more detestable because she was the more masculine in her
ferocity. We were therefore in the right mood to visit Mary's
prison, and we were both indignant and dismayed to find that our
driver, called from a mews at a special price set upon his
intelligence, had never heard of it and did not know where it
was.

We reported his inability to the head porter, who came out of the
hotel in a fine flare of sarcasm. "You call yourself a Sheffield
man and not know where the Old Manor is!" he began, and presently
reduced that proud ignoramus of a driver to such a willingness to
learn that we thought it at least safe to set out with him, and
so started for the long climb up the hills that hold Sheffield in
their hollow. When we reached their crest, we looked down and
back through the clearer air upon as strange and grand a sight as
could be. It was as if we were looking into the crater of a
volcano, which was sending up its smoke through a thousand vents.
All detail of the works and their chimneys was lost in the
retrospect; one was aware only of a sort of sea of vapor through
which they loomed and gloomed.

Our ascent was mostly through winding and climbing streets of
little dirty houses, with frowsy gardens beside them, and the
very dirtiest-faced children in England playing about them. From
time to time our driver had to ask his way of the friendly flat-
bosomed slatterns, with babies in their arms, on their
thresholds, or the women tending shop, or peddling provisions,
who were all kind to him, and assured him with varying degrees of
confidence that the Old Manor was a bit, or a goodish bit,
beyond. All at once we came upon the sight of it on an open top,