My Library

I tried to look as indignant as possible, which he was not slow to observe; for he approached, slapped me familiarly on the back, poured out and drank a cup of tea and ate a rusk, which settled the question as to his being no ghost; then he dropped carelessly into my easy-chair, rubbed his little perked-up nose with his thin, little, bluish-pale fingers, and throwing himself forward, so as to look right up into my face, he laughed heartily, and then bawled out, rather than sung, at the top of his voice: “ ‘The storm howls drearily, Let you and I live cheerily; And we’ll study things that never were known. I’ve come from the West, To see the man that I like best. Don’t think I’m all depravity— I’m in search of the centre of gravity— And you’ll find out the Philosophers’ Stone.’ And then he again burst out into one of the wildest, most outré, and ridiculous laughs that ever fell on mortal hearing. “The wretched doggerel that I had just heard was beneath my notice; and little did I know of the singer, and still less did I imagine that those lines were to me the most important I had ever