And so they went away through the din and tumult of the great London, with their own bright young universe surrounding them, and their own sweet current of thought and emotion running as pure as if they had been passing through the sweetest fields of Arcadia. They had no eyes for impertinent gazers, if such things were in their way. Twenty stout footmen at their back could not have defended them so completely as did their own innocence and security. We confess they did not even shrink, with a proper sentimental horror, from all the din and all the commotion of this noonday Babylon; they liked their rapid glance at the wonderful shop-windows; they brightened more and more as their course lay along the gayest and most cheerful streets. It was pleasant to look at the maze of carriages, pleasant to see the throngs of people, exhilarating to be drawn along in this bright flood-tide and current of the world. But they grew a little nervous as they approached the house of Mr Burlington--a little more irregular in their pace, lingering and hastening as timidity or eagerness got the upper hand--and a great deal more silent, being fully occupied with anticipations of, and preparations for, this momentous interview. What should Agnes--what would Mr Burlington say? This silence and shyness visibly increased as they came to the very scene and presence of the redoubtable publisher--where Agnes called the small attendant clerk in the outer office “Sir” and deferentially asked for Mr Burlington. When they had waited there for a few minutes, they were shown into a matted parlour containing a writing-table and a coal-scuttle, and three chairs. Mr Burlington would be disengaged in a few minutes, the little clerk informed them, as he solemnly displaced two of the chairs, an intimation that they were to sit down. They sat down accordingly, with the most matter-of-course obedience, and held their breath as they listened for the coming steps of Mr Burlington. But the minutes passed, and Mr Burlington did not come. They began to look round with extreme interest and curiosity, augmented all the more by their awe. There was nothing in the least interesting in this bare little apartment, but their young imaginations could make a great deal out of nothing. At Mr Burlington’s door stood a carriage, with a grand powdered coachman on the box, and the most superb of flunkies gracefully lounging before the door. No doubt Mr Burlington was engaged with the owner of all this splendour. Immediately they ran over all the great names they could remember, forgetting for the moment that authors, even of the greatest, are not much given, as a general principle, to gilded coaches and flunkies of renown. Who could it be?