, and proud I shall be to write for you."

"What can you do?"

"Here's a specimen."

The MS. was a bundle of bills from a public-house, and the blank side
was utilised. The Doctor never wasted money on paper when he could avoid
it. The stuff was feeble, involved, useless. My face must have fallen,
for the piteous Scarecrow said, "I have not your approval."

"We cannot use this."

Bending forward and clasping his hands, he said, "Could you not give me
two shillings for it? There are two columns good. A shilling a column;
surely that can't hurt you."

"I'll give you two shillings, and you can come back again if you are
needy, but the MS. is of no use to us."

He took the money, and returned again and again for more. I found that
he used to put fourpence in one pocket to meet the expense of his
lodging-house bed, and he bought ten two-pennyworths of gin with the
rest of the money. He always asked for two shillings, and always got
it. I was not responsible for his mode of spending it.

And now the Doctor had turned up in the region of The Chequers. He was
piteously, doggishly thankful for his drink, and he cried as he bleated
out his prayers for my good health. Men cry readily when they come to be
in the Doctor's condition. I asked him to take some soup. "I'm no great
eater," he said; "but I'd like just one more with you--only one."

"Where do you lodge, Doctor?"

"To tell you the truth, I'm forced to put up with a berth in the old
fowl-house at the bottom of the garden here. They let me stay there, but
'tis cold--cold."

"Do you work at all now?"

"Sometimes. But there is little doing--very little."

"How did you come to cease practising at the Bar, Doctor?"

"How do I come to be here? 'Tis the old thing--the old thing--and has
been all along."

This poor wretch could not be allowed to go about half-naked, so I let
the potman run out and get him a slop suit. (The Doctor sold the
clothes next day for half-a-crown, and was speechless when I went to see
him.) A hopeless, helpless wretch was the Doctor--the most hopeless I
ever knew. He entered the army, early in life, and for a time he was
petted and courted in Dublin society. The man was handsome,
accomplished, and brilliantly clever, and success seemed to follow him.
He sold out of the army and went to the Bar, where