seized him, and his arm was instantly released.

"Hist! a pal,--he has the catch," said the blackguard, surlily. The
group gave way, and by the light of the clear starlit skies, and a single
lamp hung at the entrance of the alley, gazed upon the stranger. But
they made no effort to detain him; and as he disappeared in the distant
shadows, hastened back into the wretched hostlery where they had been
merry-making. Meanwhile, the stranger gained a narrow court, and stopped
before a house in one of its angles,--a house taller than the rest, so
much taller than the rest that it had the effect of a tower; you would
have supposed it (perhaps rightly) to be the last remains of some ancient
building of importance, around which, as population thickened and fashion
changed, the huts below it had insolently sprung up. Quaint and massive
pilasters, black with the mire and soot of centuries, flanked the deep-
set door; the windows were heavy with mullions and transoms, and strongly
barred in the lower floor; but few of the panes were whole, and only here
and there had any attempt been made to keep out the wind and rain by
rags, paper, old shoes, old hats, and other ingenious contrivances.
Beside the door was conveniently placed a row of some ten or twelve bell-
pulls, appertaining no doubt to the various lodgments into which the
building was subdivided. The stranger did not seem very familiar with
the appurtenances of the place. He stood in some suspense as to the
proper bell to select; but at last, guided by a brass plate annexed to
one of the pulls, which, though it was too dark to decipher the
inscription, denoted a claim to superior gentility to the rest of that
nameless class, he hazarded a tug, which brought forth a 'larum loud
enough to startle the whole court from its stillness.

In a minute or less, the casement in one of the upper stories opened, a
head peered forth, and one of those voices peculiar to low debauch--raw,