WINTRY WEATHER 217 



looked in with longing eyes as he crept past the window, with 

 less clothes upon him than I evei- saw on anything like a man, 

 save as assigned in pictorial representations of Adam. A few 

 rags hung about him, but chest, head, and feet were bare, and 

 nipped by the wind and frost to an inflammatory blue and 

 feiTUginous brown. Jumping up, I opened the door and called 

 him back : he came with indistinct or confused notions of 

 charity or the cage. " Come in," I said, " my good fellow : " he 

 obeyed me. " Come on,"" was the next bidding ; and then our 

 conversation, kept up as it had been only on one side, termin- 

 ated by my pointing to the vacant chimney corner by my little 

 table — to the considei-able growling of Jessie and astonishment 

 of mine hostess — into that seat the poor Negro mechanically 

 fell. "Now, then, Mrs. Carey, another pot of hot stuff like 

 mine, and some bread and cheese for my guest." It was 

 brought, and I bade him do justice to it. The poor fellow's 

 mute astonishment at this change in his pi-ospects, the reverse 

 so sudden and fortunate, seemed to strike him dumb. I don't 

 think he could speak ; but he soon began to rub his hands at 

 the fire, and, to use a very expressive phrase, to pitch into the 

 viands, sipping his hot brew with the most humble but thank- 

 ful satisfaction, mine hostess waiting on him with all the 

 civility in the world — seeing that I was to pay — and Jessie, in 

 her turn, begging of him a piece of his cheese. God forgive me 

 for many a harsh word I have hastily spoken in my life to a 

 poor man ; the food I gave this Negro was no atonement for it 

 on my part, for I do not hesitate to say that I had as much 

 pleasure or more in watching this houseless, lonely, and famished 

 man eating heartily and kindly treated, when most he needed it 

 and least expected it, than I had in the day's wild-fowl shooting 

 that was to come. It cost me but little, indeed I had not much 

 to give ; but, reader, believe me when I say the shilling so laid 

 out gave me greater happiness than many a five-pound note 

 spent in other things. 



The moment Lord Malmsbury arrived we sallied forth, old 

 John Freeman the keeper in company. Than Freeman, who 



