Buckley and Mary had run
off to the kitchen to order the Doctor some supper, he seemed to see
her for the first time, and bowed profoundly. She rose, and, looking
at him intently, sat down again.
The Doctor had eaten his supper, and Mrs. Buckley had made him
something to drink with her own hands; the Doctor had lit his pipe, and
we had gathered round the empty fire-place, when the Major said,--
"Now, Doctor, do tell us your adventures, and how you have managed to
drop upon us from the skies on Christmas-day."
"Soon told, my friend," he answered. "See here. I went back to Germany
because all ties in England were broken. I went to Lord C----: I said,
'I will go back and see the palingenesis of my country; I will see what
they are doing, now the French are in the dust.' He said, 'Go, and God
speed you!' I went. What did I find? Beggars on horseback everywhere,
riding post-haste to the devil--not as good horsemen, either, but as
tailors of Brentford, and crowding one another into the mud to see who
would be there first. 'Let me get out of this before they ride over
me,' said I. So I came forth to England, took ship, and here I am.
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