Page:The German Novelists (Volume 3).djvu/98

 elapsed, until the morning was gone. Dinner came, and business seemed to cease; yet no friend caught our hero’s eye. He paced to and fro along the bridge, where there remained only himself and the mendicants; who now opened their scrips, and dined on cold meat, still keeping their respective stations. Frank wished to follow their example; but, having no provisions with him, he purchased some fruit, which he ate as he walked along. The members of the club, as they sat at dinner, remarked how long he had been haunting the same spot, without speaking to any one, or, like themselves, transacting business. They set him down for an idle youth, though most of them had experienced his benevolence; and he did not escape their facetious observations. At length, they gave him the title of the bridge-surveyor; with the exception of the old soldier, who noticed that his face no longer betokened the same cheerfulness; that he seemed to have some serious business upon his mind; his hat slouched over his eyes, his step slow and cautious: while he was engaged in eating the remnant of an apple, as if hardly conscious of what he was doing.

The old physiognomist wished to apply his observations to some profit; he set his natural and artificial leg both in motion, passed to the other side of the bridge, and prepared to ask our musing hero for more alms, as if he had been a fresh comer.