sses, and the same magnificent estates for the investment of
capital, and the same enormous quantities of capital to be invested in
estates, and, in short, the same opportunities of all sorts for people
who wanted to make their fortunes. And a most extraordinary proof it
was of the national prosperity, that people had not been found to avail
themselves of such advantages long ago.

As Nicholas stopped to look in at the window, an old gentleman happened
to stop too; and Nicholas, carrying his eye along the window-panes from
left to right in search of some capital-text placard which should be
applicable to his own case, caught sight of this old gentleman's figure,
and instinctively withdrew his eyes from the window, to observe the same
more closely.

He was a sturdy old fellow in a broad-skirted blue coat, made pretty
large, to fit easily, and with no particular waist; his bulky legs
clothed in drab breeches and high gaiters, and his head protected by
a low-crowned broad-brimmed white hat, such as a wealthy grazier might
wear. He wore his coat buttoned; and his dimpled double chin rested
in the folds of a white neckerchief--not one of your stiff-starched
apoplectic cravats, but a good, easy, old-fashioned white neckcloth that
a man might go to bed in and be none the worse for. But what principally
attracted the attention of Nicholas was the old gentleman's eye,--never
was such a clear, twinkling, honest, merry, happy eye, as that. And
there he stood, looking a little upward, with one hand thrust into the
breast of his coat, and the other playing with his old-fashioned gold
watch-chain: his head thrown a little on one side, and his hat a little
more on one side than his head, (but that was evidently accident; not
his ordinary way of wearing it,) with such a pleasant smile playing
about his mouth, and such a comical expression of mingled slyness,
simplicity, kind-heartedness, and good-humour, lighting up his jolly
old face, that Nicholas would have been content to have stood there
and looked at him until evening, and to have forgotten, meanwhile, that
there was such a thing as a soured mind or a crabbed countenance to be
met with in the whole wide world.

But, even a very remote approach to this gratification was not to
be made, for although he seemed quite unconscious of having been the
subject of observation, he looked casually at Nicholas; and the latter,
fearful of giving offence, resumed his scrutiny of the window in