Some three years went by, and I was spending the autumn at a village by the New Forest. One day I came upon a man kneeling under a hedge, examining some object on the ground,--fern or flower, or perhaps insect. His costume showed that he was no native of the locality; I took him for a stray townsman, probably a naturalist. He wore a straw hat and a rough summer suit; a wallet hung from his shoulder. The sound of my steps on crackling wood caused him to turn and look at me. After a moment's hesitation I recognised Ireton. And he knew me; he smiled, as I had often seen him smile, with a sort of embarrassment. We greeted each other. 'Look here,' he said at once, when the handshaking was over, 'can you tell me what this little flower is?' I stooped, but was unable to give him the information he desired. 'You don't go in for that kind of thing?' 'Well, no.' 'I'm having a turn at it. I want to know the flowers and ferns. I have a book at my lodgings, and I look the things up when I get home.' His wallet contained a number of specimens; he plucked up the little plant by the root, and stowed it away. I watched him with curiosity. Perhaps I had seen only his public side; perhaps even then he was capable of dressing roughly, and of rambling for his pleasure among fields and wood. But such a possibility had never occurred to me. I wondered whether his brilliant wife had given him a disgust for the ways of town. If so, he was a more interesting man than I had supposed. 'Where are you staying?' he asked, after a glance this way and that. I named the village, two miles away. 'Working?' 'Idling merely.' In a few minutes he overcame his reserve and began to talk of the things which he knew interested me. We discussed the books of the past season, the exhibitions, the new men in letters and art. Ireton said that he had been living at a wayside inn for about a week; he thought of moving on, and, as I had nothing to do, suppose he came over for a few days to the village where I was camped? I welcomed the proposal. 'There's an inn, I dare say? I like the little inns in this part of the country. Dirty, of course, and the cooking hideous; but it's pleasant for a change. I like to be awoke by the cock crowing, and to see the grubby little window when I open my eyes.' I began to suspect that he had come down in the world. Could his prosperity have been due to Mrs. Treton? Had she carried off the money? He might affect a liking for simple things when grandeur was no longer in his reach. Yet I remembered that he had undoubtedly been botanising before he knew of my approach, and such a form of pastime seemed to prove him sincere.