narrowly visible that the sight of it was as a blade of steel hung up between the houses. All this quarter of the City I was perfectly ignorant of, my knowledge being limited to such parts of it only as I had traversed betwixt the Bridge and Fetter Lane, if I except Serjeant's Inn in Fleet Street, which to my cost I had come to know pretty well. Whereto my exact intention reached, I should have found it difficult to determine, but a settled hatred of the man possessed me, beside some motions of fear (I confess now) that his continued espial had stirred within me; and under the influence of fear, much more than of hatred, we be ever apt to run into an excess of cruelty. Thus I remember well enough the coolness with which I rehearsed my attack upon him, and the considerations I maintained in my mind for and against the waylaying him before he could stand upon his defence. Overrunning him with a critical eye, I could not but admire his great stature and apparent strength, to which I had to add a probable skill in fence, that I lacked, having never been lessoned therein, though I had sometimes played a heat or two with Simon, using a pair of old foils we found one day in the stable loft at home. Notwithstanding, this defect weighed nothing against my will, but rather exalted the desire I had to prove my courage upon him, whose advantage was so every way manifest. A great moon hung above the Thames, but obscured now and then by wreaths of river mist that a light wind lifted the edge of, yet could not sustain the bulk to drive it. There was no sound but that my enemy made with his accoutrements; for I, lurking along in the black shadows, made none, and the street was now everywhere void. All went pat to my purpose, and I loosened my sword in its sheath. Then I crossed the road.