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"How glad I am you've been seeing him!" said Sludin. "He's not

well, and I fancy.... Well, what do you think of him?"

"I'll tell you," said the doctor, beckoning over Sludin's head to

his coachman to bring the carriage round. "It's just this," said

the doctor, taking a finger of his kid glove in his white hands

and pulling it, "if you don't strain the strings, and then try to

break them, you'll find it a difficult job; but strain a string

to its very utmost, and the mere weight of one finger on the

strained string will snap it. And with his close assiduity, his

conscientious devotion to his work, he's strained to the utmost;

and there's some outside burden weighing on him, and not a light

one," concluded the doctor, raising his eyebrows significantly.

"Will you be at the races?" he added, as he sank into his seat in

the carriage.

"Yes, yes, to be sure; it does waste a lot of time," the doctor

responded vaguely to some reply of Sludin's he had not caught.