out his leisure until evening, dined late at a
certain angular little tavern in the City, with a public parlour like
a wedge, to which glazed hats much resorted. The Captain's principal
intention was to pass Sol Gills's, after dark, and look in through the
window: which he did, The parlour door stood open, and he could see his
old friend writing busily and steadily at the table within, while the
little Midshipman, already sheltered from the night dews, watched
him from the counter; under which Rob the Grinder made his own bed,
preparatory to shutting the shop. Reassured by the tranquillity that
reigned within the precincts of the wooden mariner, the Captain headed
for Brig Place, resolving to weigh anchor betimes in the morning.

CHAPTER 24. The Study of a Loving Heart

Sir Barnet and Lady Skettles, very good people, resided in a pretty
villa at Fulham, on the banks of the Thames; which was one of the most
desirable residences in the world when a rowing-match happened to be
going past, but had its little inconveniences at other times, among
which may be enumerated the occasional appearance of the river in the
drawing-room, and the contemporaneous disappearance of the lawn and
shrubbery.

Sir Barnet Skettles expressed his personal consequence chiefly through
an antique gold snuffbox, and a ponderous silk pocket-kerchief, which
he had an imposing manner of drawing out of his pocket like a banner
and using with both hands at once. Sir Barnet's object in life was
constantly to extend the range of his acquaintance. Like a heavy body
dropped into water--not to disparage so worthy a gentleman by the
comparison--it was in the nature of things that Sir Barnet must spread
an ever widening circle about him, until there was no room left.
Or, like a sound in air, the vibration of which, according to the
speculation of an ingenious modern philosopher, may go on travelling for
ever through the interminable fields of space, nothing but coming to the
end of his moral tether could stop Sir Barnet Skettles in his voyage of
discovery through the social system.

Sir Barnet was proud of making people acquainted with people. He liked
the thing for its own sake, and it advanced his favourite object too.
For example, if Sir Barnet had the good fortune to get hold of a law
recruit, or a country gentleman, and ensnared him to his hospitable
villa, Sir Barnet would say to him, on the morning after his arrival,
'Now, my dear Sir, is ther