ish girl--he, he, he!" This laugh introduced a fit of
coughing, which almost suffocated the poor usurer (such we afterwards
found was the profession of this our fellow-traveller).

About this time I fell asleep, and enjoyed a comfortable nap till such
time as we arrived at the inn where we put up. Here, having alighted
from the waggon, I had an opportunity of viewing the passengers in order
as they entered. The first who appeared was a brisk, airy girl, about
twenty years old, with a silver-laced hat on her head instead of a cap,
a blue stuff riding-suit, trimmed with silver very much tarnished, and
a whip in her hand. After her came, limping, an old man, with a worsted
nightcap buttoned under his chin, and a broad-brimmed hat slouched over
it, an old rusty blue cloak tied about his neck, under which appeared a
brown surtout, that covered a threadbare coat and waistcoat, and, as
he afterwards discerned, a dirty flannel jacket. His eyes were hollow,
bleared, and gummy; his face was shrivelled into a thousand wrinkles,
his gums were destitute of teeth, his nose sharp and drooping, his chin
peaked and prominent, so that, when he mumped or spoke, they approached
one another like a pair of nutcrackers: he supported himself on an
ivory-headed cane and his whole figure was a just emblem of winter,
famine, and avarice. But how was I surprised, when I beheld the
formidable captain in the shape of a little thin creature, about the age
of forty, with a long withered visage, very much resembling that of a
baboon, through the upper part of which two little gray eyes peeped: he
wore his own hair in a queue that reached to his rump, which immoderate
length, I suppose, was the occasion of a baldness that appeared on the
crown of his head when he deigned to take off his hat, which was very
much of the size and cock of Pistol's.

Having laid aside his great-coat, I could not help admiring the
extraordinary make of this man of war: he was about five feet and three
inches high, sixteen inches of which went to his face and long scraggy
neck: his thighs were about six inches in length, his legs resembling
spindles or drumsticks, five feet and a half, and his body, which put me
in mind of extension without substance, engrossed the remainder: so that
on the whole, he appeared like a spider or grasshopper erect, and was
almost a vox et praeterea nihil. His dress consisted of a frock of what
is called bearskin, the skirts of which were about hal