he found he had reached the door of his landlord without having
yielded to one idle inclination.

He knocked at the door. The maid who opened it said her master was
not at home. "I am sorry for it," said he, strutting about; and with
a boasting air he took out his money. "I want to pay him my rent: he
needed not to have been afraid of _me_." The servant, who knew her
master was very much afraid of him, desired him to walk in, for her
master would be at home in half an hour. "I will call again," said
he; "but no, let him call on me, and the sooner the better: I shall
be at the Blue Posts." While he had been talking, he took care to
open his black leather case, and to display the bank bills to the
servant, and then, in a swaggering way, he put up his money and
marched off to the Blue Posts.

He was by this time quite proud of his own resolution, and having
tendered the money, and being clear in his own mind that it was the
landlord's own fault and not his that it was not paid, he went to
refresh himself at the Blue Posts. In a barn belonging to this
public house a set of strollers were just going to perform some of
that sing-song ribaldry, by which our villages are corrupted, the
laws broken, and that money drawn from the poor for pleasure, which
is wanted by their families for bread. The name of the last new song
which made part of the entertainment, made him think himself in high
luck, that he should have just that half hour to spare. He went into
the barn, but was too much delighted with the actor, who sung his
favorite song, to remain a quiet hearer. He leaped out of the pit,
and got behind the two ragged blankets which served for a curtain.
He sung so much better than the actors themselves, that they praised
and admired him to a degree which awakened all his vanity. He was so
intoxicated with their flattery, that he could do no less than
invite them all to supper, an invitation which they were too hungry
not to accept.

He did not, however, quite forget his appointment with his landlord;
but the half hour was long since past by. "And so," says he, "as I
know he is a mean curmudgeon, who goes to bed by daylight to save
candles, it will be too late to speak with him to-night; besides,
let him call upon me; it is his business and not mine. I left word
where I was to be found; the money is ready, and if I don't pay him
to-night, I can do it before breakfast."

By the time these firm resolutions were made, supper was