feared any pursuer,
for I was a capital runner, and in high condition; but of the locality
I was utterly ignorant, and should only surrender myself to mere chance.
With a bold rush, then, I dashed right through the crowd, and set off
down the street, the whole crew after me.

[Illustration: 369]

The dusk of the closing evening was in my favour; and although
volunteers were enlisted in the chase at every corner and turning, I
distanced them, and held on my way in advance. My great object being not
to turn on my course, lest I should come back to my starting point,
I directed my steps nearly straight onward, clearing apple-stalls and
fruit-tables at a bound, and more than once taking a flying-leap over an
Indian's fire, when the mad shout of the red man would swell the chorus
that followed me. At last I reached a network of narrow lanes and
alleys, by turning and wending through which I speedily found myself
in a quiet secluded spot, with here and there a flickering candle-light
from the windows, but no other sign of habitation. I looked anxiously
about for an open door; but they were all safe barred and fastened; and
it was only on turning a corner I spied what seemed to me a little shop,
with a solitary lamp over the entrance. A narrow canal, crossed by a
rickety old bridge, led to this; and the moment I had crossed over, I
seized the single plank which formed the footway, and shoved it into the
stream. My retreat being thus secured, I opened the door, and entered.
It was a barber's shop; at least, so a great chair before a cracked old
looking-glass, with some well-worn combs and brushes, bespoke it; but
the place seemed untenanted, and although I called aloud several times,
no one came or responded to my summons.

I now took a survey of the spot, which seemed of the poorest imaginable.
A few empty pomatum pots, a case of razors that might have defied the
most determined suicide, and a half-finished wig, on a block painted
like a red man, were the entire stock-in-trade. On the walls, however,
were some coloured prints of the battles of the French army in Germany
and Italy. Execrably done things they were, but full of meaning and
interest to my eyes in spite of that. With all the faults of drawing and
all the travesties of costume, I could recognise different corps of the
service, and my heart bounded as I gazed on the tall shakos swarming to
a breach, or the loose jacket as it floated from the hussar in a charge.
A