54 The Mysterious Tailor : [Juy, 
these last been any thing more than a bundle of old coats and oaths, they 
would most undoubtedly have drubbed each other into a better world. 
After a lively and well-sustained affair of about twenty minutes, a squa- 
dron of auxiliary watchmen arrived, and, with some difficulty, depo- 
sited us all safely in the watch-house. And here the very first person 
that met my gaze—seated, with due regard to dignity, in an arm-chair, 
a pair of spectacles on his nose, a glass of brandy-and-water by his side, 
and a newspaper, redolent of cheese, before him—was the constable of 
the night—the nun of the masquerade—the Mysterious Tailor of High 
Holborn! The wretch’s eyes gleamed with a savage but subdued joy 
at the recognition ; a low, chuckling laugh escaped him ; while his 
dull countenance, made doubly revolting by the dim light of the watch- 
house, fell, fixed and scowling, upon me, as he pointed towards the 
spot where I stood.—“ Dobson,” he exclaimed ; and, at the word, forth 
stepped the owner of this melodious appellative, with “this here 
man.” Luckily, before he could finish his charge, a five-shilling-piece, 
which I thrust into his unsuspecting palm, created a diversion among 
the watchmen in my behalf; under favour of which, while my arch 
enemy was adjusting his books, I contrived to escape from his detested 
presence. 
It happened that about a month subsequent to this last rencontre, cir- 
cumstances led me to Boulogne, whither I arrived, late in the evening, 
by the steam-boat. On being directed to the best English hotel im 
that truly social Anglo-Gallic little town, I chanced to find in. the coffee 
room an old crony, whom I had known years since at Cambridge, and 
who had just arrived from Switzerland, on a speculation connected 
with some vineyards. There is nothing that more keenly calls forth 
the lurking humanities of the heart, than such a sudden rekindling of 
early sympathies, after time, absence, and continued commerce with 
the world, have conspired to dim, if not to extinguish, them alto- 
gether. It is like a sunny genial morning, bursting forth in the midst 
of winter: we feel that it is shadowy, evanescent; that it is born and 
dies with the day, and relish it with proportionate gusto. I had a 
thousand questions to ask my friend, a thousand memories to disinter 
from their graves in my heart, past follies to re-enact, past scenes to re-+ 
people. We began with our school-days, pursued the subject to Cam- 
bridge, carried it back again to Reading, and thence traced it through 
all its windings, now in sunshine, now in gloom, till the canvass of our 
recollection was fairly filled with portraits. In this way, time, unper- 
ceived, slipped on ; noon deepened into evening, evening blackened into 
midnight, yet nothing but our wine was exhausted. And this last 
possessed a flavour that I never before experienced ; it was a sentiment 
in itself, a fine mellow sentiment, which fell upon my heart like rain on 
some parched and stunted meadow. Once or twice—so busily absorbed. 
were we in wine and chit-chat—the waiter came in, apparently to snuff 
the candles, but in reality, to hasten our retreat: the disappearance too, 
of the different persons from the coffee-room, who dropped off by twos 
and threes, told us that we were encroaching on the morning, yet stilk 
we stuck to our box “ like Teneriffe or Atlas unremoved.” At last, after 
a long evening spent in the freest and most social converse, my friend 
quitted the coffee-room, while I—imitating, as I went, the cireumlocutory 
windings of the Meander—proceeded to my allotted chamber. Unfortu- 
nately, on reaching the head of the first stair-case, where two opposite 
Pe 
