omnibuses were all carrying people home because the day's
work was done. The streets were clean and bright; and there was plenty
of gayness and joy--for them as could grab a share of it. He noticed
fine private carriages drawn up round corners, waiting for prosperous
tradesmen; young men with tennis-bats in their hands, taking
prodigiously long strides, eager to get a game of play before dusk;
girls who went by twos and threes, chattering, laughing, making funny
short quick steps of it, like as if on the dance to reach sweethearts
and green lanes. A man selling a mechanical toy--sort of a tin frog
that jumped so soon as you put it down--made him smile indulgently.

Outside the Mansion House Station the traffic stopped dead all of a
moment, and directly the wheels ceased rattling one heard the cheerful
music of a soldiers' band close upon one. It was the Bank
Guard--Coldstreams--marching proudly. The officer in charge seemed
very proud; with drawn sword, his broad red back bulging above his
sash, and the enormous bearskin narrowing to his shoulders and hiding
his neck.

The wheels rolled again; the music, floating, fading, died beneath the
horses' feet; and Dale stood gaping at a board over the entrance of
the railway station. Places served by this District Company had
pleasant-sounding suburban names--such as Kew Gardens, Richmond,
Wimbledon. Reading the names, he felt a sick nostalgic yearning for
the wind that blows through fir-trees, for the dust that falls on
highroads, for the village street and the friendly nod--for home.

He ate some food at an eating-house near Blackfriars, and then
wandered aimlessly for hours. The broad river, with its dull brown
flood breaking in oily wavelets against the embankment wall, exercised
a fascination. He admired the Temple, watched some shadows on a lawn,
and wondered if the pigeons by the cab-rank ever went to bed, or if,
changing their natural habits to suit their town-life, they had become
night birds like the owls. The trains passing to and fro in the iron
cage called Hungerford Bridge interested him; and as he approached the
Houses of Parliament, he was stirred by memories of his historical
reading.

The stately pile had become almost black against the western sky by
the time that he drew near to it, and its majestic extent, with the
lamplight gleaming from innumerable windows, gave him a quite personal
satisfaction. It represented all that was grandest in the tale of hi