, "Surely this
is one of the pleasant moments of life."

Then, having set my dress to rights, and combed my hair with a pocket
comb, I followed Jenny, who conducted me back through the long passage,
and showed me into a neat sanded parlour on the ground floor.

I sat down by a window which looked out upon the dusty street; presently
in came the handmaid, and commenced laying the table-cloth. "Shall I
spread the table for one, sir," said she, "or do you expect anybody to
dine with you?"

"I can't say that I expect anybody," said I, laughing inwardly to myself;
"however, if you please you can lay for two, so that if any acquaintance
of mine should chance to step in, he may find a knife and fork ready for
him."

So I sat by the window, sometimes looking out upon the dusty street, and
now glancing at certain old-fashioned prints which adorned the wall over
against me. I fell into a kind of doze, from which I was almost
instantly awakened by the opening of the door. Dinner, thought I; and I
sat upright in my chair. No, a man of the middle age, and rather above
the middle height dressed in a plain suit of black, made his appearance,
and sat down in a chair at some distance from me, but near to the table,
and appeared to be lost in thought.

"The weather is very warm, sir," said I.

"Very," said the stranger, laconically, looking at me for the first time.

"Would you like to see the newspaper?" said I, taking up one which lay
upon the window seat.

"I never read newspapers," said the stranger, "nor, indeed--." Whatever
it might be that he had intended to say he left unfinished. Suddenly he
walked to the mantel-piece at the farther end of the room, before which
he placed himself with his back towards me. There he remained motionless
for some time; at length, raising his hand, he touched the corner of the
mantel-piece with his finger, advanced towards the chair which he had
left, and again seated himself.

"Have you come far?" said he, suddenly looking towards me, and speaking
in a frank and open manner, which denoted a wish to enter into
conversation. "You do not seem to be of this place."

"I come from some distance," said I; "indeed I am walking for exercise,
which I find as necessary to the mind as the body. I believe that by
exercise people would escape much mental misery."

Scarcely had I uttered these words when the stranger laid his hand, with
seeming carelessness, upon the table, near one of the gl