There was the tramping of feet again outside, and a moment after something gliding past the window; something with horns, something alive.

The loose stride is contracted; the swing of the vigorous shoulders is restrained, and, instead of an honest fellow tramping sturdily after his own fashion through the paths of literature, we are treated to an imitation of Dr. Johnson, done by an illiterate butcher's son.

A moment later there came to him an echo as of swiftly tramping feet, and after that silence.