He had eaten, for he was hungry, and ham and bread and butter are not to be despised when nothing better is to be had. Even, which was curious to his state of mind, he had eaten largely, putting up before him the railway book which he had not read on his journey, and going on unconsciously with his vigorous, youthful appetite. This, the first act of his solitude, was by no means so disagreeable as he had feared. It increased his personal comfort, for he had eaten scarcely anything all day, and the increase of personal comfort ameliorates everything. When he had finished, he carried one of his candles to a small table near the window, and sat down there and read on, finishing his book, which had interested him. When he had closed it, and laid it on the table, the realisation of all the circumstances, which returned to his mind, was not so heavy as the first time. His heart began to spring up again, after being crushed under the foot of fate. It began to throb and tingle with the thought that he was in London, on the border of everything that was most living and desirable. The little fumes of interest of his story increased the effect by soothing away his personal misery. And now, as he sat in the small, silent room, something came to him which he had been conscious of all along, without knowing what it was, a sound continuous, like the far-off sound of the sea or of the wind, but subdued, as though the storm was far off, a sound which, now that he was free from those claims made by his lowered bodily condition upon his mind, became more and more apparent, filling the air with an uninterrupted murmur. What was it?