ice you'll just turn round and try to sleep for an hour or so."

Tappitt took her advice at any rate, so far that he turned round
and closed his eyes. Up to this time he had not given way about the
brewery. He had uttered no word of assent. But he was gradually
becoming aware that he would have to yield before he would be allowed
to put on his clothes. And now, in the base and weak condition of
his head and stomach, yielding did not seem to him to be so very
bad a thing. After all, the brewery was troublesome, the fight was
harassing. Rowan was young and strong, and Mr. Sharpit was very
dangerous. Rowan, too, had risen in his estimation as in that of
others, and he could not longer argue, even to himself, that the
stipulated income would not be paid. He did not sleep, but got into
that half-drowsy state in which men think of their existing affairs,
but without any power of active thought. He knew that he ought to be
in his counting-house and at work. He half feared that the world was
falling away from him because he was not there. He was ashamed of
himself, and sometimes almost entertained a thought of rising up and
shaking off his lethargy. But his stomach was bad, and he could not
bring himself to move. His head was tormented, and his pillow was
soft; and therefore there he lay. He wondered what was the time of
day, but did not think of looking at his watch which was under his
head. He heard his wife's steps about the room as she shaded some
window from his eyes, or crept to the door to give some household
order to one of her girls outside; but he did not speak to her,
nor she to him. She did not speak to him as long as he lay there
motionless, and when he moved with a small low groan she merely
offered him some beef tea.

It was nearly six o'clock, and the hour of dinner at the brewery
was long passed, when Mrs. Tappitt sat herself down by the
bedside determined to reap the fruit of her victory. He had just
raised himself in his bed and announced his intention of getting
up,--declaring, as he did so, that he would never again eat any of
that accursed fish. The moment of his renovation had come upon him,
and Mrs. Tappitt perceived that if he escaped from her now, there
might even yet be more trouble.

"It wasn't only the fish, T.," she said, with somewhat of sternness
in her eye.

"I hardly drank anything," said Tappitt.

"Of course I wasn't there to see what you took," said she; "but you
were very bad when you