n unknown and friendless
adventurer, he gazed on the expanded and silent country around him, he
felt like Castruccio Castrucani that he could stretch his hands to the
east and to the west and exclaim, "Oh, that my power kept pace with my
spirit, then should it grasp the corners of the earth!"

The road wound at last from the champaign country, through which it had
for some miles extended itself, into a narrow lane, girded on either
side by a dead fence. As the youth entered this lane, he was somewhat
startled by the abrupt appearance of a horseman, whose steed leaped the
hedge so close to our hero as almost to endanger his safety. The rider,
a gentleman of about five-and-twenty, pulled up, and in a tone of
great courtesy apologized for his inadvertency; the apology was readily
admitted, and the horseman rode onwards in the direction of W----.

Trifling as this incident was, the air and mien of the stranger were
sufficient to arrest irresistibly the thoughts of the young traveller;
and before they had flowed into a fresh channel he found himself in the
town and at the door of the inn to which his expedition was bound. He
entered the bar; a buxom landlady and a still more buxom daughter were
presiding over the spirits of the place.

"You have some boxes and a letter for me, I believe," said the young
gentleman to the comely hostess.

"To you, sir!--the name, if you please?"

"To--to--to C---- L----," said the youth; "the initials C. L., to be
left till called for."

"Yes, sir, we have some luggage; came last night by the van; and a
letter besides, sir, to C. L. also."

The daughter lifted her large dark eyes at the handsome stranger,
and felt a wonderful curiosity to know what the letter to C. L. could
possibly be about; meanwhile mine hostess, raising her hand to a shelf
on which stood an Indian slop-basin, the great ornament of the bar at
the Golden Fleece, brought from its cavity a well-folded and well-sealed
epistle.

"That is it," cried the youth; "show me a private room instantly."

"What can he want a private room for?" thought the landlady's daughter.

"Show the gentleman to the Griffin, No. 4, John Merrylack," said the
landlady herself.

With an impatient step the owner of the letter followed a slipshod and
marvellously unwashed waiter into No. 4,--a small square asylum for town
travellers, country yeomen, and "single gentlemen;" presenting, on the
one side, an admirable engraving of the Marquis of G