had time to grow tired and dusty.

I felt as light as the air itself. I had put baby's feeding-bottle in my
pocket and hung her surplus linen in a parcel about my wrist, so I had
nothing to carry in my arms except baby herself, and at first I did not
feel her weight.

There were not many people in the West-End streets at that early hour,
yet a few were riding in the Park, and when I came to the large houses
in Lancaster Gate I saw that though the sun was shining on the windows
most of the blinds were down.

I must have been walking slowly, for it was half past eight when I
reached the Marble Arch. There I encountered the first cross-tide of
traffic, but somebody, seeing baby, took me by the arm and led me safely
over.

The great "Mediterranean of Oxford Street" was by this time running at
full tide. People were pouring out of the Tube and Underground stations
and clambering on to the motor-buses. But in the rush nobody hustled or
jostled me. A woman with a child in her arms was like a queen--everybody
made way for her.

Once or twice I stopped to look at the shops. Some of the dressmakers'
windows were full of beautiful costumes. I did not covet any of them. I
remembered the costly ones I had bought in Cairo and how little
happiness they had brought me. And then I felt as if the wealth of the
world were in my arms.

Nevertheless the whole feminine soul in me awoke when I came upon a shop
for the sale of babies' clothes. Already I foresaw a time when baby,
dressed in pretty things like these, would be running about Lennard's
Green and plucking up the flowers in Mrs. Oliver's garden.

The great street was very long and I thought it would never end. But I
think I must have been still fresh and happy while we passed through the
foreign quarter of Soho, for I remember that, when two young Italian
waiters, standing at the door of their cafe, asked each other in their
own language which of us (baby or I) was "the bambino," I turned to them
and smiled.

Before I came to Chancery Lane, however, baby began to cry for her food,
and I was glad to slip down a narrow alley into Lincoln's Inn Fields and
sit on a seat in the garden while I gave her the bottle. It was then ten
o'clock, the sun was high and the day was becoming hot.

The languid stillness of the garden after the noise and stir of the
streets tempted me to stay longer than I had intended, and when I
resumed my journey I thought the rest must have done me good,