"Yes, thanks! that was all right," said I. "He could get them then when he came back; they might contain matters of importance. Good-morning." When I got outside, I came to a standstill and said loudly in the open street, as I clenched my hands: "I will tell you one thing, my good Lord God, you are a bungler!" and I nod furiously, with set teeth, up to the clouds; "I will be hanged if you are not a bungler." Then I took a few strides, and stopped again. Suddenly, changing my attitude, I fold my hands, hold my head to one side, and ask, with an unctuous, sanctimonious tone of voice: "Hast thou appealed also to him, my child?" It did not sound right! With a large H, I say, with an H as big as a cathedral! once again, "Hast thou invoked Him, my child?" and I incline my head, and I make my voice whine, and answer, No! That didn't sound right either. You can't play the hypocrite, you idiot! Yes, you should say, I have invoked God my Father! and you must set your words to the most piteous tune you have ever heard in your life. So--o! Once again! Come, that was better! But you must sigh like a horse down with the colic. So--o! that's right. Thus I go, drilling myself in hypocrisy; stamp impatiently in the street when I fail to succeed; rail at myself for being such a blockhead, whilst the astonished passers-by turn round and stare at me. I chewed uninterruptedly at my shaving, and proceeded, as steadily as I could, along the street. Before I realized it, I was at the railway square. The dock on Our Saviour's pointed to half-past one. I stood for a bit and considered. A faint sweat forced itself out on my face, and trickled down my eyelids. Accompany me down to the bridge, said I to myself--that is to say, if you have spare time!--and I made a bow to myself, and turned towards the railway bridge near the wharf. The ships lay there, and the sea rocked in the sunshine. There was bustle and movement everywhere, shrieking steam-whistles, quay porters with cases on their shoulders, lively "shanties" coming from the prams. An old woman, a vendor of cakes, sits near me, and bends her brown nose down over her wares. The little table before her is sinfully full of nice things, and I turn away with distaste. She is filling the whole quay with her smell of cakes--phew! up with the windows! I accosted a gentleman sitting at my side, and represented forcibly to him the nuisance of having cake-sellers here, cake-sellers there.... Eh? Yes; but he must really admit that.... But the good man smelt a rat, and did not give me time to finish speaking, for he got up and left. I rose, too, and followed him, firmly determined to convince him of his mistake. "If it was only out of consideration for sanitary conditions," said I; and I slapped him on the shoulders. "Excuse me, I am a stranger here, and know nothing of the sanitary conditions," he replied, and stared at me with positive fear.