THE HERON AS A TABLE- BIRD 107 
Smith, except that Camden Road was about a 
thousand times longer. At length, a mile or so 
short of the far end, I came to the number I was 
looking for on the door of a small, pretty, old- 
looking vine-clad cottage set well back from the 
road with trees and flowers about it, and there I 
found my typist and her sister—twe little un- 
married ladies, no longer young, who in their gentle 
subdued manner, low soft speech, and quiet move- 
ments appeared to harmonise very well with the 
old-world little house they lived in. They were, I 
fancy, somewhat startled at the apparition of so 
big a man in their small interior—one whose head 
came within an inch or two of the low ceiling: 
they seemed timid and troubled and anxious in 
their minds when I gave them my scrawl to 
decipher and copy. 
One day, wanting a good long walk, I paid 
them a second visit, to find them less shy and 
reticent than at first; and afterwards I went again 
on several occasions, until we became quite friendly, 
and they gratified my De Quincey-like craving to 
know everything about the life of every person I 
meet from its birth onwards, by telling me all about 
themselves. 
They had been left with very little to live on, 
and one was an invalid; yet they had to do some- 
thing, and typewriting at home was the only 
thing, as this enabled them to keep together, so 
that the invalid would always have her sister with 
her. The work they had done hitherto, they said, 
