in St. James's Park. The swans were still swimming lazily among the water-lilies, but the sun was lower in the sky, and the shadows of the trees fell longer across the grass. The park-keeper was tapping me on the shoulder and saying, "A penny for the chair, if you please. You have had a long nap, sir." I started up, and having paid my penny quitted the park and hurried back to Staple's Inn. The streets, as I passed through them, had resumed the usual aspect of bustle and tumult, which they present on a July afternoon towards the end of the London season. I could see none of the quaint black-timbered houses which had figured so prominently on my recent ride through the city; the excruciating cobbles had disappeared, and the tide of traffic rolled smoothly over the asphalt pavement. I began to think that I must have been dreaming, and that I should find Staple's Inn to have vanished like the rest of my vision. But on that point I was soon reassured. For there it was in its old place, just as I had seen it, with its ancient timbered gables overlooking the hurry, and seemingly deaf to the uproar, of Holborn. I again passed under the archway and entered the first court. Yes, there was the very bench under the plane which had been so lately occupied by Sir Roger and Will Honeycomb. There, across the court, was still the old hall with its vines and creepers, and the sunlight streaming through the painted glass of its windows. Again I passed through the vaulted passage beside the hall, and again I found myself in the garden court, with its grass and flower-beds, its terrace and stone steps, all sleeping as before in the drowsy heat of the summer afternoon. But the staircase with the balustrade of black oak was gone, and though I searched for it carefully then and since, I have never been able to find it from that day to this. Yet I know it must be there, for I saw it, and I shall find it one day, and see Sir Roger again, and Will Honeycomb, and the Spectator there-there or somewhere in the land of dreams. J. G. FRAZER. I BRICK COURT, TEMPLE, August 10, 1914. |