to get a bargain: like him, he rejoices as much over a book which has
been picked up below its price, as over a lost sheep which has
returned into the fold. But Emblem is now old, and Emblem's shop is no
longer what it was to the collector of the last generation.

It was an afternoon in late September, and in this very year of grace,
eighteen hundred and eighty-four. The day was as sunny and warm as any
of the days of its predecessor Augustus the Gorgeous, but yet there
was an autumnal feeling in the air which made itself felt even in
streets where there were no red and yellow Virginia creepers, no
square gardens with long trails of mignonette and banks of flowering
nasturtiums. In fact, you cannot anywhere escape the autumnal feeling,
which begins about the middle of September. It makes old people think
with sadness that the grasshopper is a burden in the land, and that
the almond-tree is about to flourish; but the young it fills with a
vinous and intoxicated rejoicing, as if the time of feasting, fruits,
harvests, and young wine, strong and fruity, was upon the world. It
made Mr. James--his surname has never been ascertained, but man and
boy, Mr. James has been at Emblem's for twenty-five years and
more--leave his table where he was preparing the forthcoming
catalogue, and go to the open door, where he wasted a good minute and
a half in gazing up at the clear sky and down the sunny street. Then
he stretched his arms and returned to his work, impelled by the sense
of duty rather than by the scourge of necessity, because there was no
hurry about the catalogue and most of the books in it were rubbish,
and at that season of the year few customers could be expected, and
there were no parcels to tie up and send out. He went back to his
work, therefore, but he left the door partly open in order to enjoy
the sight of the warm sunshine. Now for Emblem's to have its door
open, was much as if Mr. Emblem himself should so far forget his