London. I had mechanically turned in this latter direction, and
was strolling along the lonely high-road--idly wondering, I
remember, what the Cumberland young ladies would look like--when,
in one moment, every drop of blood in my body was brought to a
stop by the touch of a hand laid lightly and suddenly on my
shoulder from behind me.

I turned on the instant, with my fingers tightening round the
handle of my stick.

There, in the middle of the broad bright high-road--there, as if
it had that moment sprung out of the earth or dropped from the
heaven--stood the figure of a solitary Woman, dressed from head to
foot in white garments, her face bent in grave inquiry on mine,
her hand pointing to the dark cloud over London, as I faced her.

I was far too seriously startled by the suddenness with which this
extraordinary apparition stood before me, in the dead of night and
in that lonely place, to ask what she wanted. The strange woman
spoke first.

"Is that the road to London?" she said.

I looked attentively at her, as she put that singular question to
me. It was then nearly one o'clock. All I could discern
distinctly by the moonlight was a colourless, youthful face,
meagre and sharp to look at about the cheeks and chin; large,
grave, wistfully attentive eyes; nervous, uncertain lips; and
light hair of a pale, brownish-yellow hue. There was nothing
wild, nothing immodest in her manner: it was quiet and self-