Old age, like most other inevitable things, is a great leveller, and our group sometimes consists of individuals who have held very various positions in life. The chief spokesman and referee in all matters of gossip is an old man-of-war sailor. He has many a tale to tell of ’board ship, but is best known as the village Zadkiel; a title given, we fancy, in derision rather than flattery. He has been every inch a seaman, and is even yet a good type of an old salt, in spite of rheumatism and crutches. The other veterans have for the most part been farm-labourers; some have been mechanics; several innkeepers and tradesmen; and one or two have been farmers in a small way. All now meet, however, on the common ground of age and infirmity. Old Dalboys, at one time the hectoring farmer of Longley, smokes the pipe of equality with Tommy Hill, whom for thirty years he had bullied as his horse-tender; while the superannuated schoolmaster gossips amicably with his ancient enemy the now retired sexton. They have buried old grudges, feuds, and animosities under that wall with the sunny southern exposure, as thoroughly as they must in any case do ere long under the chill walls of the old churchyard. No doubt they have their little childish jealousies still, but these are of a fresh growth. Sam Payne and Bill Shipley are both fond of the easy position afforded by the obtuse angle of a bend in the wall, and grumble a little when the other contrives to secure it. Occasionally John Shore, in the pride of his practical knowledge, will make a stir in the camp by doggedly disputing such a statement as that London lies north-east of Cambridge. At times, too, Billie Wright, who we fear is the butt of these veteran schoolboys, will totter off in dudgeon, because, being no smoker himself, some of the more vivacious of his mates get on the weather-side of him with their pipes. But these tiffs are harmless and ephemeral, and one can well afford to smile at and forget them in view of the genuine friendship and good-will that prevail.