only sixpence on the table for the
waiter, and, with a last salutation to the honorable company, walked
out. I have a perfect memory of every circumstance of the evening, and
I recollect that my swaggering exit was as free from any semblance of
concern or care as though a carriage waited for me outside to convey me
to a luxurious home!

It has often been a fancy of mine through life to pass the entire of a
summer night out of door; to wander either through the moonlit roads
of some picturesque country, or in the still more solitary streets of
a great city. I have always felt on these occasions as though one were
"stealing a march" upon the sleeping world,--gaining so many more hours
of thought and reflection, which the busy conflict of life renders so
often difficult.

The hours of the night seem to typify so many stages of existence,--only
reversing the natural order of age, and making the period of deep
reflection precede the era of sanguine hope; for if the solemn closing
in of the darkness suggests musing, so do the rosy tints and fresh air
of breaking day inspire the warm hopefulness of youth. If "the daylight
sinking" invites the secret communing of the heart, "the dawning of
morn" glows with energetic purpose and bold endeavor.

To come back to myself. I left the tavern without a thought whither I
should turn my steps. It was a calm night, with a starry sky and a mild,
genial air, so that to pass the hours until morning without shelter was
no great privation. One only resolve I had formed,--never to go back to
Betty's. I felt that I had sojourned over long in such companionship; it
was now time some other, and more upward, path should open before me.

Following the course of the Liffey, I soon reached the quay called the
North Wall, and at last arrived at the bluff extremity which looks out
upon the opening of the river into the Bay of Dublin. The great expanse
was in deep shadow, but so calm the sea that the two lighthouses were
reflected in long columns of light in the tranquil water. The only sound
audible was the low, monotonous plash of the sea against the wall, or
the grating noise of a chain cable, as the vessel it held surged slowly
with the tide. The sounds had something plaintive in them, that soon
imparted a tone of sadness to my mind; but it was a melancholy not
unpleasing; and I sat down upon a rude block of stone, weaving strange
fancies of myself and my future.

As I sat thus, my ear, grown mo