relief to the monotony of the petrified street--the old man with
the brown-gaitered legs and the doubled-up old woman with the crutch. I
heard the London horn this morning.'

Evan thrust the letter in his hands, telling him to read and form an
opinion on it, and went in the track of Miss Wheedle.

Mr. Raikes resumed his station against the pillar, and held the letter
out on a level with his thigh. Acting (as it was his nature to do off
the stage), he had not exaggerated his profound melancholy. Of a light
soil and with a tropical temperament, he had exhausted all lively
recollection of his brilliant career, and, in the short time since Evan
had parted with him, sunk abjectly down into the belief that he was
fixed in Fallow field for life. His spirit pitied for agitation and
events. The horn of the London coach had sounded distant metropolitan
glories in the ears of the exile in rustic parts.

Sighing heavily, Raikes opened the letter, in simple obedience to the
wishes of his friend; for he would have preferred to stand contemplating
his own state of hopeless stagnation. The sceptical expression he put on
when he had read the letter through must not deceive us. John Raikes
had dreamed of a beneficent eccentric old gentleman for many years: one
against whom, haply, he had bumped in a crowded thoroughfare, and
had with cordial politeness begged pardon of; had then picked up
his walking-stick; restored it, venturing a witty remark; retired,
accidentally dropping his card-case; subsequently, to his astonishment
and gratification, receiving a pregnant missive from that old
gentleman's lawyer. Or it so happened that Mr. Raikes met the old
gentleman at a tavern, and, by the exercise of a signal dexterity,
relieved him from a bone in his throat, and reluctantly imparted his
address on issuing from the said tavern. Or perhaps it was a lonely
highway where the old gentleman walked, and John Raikes had his name in
the papers for a deed of heroism, nor was man ungrateful. Since he had
eaten up his uncle, this old gentleman of his dreams walked in town
and country-only, and alas! Mr. Raikes could never encounter him in
the flesh. The muscles of his face, therefore, are no index to the real
feelings of the youth when he had thoroughly mastered the contents of
the letter, and reflected that the dream of his luck--his angelic old
gentleman--had gone and wantonly bestowed himself upon Evan Harrington,
instead of the expectant and far