The whole journey was made without an adventure
of importance. But it ended with one. About ten
o'clock on the night of the 19th of February, they
stepped upon London Bridge, in the midst of a
writhing, struggling jam of howling and hurrahing
people, whose beer-jolly faces stood out strongly in
the glare from manifold torches--and at that instant
the decaying head of some former duke or other
grandee tumbled down between them, striking Hen-
don on the elbow and then bounding off among the
hurrying confusion of feet. So evanescent and un-
stable are men's works in this world!--the late
good king is but three weeks dead and three days in
his grave, and already the adornments which he took
such pains to select from prominent people for his
noble bridge are falling. A citizen stumbled over
that head, and drove his own head into the back of
somebody in front of him, who turned and knocked
down the first person that came handy, and was
promptly laid out himself by that person's friend.
It was the right ripe time for a free fight, for the
festivities of the morrow--Coronation Day--were
already beginning; everybody was full of strong
drink and patriotism; within five minutes the free
fight was occupying a good deal of ground; within
ten or twelve it covered an acre or so, and was be-
come a riot. By this time Hendon and the king
were hopelessly separated from each other and lost
in the rush and turmoil of the roaring masses of
humanity. And so we leave them.

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