ections of human gas-lights.

A city clerk, with shining evening hat, went by, his sweetheart on his
arm. They were wending gaily to the theatre, without a thought of all the
happy people who had done the same long ago--hasting down the self-same
street, to the self-same theatre, with the very same sweet talk--all long
since mouldering in their graves. I felt I ought to rush up and shake
them, take them into a bystreet, turn their eyes upon Jupiter, and tell
them they must die; but I thought it might spoil the play for them.

Besides, there were so many hundreds in the streets I should have to
address in the same way: formidable people, too, clad in respectability as
in a coat of mail. The pompous policeman yonder: I longed to go and say to
him that there had been policemen before; that he was only the ephemeral
example of a world-old type, and needn't take himself so seriously. It was
an irresistible temptation to ask him: 'Canst thou bind the sweet
influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion? Canst thou bring
forth Mazzaroth in his season? Or canst thou guide Arcturus with his
sons?' But I forbore, and just then, glancing into an oyster shop, I was
fascinated by the oysterman. He was rapidly opening a dozen for a new
customer, and wore the while the solemnest face I ever saw. Oysters were
so evidently, so pathetically, all the world to him. All his surroundings
suggested oysters, legends of their prices and qualities made the art on
his walls, printed price-lists on his counter made his literature, the
prospects and rivalries of trade made his politics: oysters were, in fact,
his _raison d'etre_. His associations from boyhood had been oysters, I
felt certain that his relatives, even his ancestors, must be oysters, too;
and that if he had any idea of a supreme being, it must take the form of
an oyster. Indeed, a sort of nightmare seemed suddenly to take possession
of the world, in which alternately policemen swallowed oysters and oysters
policemen. How sad it all was--that masterly flourish of the knife with
which the oysterman ruthlessly hurried dozen after dozen into eternity;
that deferential 'Sir' in his voice to every demand of his customer; that
brisk alacrity with which he bid his assistant bring 'the gentleman's
half-stout.'

There seemed a world of tears in these simple operations, and the plain
oysterman had grown suddenly mystical as an astrological symbol. And,
indeed, there was planetary influence