liked for Lilian. The main objection to it in the eyes of the "genteel"
was, that it had formerly belonged to a member of the healing profession
who united the shop of an apothecary to the diploma of a surgeon; but that
shop had given the house a special attraction to me; for it had been built
out on the side of the house which fronted the lane, occupying the greater
portion of a small gravel court, fenced from the road by a low iron
palisade, and separated from the body of the house itself by a short and
narrow corridor that communicated with the entrance-hall. This shop I
turned into a rude study for scientific experiments, in which I generally
spent some early hours of the morning, before my visiting patients began
to arrive. I enjoyed the stillness of its separation from the rest of
the house; I enjoyed the glimpse of the great chestnut-trees, which
overtopped the wall of the school-garden; I enjoyed the ease with which,
by opening the glazed sash-door, I could get out, if disposed for a short
walk, into the pleasant fields; and so completely had I made this
sanctuary my own, that not only my man-servant knew that I was never to be
disturbed when in it, except by the summons of a patient, but even the
housemaid was forbidden to enter it with broom or duster, except upon
special invitation. The last thing at night, before retiring to rest, it
was the man-servant's business to see that the sash-window was closed,
and the gate to the iron palisade locked; but during the daytime I so
often went out of the house by that private way that the gate was then
very seldom locked, nor the sash-door bolted from within. In the town of
L---- there was little apprehension of house-robberies,--especially in the
daylight,--and certainly in this room, cut off from the main building,
there was nothing to attract a vulgar cupidity. A few of the apothecary's
shelves and cases still remained on the walls, with, here and there, a
bottle of some chemical preparation for experiment; two or three
worm-eaten, wooden chairs; two or three shabby old tables; an old
walnut-tree bureau without a lock, into which odds and ends were