It was from first wearing his boots that old Matt came to lodge with Isaac Gross, sharing with him the back-parlour, turned for their accommodation into a double-bedded room without bedsteads; but of itself a pleasant grove, whose fruitful sides teemed with boots and shoes in every stage of decay or remanufacture, hung upon nails wherever a nail would hold, the window-frame and its cross-bars not being spared. As to the large and ever-increasing pile of waste-paper owned by Mrs Slagg, old Matt resisted the encroachment with some bitterness; but still it grew, and though the old man grumbled, he would not move, for he liked his abode for its freedom from all restraint, since he could go to bed when he liked, stay as long as he liked, and use his own discretion respecting the removal of boots or other articles of clothing. The place was dirty, but that he did not mind; odorous, but then it was the true sherry twang; but what suited Matt best was, that his landlord troubled him little about rent, leaving him to pay when so minded, and never hinting at arrears; while still another advantage was that, next to a lamp-post, old Matt found his landlord the most satisfactory listener he knew, one ready to be talked to upon any subject, and to fall into the talker's way of thinking. On the morning when the words at the head of this chapter were spoken, in spite of the hammering, Matt continued to sleep on until nearly eight, when he rose, had his boots polished at half-price in the shade of Temple Bar, and then walked to the barber's, declaring a brushing to be the finest thing in the world for corns. Here he had an easy shave and a wash for a penny; breakfasted heartily and sumptuously to the surprise of _habitues_ and waitress, by calling for a rasher of bacon, and having a crumpled, greasy, brown dog's ear brought him to devour with his bread-and-butter and coffee. For Matt was in high spirits: he was in full work upon a newspaper for a few days, and he had discovered the paragraph which, in spite of the drawback of its terrible contents, was a piece of news that should give Mr Septimus Hardon the income and position "of what I always said he was, sir,--a gentleman." So old Matt breakfasted, as he said, "like a prince," for fivepence, spent the change of his sixpence in a morning paper, and walked back to his lodging to read it at leisure, for his work would not begin till the afternoon. Mr Isaac Gross had finished his economical bachelor breakfast, consisting of bread-and-butter and packet-cocoa, combining cheapness, succulence, and convenience. The breakfast-things were cleared away-- not a long task--and Isaac was about to add a pile of old account-books to the waste-paper heap in the back-room. "She bring them in?" said Matt. Isaac, with his pipe in his mouth, nodded, and said in a gruff, slow growl, "Waste-paper."