rustlingly, upstairs to bed, accompanied by their cats.

At Cathedral Street, a block or two from Charles, Biddle Street performs
a jog, dashing off at a tangent from its former course, while Chase
Street not only jogs and turns at the corresponding intersection, but
does so again, where, at the next corner, it meets at once with Park
Avenue and Berkeley Street. After this it runs but a short way and dies,
as though exhausted by its own contortions.

Here, in a region of malformed city blocks--some of them pentagonal,
some irregularly quadrangular, some wedge-shaped--Howard Street sets
forth upon its way, running first southwest as far as Richmond Street,
then turning south and becoming, by degrees, an important thoroughfare.

Somewhere near the beginning of Howard Street my attention was arrested
by shadowy forms in a dark window: furniture, andirons, chinaware, and
weapons of obsolete design: unmistakable signs of a shop in which
antiquities were for sale. After making mental note of the location of
this shop, I proceeded on my way, keeping a sharp lookout for other like
establishments. Nor was I to be disappointed. These birds of a feather
bear out the truth of the proverb by flocking together in Howard Street,
as window displays, faintly visible, informed me.

Since we have come naturally to the subject of antiques, let us pause
here, under a convenient lamp-post, and discuss the matter further.

Baltimore--as I found out later--is probably the headquarters for the
South in this trade. It has at least one dealer of Fifth Avenue rank,
located on Charles Street, and a number of humbler dealers in and near
Howard Street. Among the latter, two in particular interested me. One of