It stood alone: the extensive gardens in front of it; the space once occupied by the chapel behind it. All traces of the chapel building were gone now, but its mossy gravestones were imbedded in the ground still, and the spot remained as sacred as a graveyard. The Latin inscriptions on some of these stones could be yet made out: and that on one attracted as much imaginative speculation as the famed gravestone in the cloisters of Worcester Cathedral. A few Latin words only were on it, signifying "buried in misery:" no name, no date. Thoughtful natures would glance at that stone as they passed it, with an inward breath of hope--perhaps of prayer--that the misery experienced by its unhappy tenant in this world had been exchanged for a life of immortality. This graveyard was not a thoroughfare, and few cared to walk there who were absorbed in the bustle and pleasures of life; but the aged, the invalid, the mourner might be seen there on fine days, seated on its one solitary bench, and buried in solemn reflections. A short space of time, more or less, as it might happen, and they would be lying under gravestones in their turn: a short space of time, my friends, and you and I shall be equally lying there. The broad space of the public road running along the Abbey's front divided it from the gardens, the gardens being the public property of the town. On the opposite side of these gardens, furthest from the Abbey, were the buildings of the new station and the lines upon lines of rails. It is well to say lines upon lines of rails! Hallingham said it--said it with a groan. Not content with a simple line, or a double line of rails, sufficient for ordinary traffic, the railway authorities had made it into a "junction"--"Hallingham Junction!"--and more lines branched off from it than you would care to count. This was at the east end of the town; beyond it was the open country. Some of the lines made a sort of semicircle, cut off a corner of the town, and branched off into space. It's true it was a very shabby little corner of the town that had thus been cut off, but Hallingham did not the less resent the invasion.