sity of the buildings to which he
applied it but poorly concealed its sameness. But, in fact, he was
doing his best to be kind, and succeeded in a sort; for it roused a
childish scorn in me and so fetched back my heart, which at starting
had been somewhere in my boots.

I took it for granted that a sweep must inhabit a dingy hovel, and
certainly the crowded filth of the Barbican promised nothing better
as we threaded our way among fishermen, fish-jowters, blowzy women,
and children playing hop-scotch with the heads of decaying fish.
At the seaward end of it, and close beside the bow-fronted Custom
House, we turned aside into an alley which led uphill between high
blank walls to the base of the Citadel: and here, stuck as if it were
a marten's nest under the shadow of the ramparts, a freshly
whitewashed cottage overhung the slope, with a sweep's brush dangling
over its doorway and the sign "S. Trapp, Chimney Sweep in Season."

While I wondered what might be the season for chimney-sweeps, a small
bead-eyed woman emerged from the doorway and shook a duster
vigorously: in the which act catching sight of us, she paused.

"I've a-got en, my dear," said Mr. Trapp much as a man might announce
the capture of a fish: and though he did not actually lift me for
inspection his hand seemed to waver over my collar.

But it was Mrs. Trapp, who, after a fleeting glance at me, caught her
husband by the collar.

"And you actilly went in that state, you nasty keerless hulks!
O, you heart-breaker!"

Mr. Trapp in custody managed to send me a sidelong, humorous grin.

"My dear, I thought 'twould be a surprise for you--business taking me
that way, and the magistrates being used to worse."

"You heart-breaker!" repeated Mrs. Trapp. "And me slaving morn and
night to catch up with your messy ways! What did I tell you the
first time you came back from the Hospital looking like a malkin, and
with a clean shift of clothes laid out for you and the water on the
boil, that I couldn't have taken more trouble, no, not for a funeral?
Didn't I tell you 'twas positively lowering?"

"I ha'n't a doubt you did, my dear."

"That's what you are. You're a lowering man. And there by your own
account you met a lady, with your neck streaked like a ham-rasher,
and me not by--thank goodness!--to see what her feelings were; and
now 'tis magistrates. But nothing warns you. I suppose you thought
that as 'twas only fondlings without any father or mother