shape of enormous brazen eagles with outstretched
wings from Birmingham, enormous
candelabra and gaseliers of Gothic
pattern from Liege, and sculptured pulpits
and carved altar-rails from the Curtain-
road, Shoreditch. Altar-cloths hang from
the tables, and altar carpets, none of your
common loom-woven stuff, but hand-worked
and—as Herr Tubelkahn gives you to
understand—by the fairest fingers are
spread about to show their patterns to the
best advantage; while there is so much
stained glass about ready for immediate
transfer to the oriel windows of country
churches, that when the sun shines, Herr
Tubelkahn's customers seem to be suddenly
invested with Joseph's garment of
many colours, and the whole shop lights up
like a kaleidoscope.

Many of the customers both of Messrs.
Cope and Tubelkahn were customers, or,
more euphuistically, clients, of Messrs.
Camoxon, who kept the celebrated Clerical
and Educational Registry higher up the
street; but these customers and clients
invariably crossed and recrossed the road,
in proceeding from the one to the other of
these establishments, in order to avoid a certain
door which lay midway between them.
A shabby swing door sun-blistered, and with
its bottom panel scored with heel and toe
kicks from impatient entrance-seeking feet;
a door flanked by two flaming bills, and
surrounded by a host of close-shaven,
sallow-faced men, in shabby clothes and
shiny hats, and red noses, and swinging
canes, noble Romans, roystering cavaliers,
clamorous citizens, fashionable guests, virtuous
peasants—all at a shilling a night;
for the door was, in fact, the stage-door of
the Cracksideum Theatre. The shabby
men in threadbare jauntiness smiled furtively,
and grinned at each other as they
saw the sleek gentlemen in shining broadcloth
step out of their path; but the said
gentlemen felt the proximity of the Thespian
temple very acutely, and did not
scruple to say so to Messrs. Camoxon, who,
as in duty bound, shrugged their shoulders
deprecatingly, and—changed the conversation.
They were very sorry, but—and
they shrugged their shoulders! When men
shrug their shoulders to their customers it's
time that they should retire from business.
It was time that the Messrs. Camoxon so
retired, for the old gentleman now seldom
appeared in Rutland-street, but remained
at home at Wimbledon, enacting his favourite
character of the British squire,
and actually dressing the part in a blue
coat and gilt buttons, grey knee-breeches,
and Hessian boots; while young George
Camoxon hunted with the queen's hounds,
had dined twice at the Life Guards' mess
at Windsor, and had serious thoughts of
standing for the county. But the business
was far too good to give up; every one
who had a presentation or an advowson to
sell took it to Camoxons'; the head clerk
could tell you off-hand the net value of
every valuable living in England, the age
of the incumbent, and the state of his
health, every rector who wanted assistance,
every curate who wanted a change,
in servants' phrase, "to better himself,"
every layman who wanted a title for
orders, every vicar who, oddly enough,
wanted to change a dull bleak living in
the north for a pleasant social sphere of
duty in a cheerful neighbourhood in the
south of England; parents on the look-out
for tutors, tutors in search of pupils—all
inscribed their names on Camoxons' books,
and looked to them for assistance in their
extremity. There was a substantial, respectable,
orthodox appearance about Camoxons',
in the ground-glass windows, with
the device of the Bible and Sceptre duly
inscribed thereon; in the chaste internal
fittings of polished mahogany and plain
horsehair stools, with the Churchman's
Almanack on the wall in mediæval type,
very illegible, and in a highly mediæval
frame, all bosses and clamps; in the big
ledgers and address books, and in the Post-
office Directory, which here shed its truculent
red cover, and was scarcely recognisable
in a meek sad-coloured calf binding;
and, above all, in the grave, solemn,
sable-clad clerks, who moved noiselessly
about, and who looked like clergymen playing
at business.

Up and down Rutland- street had Walter
Joyce paced full a thousand times since his
arrival in London. The name of the
street and of its principal inhabitants were
familiar to him, through the advertisements
in the clerical newspaper which used to be
sent to Mr. Ashurst at Helmingham; and
no sooner was he settled down in his little
lodging in Winchester-street, than he
crossed the mighty artery of the Strand,
and sought out the street and the shops of
which he had already heard so much. He
saw them, peered in at Copes' and at
Tubelkahn's, and looked earnestly at
Camoxons' ground-glass window, and half
thought of going in to see whether they
had anything which might suit him on
their books. But he refrained until he had