At half-past nine precisely he retired to bed and unhesitating sleep.
Next morning he awoke to a changed world.

The sky was grey and so low that his outlook was bounded by a cabbage garden, while a surly wind prophesied rain.

It was chilly, too, and he had his breakfast beside the kitchen fire.

Mrs.Brockie could not spare a capital letter for her surname on the signboard, but she exalted it in her talk.

He heard of a multitude of Brockies, ascendant, descendant, and collateral, who seemed to be in a fair way to inherit the earth.