“If it’s Putney,” said the guard, “it’s the very place we’re going through. Hold hard, Tom, the young woman wants to get down.” Tom immediately pulled up; the young woman did get down, and her two trunks, three bandboxes, her bundle, and her hand-basket, were ranged round her. “I’ve had a very pleasant ride,” she said, giving the fare with a smirk and a courtesy to the coachman, “and am very much obliged,”--dropping a second courtesy to the guard,--“for other civilities. The boxes and things is quite correct, and won’t give further trouble, Mr. Guard, except to be as good as pint out the house I’m going to.” The guard thus appealed to, for a moment stood all aghast; but at last his wits came to his aid, and he gave the following lesson in geography. “You’re all right--ourn a’n’t a short stage, and can’t go round setting people down at their own doors; but you’re safe enough at Putney--don’t be alarmed, my dear--you can’t go out of it. It’s all Putney, from the bridge we’ve just come over, to that windmill you almost can’t see t’other side of the common.” “But, Mr. Guard, I’ve never been in Putney before, and it seems a scrambling sort of a place. If the coach can’t go round with me to the house, can’t you stretch a pint and set me down in sight of it?” “It’s impossible--that’s the sum total; this coach is timed to a minute, and can’t do more for outsides if they was all kings of England.” “I see how it is,” said the female, bridling up, while the coachman, out of patience, prepared to do quite the reverse; “some people are very civil, while some people are setting beside ’em in dickies; but give me the paper again, and I’ll find my own ways.” “It’s chucked away,” said the guard as the coach got into motion; “but just ask the first man you meet--anybody will tell you.” “But I don’t know who or where to ask for,” screamed the lost woman after the flying Rocket; “I can’t read; but it was all down in the paper as is chucked away.” A loud flourish of the bugle to the tune of “My Lodging is on the Cold Ground” was the only reply: and as long as the road remained straight, I could see “the Bewildered Maid” standing in the midst of her baggage, as forlorn as Eve, when, according to Milton, “The world was all before her, where to choose Her _place_--” [Illustration: THE OPENING OF MILTON’S PARADISE LOST.] [Illustration: THE MOON IS ON THE WAIN.] THE APPARITION. In the dead of the night, when from beds that are turfy, The spirits rise up on old cronies to call, Came a shade from the shades on a visit to Murphy, Who had not foreseen such a visit at all. “Don’t shiver and shake,” said the mild Apparition, “I’m come to your bed with no evil design; I’m the Spirit of Moore, Francis Moore the Physician, Once great like yourself in the Almanack line.”