to look at him."

Several of us were impelled to ask a number of questions, but Ferguson
was listening now, with the detachment of youth, to the end of a bawdy
story that two men were laughing over. This had already displaced Purdy
in his mind.

"Didn't he say anything at all? Didn't he mention Hanson?" we asked
Ferguson.

"Eh? What, old Purdy? I don't think so. I don't remember. Now you
mention it, I think I did hear somewhere that Hanson was with Purdy. But
I don't believe he said anything about him. I was just going to ask him
to come and have a drink, when he said good-bye. All I know is I saw him
standing there like a sorrowful saint. Then he walked off slowly down
the corridor. He's a sociable beggar. I couldn't help laughing at him."

5

There was a notice in the window of the _Negro Boy_, and I discovered
that the tavern was under Entirely New Management. The picture sign over
the principal door had been renewed. The mythical little figure which
had given the public-house its name was no longer lost in the soot of
half a century. He was now an obvious negro boy, resplendent in a golden
coat. The reticence of the green window-curtains had become a bright
vacancy of mirrors, and the tavern was modern within. Reform had
destroyed the exclusiveness of the saloon bar; instead of privacy,
distant mirrors astonished you with glimpses of your own head which were
incredible and embarrassing in their novelty. The table-tops were of
white marble supported on gilded iron. The prints and lithographs of
ships had gone from the walls, and were replaced by real pictures
converted to the advertisement of various whiskies--pictures of
battleships, bull-dogs, Scotsmen, and figures in armour tempted from
their ancient posts in baronial halls, after midnight, to finish the
precious drink forgotten by the guests. In accordance with this
transformation the young lady in attendance at the bar was in neat black
and white, with her hair as compact and precise as a resolution at a
public meeting which had been passed even by the women present. She was
severe and decisive, and without recognition of anything there but the
tariff of the house, and sold her refreshments as in a simple yet
exacting ritual which she despised, but knew to be righteous.

It was many months since I had been there. Macandrew was no nearer than
Rotterdam, and perhaps would not see London that voyage. There had been
a long period in w