eye peculiar (like quotation from Shakespeare) to persons of the
obsolete old time, _"we_ know better than to forecast the weather if a
petticoat influence appears on the horizon. One prediction, however, I
do risk. If his mother buys any of that lace--I know who will get the
best of the bargain!"

The conditions under which the old doctor was willing to assume the
character of a prophet never occurred. Ovid remembered that he was
going away on a long voyage--and Ovid was a good son. He bought some of
the lace, as a present to his mother at parting; and, most assuredly,
he got the worst of the bargain.

His shortest way back to the straight course, from which he had
deviated in making his purchase, led him into a by-street, near the
flower and fruit market of Covent Garden. Here he met with the second
in number of the circumstances which attended his walk. He found
himself encountered by an intolerably filthy smell.

The market was not out of the direct way to Lincoln's Inn Fields. He
fled from the smell to the flowery and fruity perfumes of Covent
Garden, and completed the disinfecting process by means of a basket of
strawberries.

Why did a poor ragged little girl, carrying a big baby, look with such
longing eyes at the delicious fruit, that, as a kind-hearted man, he
had no alternative but to make her a present of the strawberries? Why
did two dirty boyfriends of hers appear immediately afterwards with
news of Punch in a neighbouring street, and lead the little girl away
with them? Why did these two new circumstances inspire him with a fear
that the boys might take the strawberries away from the poor child,