became aware of my looking at him. Immediately,
he turned the parting in his hair towards
the glass partition, as if he said to me with a
sweet smile, " Straight up here, if you please.
Off the grass!"

In a few moments he had put on his hat and
taken up his umbrella, and was gone.

I beckoned the clerk into my room, and asked,
"Who was that?"

He had the gentleman's card in his hand.
Mr. Julius Slinkton, Middle Temple."

"A barrister, Mr. Adams?"

"I think not, sir."

"I should have thought him a clergyman, but
for his having no Reverend here," said I.

"Probably, from his appearance," Mr. Adams
replied, " he is reading for orders."

I should mention that he wore a dainty white
cravat, and dainty linen altogether.

"What did he want, Mr. Adams?"

"Merely a form of proposal, sir, and a form of
reference."

"Recommended here? Did he say?"

"Yes; he said he was recommended here by
a friend of yours. He noticed you, but said that
as he had not the pleasure of your personal acquaintance
he would not trouble you."

"Did he know my name?"

"Oh yes, sir! He said, ' There is Mr. Sampson,
I see.'"

"A well-spoken gentleman, apparently?"

"Remarkably so, sir."

"Insinuating manners, apparently?"

"Very much so, indeed, sir."

"Hah!" said I. " I want nothing at present,
Mr. Adams."

Within a fortnight of that day, I went to dine
with a friend of mine— a merchant, a man of taste,
who buys pictures and books; and the first person
I saw among the company was Mr. Julius
Slinkton. There he was, standing before the
fire, with good large eyes and an open expression
of face; but still (I thought) requiring
everybody to come at him by the prepared way
he offered, and by no other.

I noticed him ask my friend to introduce him
to Mr. Sampson, and my friend did so. Mr.
Slinkton was very happy to see me. Not too
happy; there was no overdoing of the matter;
happy, in a thoroughly well-bred, perfectly unmeaning
way.

"I thought you had met," our host observed.

"No," said Mr. Slinkton. " I did look in at
Mr. Sampson's office, on your recommendation;
but I really did not feel justified in troubling
Mr. Sampson himself, on a point within the everyday
routine of an ordinary clerk."

I said I should have been glad to show him
any attention on our friend's introduction.

"I am sure of that," said he, " and am much
obliged. At another time, perhaps, I may be
less delicate. Only, however, if I have real
business; for I know, Mr. Sampson, how
precious business time is, and what a vast
number of impertinent people there are in the
world."

I acknowledged his consideration with a slight
bow. " You were thinking," said I, " of effecting
a policy on your life?"

"Oh dear, no! I am afraid I am not so prudent
as you pay me the compliment of supposing
me to be, Mr. Sampson. I merely inquired for
a friend. But you know what friends are, in
such matters. Nothing may ever come of it.
I have the greatest reluctance to trouble men of
business with inquiries for friends, knowing the
probabilities to be a thousand to one that the
friends will never follow them up. People are
so fickle, so selfish, so inconsiderate. Don't you,
in your business, find them, so every day, Mr.
Sampson?"

I was going to give a qualified answer; but, he
turned his smooth, white parting on me, with
its " Straight up here, if you please!" and I
answered, " Yes."

"I hear, Mr. Sampson," he resumed, presently,
for our friend had a new cook, and dinner was
not so punctual as usual, " that your profession
has recently suffered a great loss."

"In money?" said I.

He laughed at my ready association of loss
with money, and replied, "No; in talent and
vigour."

Not at once following out his allusion, I considered
for a moment. " Has it sustained a
loss of that kind?" said I. " I was not aware
of it."

"Understand me, Mr. Sampson. I don't
imagine that you have retired. It is not so bad
as that. But Mr. Meltham—"

"Oh, to be sure!" said I. "Yes! Mr.
Meltham, the young actuary of the 'Inestimable'?"

"Just so," he returned, in a consoling way.

"He is a great loss. He was at once the most
profound, the most original, and the most energetic
man, I have ever known connected with
Life Assurance."

I spoke strongly; for I had a high esteem and
admiration for Meltham, and my gentleman had
indefinitely conveyed to me some suspicion that
he wanted to sneer at him. He recalled me to
my guard, by presenting that trim pathway up
his head, with its infernal, " Not on the grass, if
you please— the gravel,"

"You knew him, Mr. Slinkton?"

"Only by reputation. To have known him,
as an acquaintance, or as a friend, is an honour
I should have sought, if he had remained in
society: though I might never have had the
good fortune to attain it, being a man of far
inferior mark. He was scarcely above thirty, I
suppose?"

"About thirty."

"Ah!" He sighed in his former consoling
way. " What creatures we are! To break up,
Mr. Sampson, and become incapable of business
at that time of life!— Any reason assigned for
the melancholy fact?"

(" Humph!" thought I, as I looked at him.
"But I WON'T go up the track, and I WILL go on
the grass.")

"What reason have you heard assigned, Mr.
Sliukton?" I asked, point blank.