A mile was soon told, and I felt no tiring. Up this step and that, peering at the blind numbers on the doors; how could I tell one from the other? The almanac said there should be moonshine at this hour, the clouds and rain put in their veto. No matter, the almanac had said it, and that was enough for the gas contractors. If the moon chose to get behind a cloud, it was none of their look out. They would not light their lamps, though darkness, thick, black darkness, spread over the earth. Why should they? It was not in the bond. So the traveller plodded on in the dark. How could one see the numbers? Not by city light, but by city license. Here burns a "coffee-house" lamp, where rum alone is sold. More improvident than his city fathers, this one lights up his lamp, of dark, rainy nights, whether the moon is in the almanac, or city fathers' brains. His number is plain enough. 'Tis an even number--I am on the wrong side of the street. Now, cross over, and here is, 47, 49, 51, 53--this must be it, and yet it cannot be. It is a neat, two story, brick house, with basement and attic, in a row of the same sort, in a clean, wide street. It is a very unlikely place for such a home as we have seen, for the home of Little Katy's mother. How, are we deceived again? It must be in the number; perhaps we can not see it rightly by the dim glimmer of the grog-shop lamp. It is the first glimmer that ever came from such a place to any good. There is no bell, but there is an old-fashioned iron knocker upon the door; shall I use it; what if it wakes up some strange sleeper and brings a fever-heated night-capped angry head out of the upper window, with hasty words, perhaps cross ones of "who is there?" I have no familiar "it's me," to answer. No one will say, "wait a moment, dear, and I will open the door." All is still within. It were a pity to disturb the quiet sleepers for nothing, nothing but the gratification of idle curiosity; to make the inquiry if--if--Mrs. Mrs.--what was her name? Now that is gone--faded from my memory as easily as it was washed away from that paper. Whom could I inquire for? Should I inquire for "Little Katy's Mother?" I should in all probability be told to go across the street and inquire there, where I got my liquor, upon which to get drunk. Or else, perhaps, to go home and inquire if my "mother knew that I was out;" or told that she might happen to wake up, and find her green gosling of a son gone--gone out in the street to inquire after little girls' mothers--no doubt she would be much alarmed. It was well that the moon was veiled, or else the man in it would have seen how sheepish I looked as I sneaked down the steps, with a weary step, that could not have gone the half a mile without tiring. How I did rejoice that no watchman was in sight to see how crest-fallen I went away and stood up in the shade of a lamp post! A few minutes afterwards, I would have given gold for the sight of a brass star.