descended the stairs; and when
I likewise reached the street-door, the carriage was already rolling away.
 

                            XXI. An Old Acquaintance

Thus excluded from everybody's confidence, and attaining no further, by my most
earnest study, than to an uncertain sense of something hidden from me, it would
appear reasonable that I should have flung off all these alien perplexities.
Obviously, my best course was, to betake myself to new scenes. Here, I was only
an intruder. Elsewhere, there might be circumstances in which I could establish
a personal interest, and people who would respond, with a portion of their
sympathies, for so much as I should bestow of mine.
    Nevertheless, there occurred to me one other thing to be done. Remembering
old Moodie, and his relationship with Priscilla, I determined to seek an
interview, for the purpose of ascertaining whether the knot of affairs was as
inextricable, on that side, as I found it on all others. Being tolerably well
acquainted with the old man's haunts, I went, the next day, to the saloon of a
certain establishment about which he often lurked. It was a reputable place
enough, affording good entertainment in the way of meat, drink, and fumigation;
and there, in my young and idle days and nights, when I was neither nice nor
wise, I had often amused myself with watching the staid humors and sober
jollities of the thirsty souls around me.
    At my first entrance, old Moodie was not there. The more patiently to await
him, I lighted a cigar, and establishing myself in a corner, took a quiet, and,
by sympathy, a boozy kind of pleasure in the customary life that was going
forward. Human nature, in my opinion, has a naughty instinct that approves of
wine, at least, if not of stronger liquor. The temperance-men may preach till
doom's day; and still this cold and barren world will look warmer, kindlier,
mellower, through the medium of a toper's glass; nor can they, with all their
efforts, really spill his draught upon the floor, until some hitherto
unthought-of discovery shall supply him with a truer element of joy. The general
atmosphere of life must first be rendered so inspiriting that he will not need
his delirious solace. The custom of tippling has its defensible side, as well as
any other question. But these good people snatch at the old, time-honored
demijohn, and offer nothing - either sensual or moral - nothing whatever to
supply its place; and human life, as