round the Churchyard as fast as I could, trying to make people
believe I was busy, and just as I came to Doctors Commons I stumbled
against Larkins, who used to travel for Jackman and Larkins.

'Hullo, Whittaker!' said he, 'haven't seen you since you left.
Lucky dog! Wish I could do the same. Ta-ta; can't stop.'

A year ago Mr. Larkins, with the most pressing engagement in front
of him, would have spared me just as much time as I liked to give
him.

Formerly I woke up (sometimes, it is true, after a restless night)
with the feeling that before me lay a day of adventure. I did not
know what was in my letters, nor what might happen. Now, when I
rose I had nothing to anticipate but fifteen hours of monotony
varied only by my meals. My niece proposed that I should belong to
a club, but the members of clubs were not of my caste. I had taken
a pride in my garden and determined I would attend to it more
myself. I bought gardening books, but the gardener knew far more
than I could ever hope to know, and I could not displace him. I had
been in the habit of looking through a microscope in the evening,
although I did not understand any science in which the microscope is
useful, and my slides were bought ready-made. I brought it out now
in the daytime, but I was soon weary of it and sold it. We went to
Worthing for a month. We had what were called comfortable lodgings
and the weather was fine, but if I had been left to myself I should
have gone back to Stockwell directly my boxes were unpacked. We
drove eastwards as far as we could and then westward, and after that
there was nothing more to be done except to do the same thing over
again. At the end of the first week I could stand it no longer, and