I was free to obtain my other meals wherever I might choose. Thus
provided for in the matter of a place of residence, I resumed the
discarded journalistic life, as a member of the _Advocate's_ editorial
staff, in accordance with the engagement entered into with Arncliffe,
when I believed I had been arranging to secure an income for Cynthia
and myself.

Before renting these rooms I had called upon Sidney Heron, and invited
him to share a set of chambers with me.

'No,' he said, in his blunt way, 'I'd rather keep you as a friend.'

I dare say he was right; and, in any case, he had a fancy for living
at a good distance from the centre of the town; whereas my own
inclination was to avoid the town altogether, if that might be, and
failing this to have one's sanctuary right in the centre of it. My
chambers were within five minutes' walk of the _Advocate_ office, and
not much more than half that distance from the Thames Embankment--a
spot which interested me as much as its lively neighbour, the Strand,
irritated and worried me. An uneasy, shoddy street I thought the
Strand, full of insistent tawdriness and of broken-spirited folk whose
wretchedness had something in it more despicable than pitiable. Save
for its occasional gaping rustics (whom I thought sadly misguided to
be there at all) I cordially hated the Strand. But the Embankment I
regarded as one of the most romantic thoroughfares in London; and many
a score of articles (which brought me money) do I owe to the
inspiration of that broad, darkling, river-skirted road, and the queer
human flotsam and jetsam one may meet with there.

Among the direct results of Cynthia Lane's influence, I must place my
interest in politics. I had hardly realised that women had any concern
with politics until I met Cynthia. She was in no sense a politician,
but she followed the political news of the day with the same bright
and illuminating intelligence which she brought to bear upon all the
affairs of her life; and her attitude toward them was informed by a
fine patriotism, at once reasoning and ardent. Chance phrases from her
lips had opened my eyes to the existence of a love for England, for
our flag, and race, such as I had not dreamed of till that time.

We spoke once or twice of my Australian experiences. And here again
Cynthia's patriotism suggested whole avenues of unsuspected thought
and feeling to me. It was Cynthia who introduced to my mind the
conception of the British Empir