"Much better—indeed, quite gone, I am greatly obliged to you, ma'am," he answered. "I find nursing of little account. Gruel and foot-baths and a tallow candle for the nose do not help me so much as fresh air. Fresh air seems to dry the cold up."

She agreed with him with a smile, and with a pleasant salutation of the head, walked on.

The old man looked after her, and whispered to himself in admiration of her kindness and person. A wooden-legged sailor just then came up some steps from the river side on to that end of the bridge which the money-lender was approaching, and when Greyquill was close to, the tar, assuming a posture of abject despondency, pulled off his hat, and extending it begged for alms.

"I have bled for my country, your honour," said the man.

"But you don't say you were paid to do so," answered Greyquill.

"Ay, but I wasn't paid to lose my leg," called out the man.

Greyquill, who saw little to fear in the pursuit of a man with a wooden leg, turned his head upon his shoulder and cried back: "There are too many of us." 

[Pg 32]

[Pg 32]

"That ain't my fault!" bawled the man at the receding figure.

"Yes, it is," cried Greyquill. "For people like you who can't get on ought to get out."

The laugh with which the malicious old fellow accompanied this sally caused the sailor to gaze eagerly round the ground as though for a stone to heave at him.

Meanwhile, Lucy crossing the bridge pursued the road to Old Harbour Town. She walked up an incline as gradual and pleasant as the lane which had brought her to the river. The hedges on either side stood thick, and the road was sentinelled by trees which when robed in their foliage transformed a long space of it into a beautiful avenue. The way took her straight to Lower Street, at the corner of which stood "The Swan" Tavern, a posting-house with a signboard that swang rustily through the long dark night, but behind its little lower windows a glimpse of old-world comfort could be caught: a sanded floor, a dark-polished table ringed with impressions of immemorial mugs of ale set down upon it, 

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