In appearance, James Million, the eminent brewer, was a small, flabby man, with a white face on which the flesh hung loosely. It had been said of him that his morals were as flabby as his flesh--but this was invented by a detractor, and if it conveyed any reproach, it was at best a hazy one. He had a curious trick with his eyes. They were sound and of the first water--not a flaw in them, as diamond merchants say; but whenever there was presented for his contemplation or consideration a question of a perplexing or disagreeable nature, he would close one of his eyes, and look at it with the other. It was a favourite habit with him to walk along the streets so, with one eye closed; and a man who set himself up for a satirist, or a wag, or both, once said: 'Jimmy Million is so moral that he doesn't like to look on the wickedness of the world; so he shuts one eye, and can only see half of it, and thereby saves himself half the pain.' To James Million, as he sits in his study, comes a servant, who, after due tapping at the door, so as not to disturb the ruminations of the legislator, announces a man in the passage who desires to see Mr. Million. 'Name? asks Mr. Million. [Illustration] 'Saul Fielding,' answers the servant, and adds, 'but he says he does not think you know him.' 'What does he look like?' The servant hesitates; he has not made up his mind. Although Saul Fielding is shabbily dressed, he is clean, and Jane's watchful care has made his wardrobe (the whole of which he wears on his back) seem better than it is. Besides, there is 'an air' about Saul Fielding which prevents him being placed, in the servant's mind, on the lowest rung of vagabondism. 'Is he a poor man? Is he a working man? demands Mr. Million impatiently. 'He looks like it, sir,' replies the servant, not committing himself distinctly to either statement. Mr. Million has an idle hour before him, which he is not disinclined to devote to the workingman question, so he bids the servant admit the visitor.