“But what is it that he has done? What's his offence?” I heard a voice say from the crowd, and I fancied his accent was that of a foreigner. A perfect inundation of vituperative accusation, however, now poured in, and I could gather no more. The turmoil and uproar rose and fell, and fell and rose again, till at last, my patience utterly exhausted, I burst out into a very violent attack on the uncivilized habits of a people who could thus conduct themselves to a man totally unconvicted of any offence. “Well, well, don't give way to passion; don't let temper get the better of you,” said a fat, citizen-like man beside me. “The stranger there has just paid for what you have had, and all is settled.” I thought I should have fainted as I heard these words. Indeed, until that instant, I had never brought home to my own mind the utter destitution of my state; but now, there. I stood, realizing to myself the condition of one of those we read of in our newspapers as having received five shillings from the poor-box, while D 490 is deputed to “make inquiries after him at his lodgings,” and learn particulars of his life and habits. I could have borne being sent to prison. I could have endured any amount of severity, so long as I revolted against its injustice; but the sense of being an object of actual charity crushed me utterly, and I could nearly have cried with vexation. By degrees the crowd thinned off, and I found myself sit-, ting alone beside the table where I had dined, with the hateful old waiter, as though standing sentinel over me. “Who is this person,” asked I, haughtily, “who, with an indelicate generosity, has presumed to interfere with the concerns of a stranger?” “The gracious nobleman who paid for your dinner is now eating his own at No. 8,” said the old monster with a grin. “I will call upon him when he has dined,” said I, transfixing the wretch with a look so stern, as to make rejoinder impossible; and then, throwing my plaid wrapper and my knapsack on a table near, I strolled out into the street.