a very
sorrowful look, as if she perceived and recognised some miserable
possibility which she had known in the past, and now saw advancing with
distress. But she did not speak either to Hans or Aubrey.

The full moon of a spring evening, almost as mild as summer, lighted up
the Strand, throwing into bold relief the figure of a young man,
fashionably dressed, who stood at the private door of a tailor's shop,
the signboard of which exhibited a very wild-looking object of human
species, clad in a loose frock, with bare legs and streaming hair, known
to the initiated as the sign of the Irish Boy.

Fashionably dressed meant a good deal at that date. It implied a
doublet of velvet or satin, puffed and slashed exceedingly, and often
covered with costly embroidery or gold lace; trunk hose, padded to an
enormous width, matching the doublet in cost, and often in pattern;
light-coloured silk stockings, broad-toed shoes, with extremely high
heels, and silver buckles, or gold-edged shoe-strings; garters of broad
silk ribbons, often spangled with gold, and almost thick enough for
sashes; a low hat with a feather and silk hatband, the latter sometimes
studded with precious stones; a suspicion of stays in the region of the
waist, but too likely to be justified by fact; fringed and perfumed
gloves of thick white Spanish leather; lace ruffs about the neck and
wrists, the open ones of immense size, the small ones closer than in the
previous reign; ear-rings and love-locks: and over all, a gaudy cloak,
or rather cape, reaching little below the elbow. In the youth's hand
was an article of the first necessity in the estimation of a gentleman
of fashion,--namely, a tobacco-box, in this instance of chased silver,
with a mirror in the lid, whereby its owner might assure himself that
his ruff sat correctly, and that his love-locks were not out of curl. A
long slender cane was in the other hand, which the youth twirled with
busy idleness, as he carelessly hummed a song.

"Let's cast away care, and merrily sing,
For there's a time for every thing:
He that plays at his work, and works at his play,
Doth neither keep working nor holy day."

A second youth came down the street westwards, walking not with an air
of haste, but of one whose time was too valuable to be thrown away. He
was rather shorter and younger than the first, and was very differently
attired. He wore a fustian doublet, without either lace or embroidery;
a pair of