Ten pounds was enough for him--without ambition, and without business-avarice; ten pounds was enough for his Fleet Street life. It was not only the actual money he gave away, but the kindness of the man. Have you ever noticed the boys who work in printing-offices?--their elbows seem so sharp and pointed, bony, and without flesh. Instead of the shirt-sleeve being turned up, it looks as if the pointed elbow had thrust its way through. He always had something for them;--a plate of beef, soup, beer to be shared, apples, baked potatoes, now and then half-a-dozen mild cigars. Awful this, was it not? Printers' boys _will_ smoke; they had better have Flamma's fine tobacco than the vile imitation they buy. They always had a tale for him; either their mothers, or sisters, or some one was in trouble; Flamma was certain to do something, however little might be within his power. At least he went to see. Had a man an income of a million he could not relieve the want of London; the wretch relieved to-day needs again to-morrow. But Alere went to see. Ten pounds did much in the shaky hands of a man without ambition, and without business-avarice, who went to see the unfortunate. His own palsied mother, at the verge of life, looked to Alere for all that the son can do for the parent. Other sons seemed more capable of such duty; yet it invariably fell upon Alere. He was the Man. And for those little luxuries and comforts that soothe the dull hours of trembling age she depended entirely upon him. So you see the ten-pound notes that satisfied him were not all spent in drink. But alas! once now and then the rats began to run up the wall in broad daylight, and foolish Alere, wise in this one thing, immediately began to pack his carpet-bag. He put in his collars, his slippers, his sketch-books and pencils, some of his engraving tools, and a few blocks of boxwood, his silver-mounted flute, and a book for Amaryllis. He packed his carpet-bag and hastened away to his Baden-Baden, to Coombe Oaks, his spa among the apple-bloom, the song of finches, and rustle of leaves. They sat and talked in the round summer-house in Iden's garden, with the summer unfolding at their knees; Amaryllis, Amadis, Iden, and Flamma. By Flamma's side there stood a great mug of the Goliath ale, and between his lips there was a long churchwarden pipe. The Goliath ale was his mineral water; his gaseous, alkaline, chalybeate liquor; better by far than Kissingen, Homburg, Vichy; better by far than mud baths and hot springs. There is no medicine in nature, or made by man, like good ale. He who drinks ale is strong. The bitter principle of the aromatic hops went to his nervous system, to the much-suffering liver, to the clogged and weary organs, bracing and stimulating, urging on, vitalizing anew. The spirit drawn from the joyous barley warmed his heart; a cordial grown on the sunny hill-side, watered with dew and sweet rain, coloured by the light, a liquor of sunshine, potable sunbeam.