Chapter XIII (1)

_Supposed to be a Letter from Mrs. Hazeldean to ---- Riccabocca,
Esq., The Casino; but edited, and indeed composed, by Miss Jemima
Hazeldean._

"DEAR SIR--To a feeling heart it must always be painful to give pain to another, and (though I am sure unconsciously) you have given the _greatest_ pain to poor Mr. Hazeldean and myself, indeed to _all_ our little circle, in so cruelly refusing our attempts to become better acquainted with a gentleman we so highly ESTEEM. Do, pray, dear sir, make us the _amende honorable_, and give us the _pleasure_ of your company for a few days at the Hall! May we expect you Saturday next?--our dinner-hour is six o'clock.

"With the best compliments of Mr. and Miss Jemima Hazeldean.

"Believe me, my dear sir, yours truly,

"H.H.
"_Hazeldean Hall._"

Miss Jemima having carefully sealed this note, which Mrs. Hazeldean had very willingly deputed her to write, took it herself into the stable-yard, in order to give the groom proper instructions to wait for an answer. But while she was speaking to the man, Frank, equipped for riding with more than his usual dandyism, came also into the yard, calling for his pony in a loud voice, and singling out the very groom whom Miss Jemima was addressing--for, indeed, he was the smartest of all in the Squire's stables--told him to saddle the gray pad, and accompany the pony.

"No, Frank," said Miss Jemima, "you can't have George; your father wants him to go on a message--you can take Mat."

"Mat, indeed!" said Frank, grumbling with some reason; for Mat was a surly old fellow, who tied a most indefensible neckcloth, and always contrived to have a great patch in his boots; besides, he called Frank "Master," and obstinately refused to trot down hill; "Mat, indeed!--let Mat take the message, and George go with me."

But Miss Jemima had also her reasons for rejecting Mat. Mat's foible was not servility, and he always showed true English independence in all houses where he was not invited to take his ale in the servants' hall. Mat might offend Signor Riccabocca, and spoil all. An animated altercation ensued, in the midst of which the Squire and his wife entered the yard, with the intention of driving in the conjugal gig to the market town. The matter was referred to the natural umpire by both the contending parties.

The Squire looked with great contempt on his son. "And what do you want a groom at all for? Are you afraid of tumbling off the pony?"

FRANK.--"No, sir; but I like to go as a gentleman, when I pay a visit to a gentleman!"

SQUIRE, in high wrath.--"You precious puppy! I think I'm as good a gentleman as you, any day, and I should like to know when you ever saw me ride to call on a neighbor, with a fellow jingling at my heels, like that upstart Ned Spankie, whose father kept a cotton-mill. First time I ever heard of a Hazeldean thinking a livery-coat was necessary to prove his gentility!"

MRS. HAZELDEAN, observing Frank coloring, and about to reply.--"Hush, Frank, never answer your father--and you are going to call on Mr. Leslie?"

"Yes, ma'am, and I am very much obliged to my father for letting me," said Frank, taking the Squire's hand.

"Well, but, Frank," continued Mrs. Hazeldean, "I think you heard that the Leslies were very poor."

FRANK.--"Eh, mother?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"And would you run the chance of wounding the pride of a gentleman, as well born as yourself, by affecting any show of being richer than he is?"

SQUIRE, with great admiration.--"Harry, I'd give £10 to have said that!"

FRANK, leaving the Squire's hand to take his mother's.--"You're quite right, mother--nothing could be more _snobbish_!"

SQUIRE.--"Give us your fist too, sir; you'll be a chip of the old block, after all."

Frank smiled, and walked off to his pony.

MRS. HAZELDEAN to Miss Jemima.--"Is that the note you were to write for me?"

MISS JEMIMA.--"Yes, I supposed you did not care about seeing it, so I have sealed it and given it to George."

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"But Frank will pass close by the Casino on his way to the Leslies'. It may be more civil if he leaves the note himself."

MISS JEMIMA, hesitatingly.--"Do you think so?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"Yes, certainly. Frank--Frank--as you pass by the Casino, call on Mr. Riccabocca, give this note, and say we shall be heartily glad if he will come."

Frank nods.

"Stop a bit," cried the Squire. "If Rickeybockey's at home, 'tis ten to one if he don't ask you to take a glass of wine! If he does, mind, 'tis worse than asking you to take a turn on the rack. Faugh! you remember, Harry?--I thought it was all up with me."

"Yes," cried Mrs. Hazeldean, "for Heaven's sake, not a drop! Wine indeed!"

"Don't talk of it," cried the Squire, making a wry face.

"I'll take care, sir!" said Frank, laughing as he disappeared within the stable, followed by Miss Jemima, who now coaxingly makes it up with him, and does not leave off her admonitions to be extremely polite to the poor foreign gentleman, till Frank gets his foot into the stirrup; and the pony, who knows who he has got to deal with, gives a preparatory plunge or two and then darts out of the yard.

_To be continued._

[From Chambers's Edinburgh Journal.]

THE EVERY-DAY MARRIED LADY.

It might be supposed that the every-day married lady was formerly the every-day young lady, and has now merely changed her condition. But this is not the case, for nothing is more common than to see the most holiday spinsters settle down into the most working-day matrons. The married lady, in fact, of the species we would describe, has no descent in particular. If you can imagine a pupa coming into the world of itself without any connection with the larva, or an imago unconscious of the pupa, that is the every-day married lady. She is born at the altar, conjured into life by the ceremonial, and having utterly lost her individual existence, becomes from that moment a noun of multitude. People may say, "Oh, this is our old acquaintance, Miss Smith!" but that is only calling names, for the identity is gone. If she is any thing at all but what appertains to the present, she is the late Miss Smith, who has survived herself, and changed into a family.

We would insist upon this peculiarity of the every-day married lady--that her existence is collective. Her very language is in the plural number--such as we, ours, and us. She respects the rights of paternity so much, as never to permit herself to talk of her children as peculiarly her own. Her individuality being merged in her husband and their actual or possible offspring, she has no private thoughts, no wishes, no hopes, no fears but for the concern. And this is all the better for her tranquillity: for although a part of her husband, she does not quite fancy that he is a part of her. She leaves at least the business to his management, and if she does advise and suggest on occasions, she thinks that somehow things will come out very well. She feels that she is only a passenger; and although, as such, she may recommend the skipper to shorten sail when weathering a critical point, or, for the sake of safety, to come to anchor in the middle of the sea, she has still a certain faith in his skill or luck, and sleeps quietly in the storm. For this reason the every day married lady is comfortable in the figure, and has usually good round features of her own. The Miss Smith she has survived had a slender waist and small delicate hands; but this lady is a very tolerable armful, and the wedding-ring makes such a hollow on her finger, that one might think it would be difficult to get off.

The every-day married lady is commonly reported to be selfish; but this is a mistake. At least her selfishness embraces the whole family circle: it has no personality. When the wife of a poor man, she will sit up half the night sewing and darning, but not a stitch for herself: that can be done at any time; but the boys must go comfortably to school, and the girls look genteel on the street, and the husband--to think of Mr. Brown wanting a button on his shirt! She looks selfish, because her eye is always on her own, and because she talks of what she is always thinking about; but how can one be selfish who is perpetually postponing herself, who dresses the plainest, eats the coarsest, and sleeps the least of the family? She never puts herself forward in company unless her young ladies want backing; but yet she never feels herself overlooked, for every word, every glance bestowed upon them, is communicated electrically to her. She is, indeed, in such perfect _rapport_ with the concern, that it is no uncommon thing for her to go home chuckling with amusement, overpowered with delight, from a party at which she had not once opened her lips. This is the party which she pronounces to have "gone off" well. Half-observant people fancy that the calculation is made on the score of the jellies and ice, and singing and dancing, and so on, and influenced by a secret comparison with her own achievements; but she has more depth than they imagine, and finer sympathies--they don't understand her.

Not that the every-day married lady is unsocial--not at all: all comfortable people are social; but she is partial to her own class, and does not care to carry her confidences out of it. She has several intimate friends whom she is fond of meeting; but besides that, she is a sort of freemason in her way, and finds out every-day people by the word and sign. Rank has very little to do with this society, as you will find if you observed her sitting at a cottage door, where, in purchasing a draught of milk, she has recognized a sister. If these two every-day married women had been rocked in the same cradle, they could not talk more intimately; and, indeed, they have heavy matters to talk about, for of all the babies that ever came into this breathing world, theirs were the most extraordinary babies. The miracle is, that any of them are extant after such outrageous measles, and scarlet fevers, and chicken-poxes--prophesied of, so to speak, even before their birth, by memorabilia that might have alarmed Dr. Simson. The interlocutors part very well pleased with each other: the cottager proud to find that she has so much in common with a real lady, and the lady pronouncing the reflection of herself she had met with to be a most sensible individual.

Although careless in this instance of the circumstance of rank, the every-day married lady has but little sympathy with the class of domestic servants. She looks upon her servants, in fact, as in some sort her natural enemies, and her life may therefore be said to be passed at the best in a state of armed neutrality. She commonly proceeds on the allowance system; and this is the best way, as it prevents so many sickening apprehensions touching that leg of mutton. Indeed the appetite of servants is a constant puzzle to her: she can not make it out. She has a sharp eye, too, upon the policeman, and wonders what on earth he always looks down her area for. As for followers, that is quite out of the question. Servants stay long enough upon their errands to talk to all the men and women in the parish; and the idea of having an acquaintance now and then besides--more especially of the male sex--tramping into the kitchen to see them, is wildly unnatural. She tells of a sailor whom she once detected sitting in the coolest possible manner by the fireside. When she appeared, the man rose up and bowed--and then sat down again. Think of that! The artful girl said he was her brother!--and here all the every-day married ladies in the company laugh bitterly. Since that time she has been haunted by a sailor, and smells tar in all sorts of places.

If she ever has a passable servant, whom she is able to keep for a reasonable number of years, she gets gradually attached to her, and pets and coddles her. Betty is a standing testimony to her nice discrimination, and a perpetual premium on her successful rearing of servants. But alas! the end of it all is, that the respectable creature gets married to the green grocer, and leaves her indulgent mistress: a striking proof of the heartlessness and ingratitude of the whole tribe! If it is not marriage, however, that calls her away, but bad health; if she goes home unwell, or is carried to the infirmary--what then? Why, then, we are sorry to say, she passes utterly away from the observation and memory of the every-day married lady. This may be reckoned a bad trait in her character; and yet it is in some degree allied to the great virtue of her life. Servants are the evil principle in her household, which it is her business to combat and hold in obedience. A very large proportion of her time is spent in this virtuous warfare; and success on her part ought to be considered deserving of the gratitude of the vanquished, without imposing burdens upon the victor.

The every-day married lady is the inventor of a thing which few foreign nations have as yet adopted either in their houses or languages. This thing is Comfort. The word can not well be defined, the items that enter into its composition being so numerous, that a description would read like a catalogue. We all understand, however, what it means, although few of us are sensible of the source of the enjoyment. A widower has very little comfort, and a bachelor none at all; while a married man--provided his wife be an every-day married lady--enjoys it in perfection. But he enjoys it unconsciously, and therefore ungratefully: it is a thing of course--a necessary, a right, of the want of which he complains without being distinctly sensible of its presence. Even when it acquires sufficient intensity to arrest his attention, when his features and his heart soften, and he looks round with a half smile on his face, and says, "This is comfort!" it never occurs to him to inquire where it all comes from. His every-day wife is sitting quietly in the corner: it was not she who lighted the fire, or dressed the dinner, or drew the curtains, and it never occurs to him to think that all these, and a hundred other circumstances of the moment, owe their virtue to her spiriting, and that the comfort which enriches the atmosphere, which sparkles in the embers, which broods in the shadowy parts of the room, which glows in his own full heart, emanates from her, and encircles her like an aureola. We have suggested, on a former occasion, that our conventional notions of the sex, in its gentle, modest, and retiring characteristics, are derived from the every-day young lady; and in like manner we venture to opine that the every-day married lady is _the_ English wife of foreigners and moralists. Thus she is a national character, and a personage of history; and yet there she sits all the while in that corner, knitting something or other, and thinking to herself that she had surely smelt a puff of tar as she was passing the pantry.

The curious thing is, that the dispenser of comfort can do with a very small share of it herself. When her husband does not dine at home, it is surprising what odds and ends are sufficient to make up the dinner. Perhaps the best part of it is a large slice of bread-and-butter; for it is wasting the servants' time to make them cook when there is _nobody_ to be at the table. But she makes up for this at tea: that _is_ a comfortable meal for the every-day married lady. The husband, a matter-of-fact, impassive fellow, swallows down his two or three cups in utter unconsciousness of the poetry of the occasion; while the wife pauses on every sip, drinks in the aroma as well as the infusion, fills slowly and lingeringly out, and creams and sugars as if her hands dallied over a labor of love. With her daughters, in the mean time, grown up, or even half-grown up, she exchanges words and looks of motherly and masonic intelligence: she is moulding them to comfort, initiating them in every-dayism; and as their heads bend companionably toward each other, you see at a glance that the girls will do honor to their breeding. The husband calls this "dawdling," and already begins to fret. Let him: he knows nothing about it.

It is surprising the affection of the daughters for their every-day mother. Not that the sentiment is steady and uniform in its expression, for sometimes one might suppose mamma to be forgotten, or at least considered only as a daily necessary not requiring any special notice. But wait till a grief comes, and mark to what bosom the panting girl flies for refuge and comfort; see with what _abandon_ she flings her arms round that maternal neck, and with what a passionate burst the hitherto repressed tears gush forth. This is something more than habit, something more than filial trust. There are more senses than five in human nature--or seven either: there is a fine and subtle link between these two beings--a common atmosphere of thought and feeling, impalpable and imperceptible, yet necessary to the souls of both. If you doubt it--if you doubt that there is a moral attraction in the every-day married lady, irrespective of blood-affinity, carry your view forward to another generation, and interrogate those witnesses who are never mistaken in character, and who never give false testimony--little children. They dote on their every-day grandmamma. Their natures, not yet seared and hardened by the world, understand hers; and with something of the fresh perfume of Eden about them still, they recognize instinctively those blessed souls to whom God has given to love little children.

This is farther shown when the every-day married lady dies. What is there in the character we have drawn to account for the shock the whole family receives? The husband feels as if a thunder-cloud had fallen, and gathered, and blackened upon his heart, through which he could never again see the sun. The grown-up children, especially the females, are distracted; "their purposes are broken off;" they desire to have nothing more to do with the world: they lament as those who will not be comforted. Even common acquaintances look round them, when they enter the house, with uneasiness and anxiety--

"We miss her when the morning calls,
As one that mingled in our mirth:
We miss her when the evening falls--
A trifle wanted on the earth!

"Some fancy small, or subtle thought,
Is checked ere to its blossom grown;
Some chain is broken that we wrought,
Now--she hath flown!"

And so she passes away--this every-day married lady--leaving memorials of her commonplace existence every where throughout the circle in which she lived, moved, and had her being, and after having stamped herself permanently upon the constitution, both moral and physical, of her descendants.

ANECDOTE OF A SINGER.

Signora Grassini, the great Italian singer, died a few months since at Milan. She was distinguished not only for her musical talents, but also for her beauty and powers of theatrical expression. One evening in 1810, she and Signor Crescentini performed together at the Tuileries, and sang in "Romeo and Juliet." At the admirable scene in the third act, the Emperor Napoleon applauded vociferously, and Talma, the great tragedian, who was among the audience, wept with emotion. After the performance was ended, the Emperor conferred the decoration of a high order on Crescentini, and sent Grassini a scrap of paper, on which was written, "Good for 20,000 livres.--NAPOLEON."

"Twenty thousand francs!" said one of her friends--"the sum is a large one."

"It will serve as a dowry for one of my little nieces," replied Grassini quietly.

Indeed few persons were ever more generous, tender, and considerate toward their family than this great singer.

Many years afterward, when the Empire had crumbled into dust, carrying with it in its fall, among other things, the rich pension of Signora Grassini, she happened to be at Bologna. There another of her nieces was for the first time presented to her, with a request that she would do something for her young relative. The little girl was extremely pretty, but not, her friends thought, fitted for the stage, as her voice was a feeble contralto. Her aunt asked her to sing; and when the timid voice had sounded a few notes, "Dear child," said Grassini, embracing her, "you will not want _me_ to assist you. Those who called your voice a contralto were ignorant of music. You have one of the finest sopranos in the world, and will far excel me as a singer. Take courage, and work hard, my love: your throat will win a shower of gold." The young girl did not disappoint her aunt's prediction. She still lives, and her name is Giulia Grisi.

[From Chambers's Edinburgh Journal.]

WHEN THE SUMMER COMES.

I once knew a little boy, a little child of three years old; one of those bright creatures whose fair loveliness seems more of heaven than of earth--even at a passing glimpse stirring our hearts, and filling them with purer and holier thought. But this, the little Francie, was more of a cherub than an angel,--as we picture them--with his gladsome hazel eyes, his dazzling fairness, his clustering golden hair, and his almost winged step. Such he was, at least, until sickness laid its heavy hand on him; then, indeed, when, after days of burning, wasting fever--hours of weary restlessness--the little hand at last lay motionless outside the scarcely whiter coverlet of his tiny bed, the fair, still head, pressed down upon the pillow, and the pale face gazing with the silent wonder of returning consciousness on the anxious ones around it; then, indeed, a bright yet pitying look would flit across it, or dwell in the earnest eyes--a look such as we assign to angels in our dreams, when some fond fancy seems to bring them near us, weeping for mortal griefs beyond their remedy.

It was a strange sickness for one so young--the struggle of typhus fever with a baby frame; but life and youth obtained the victory; and quicker even than hope could venture to expect, the pulses rallied, the cheeks grew round and rosy, and the little wasted limbs filled up again. Health was restored--health, but not strength: we thought this for a while. We did not wonder that the weakened limbs refused their office, and still we waited on in hope, until days, and even weeks, passed by: then it was found that the complaint had left its bitter sting, and little Francie could not walk a step, or even stand.

Many and tedious and painful were the remedies resorted to; yet the brave little heart bore stoutly up, with that wonderful fortitude, almost heroism, which all who have watched by suffering childhood, when the tractable spirit bends to its early discipline, must at some time or other have remarked. Francie's fortitude might have afforded an example to many; but a dearer lesson was given in the hopeful spirit with which the little fellow himself noted the effect of each distressing remedy, marking each stage of progress, and showing off with eager gladness every step attained, from the first creeping on the hands and knees, to the tiptoe journey round the room, holding on by chairs and tables; then to the clinging to some loving hand; and then, at last, the graceful balancing of his light body, until he stood quite erect alone, and so moved slowly on.

It was in autumn this illness seized on the little one, just when the leaves were turning, and the orchard fruits becoming ripe. His nurse attributed it all to his sitting on a grassy bank at play on one of those uncertain autumn days; but he, in his childish way, always maintained "It was Francie himself--eating red berries in the holly bower." However this may have been, the season and the time seemed indelibly impressed upon his mind. In all his long confinement to the house, his thoughts continually turned to outward objects, to the external face of nature and the season's change, and evermore his little word of hope was this, "When the _summer_ comes!"

He kept it up throughout the long winter, and the bleak cold spring. A fairy little carriage had been provided for him, in which, well wrapped up from the cold, and resting on soft cushions, he was lightly drawn along by a servant, to his own great delight, and the admiration of many a young beholder. But when any one--attempting to reconcile him the better to his position--expatiated on the beauty or comfort of his new acquisition, his eager look and word would show how far he went beyond it, as, quickly interrupting, he would exclaim, "Wait till the summer comes--then Francie will walk again!"

During the winter there was a fearful storm, it shook the windows, moaned in the old trees, and howled down the chimneys with a most menacing voice. Older hearts than Francie's quailed that night, and he, unable to sleep, lay listening to it all--quiet, but asking many a question, as his excited fancy formed similitudes to the sounds. One time it was poor little children cruelly turned out, and wailing; then something trilling, with its last hoarse cry; then wolves and bears, from far-off other lands. But all the while Francie knew he was snug and safe himself: no fears disturbed him, whatever the noise may have done. Throughout the whole of it he carried his one steadfast hope, and, in the morning telling of it all, with all his marvelous thoughts, he finished his relation with the never-failing word of comfort, "Ah! there shall be no loud wind, no waking nights, when once the summer comes!"

The summer came with its glad birds and flowers, its balmy air; and who can paint the exquisite delight of the suffering child that had waited for it so long? Living almost continually in the open air he seemed to expect fresh health and strength from each reviving breath he drew, and every day would deem himself capable of some greater effort, as if to prove that his expectation had not been in vain.

One lovely day he and his little playfellows were in a group amusing themselves in part of the garden, when some friends passed through. Francie, longing to show how much he could do, entreated hard to be taken with them "along the walk, just to the holly bower." His request was granted, and on he did walk; quick at first, then slowly slower: but still upheld by his strong faith in the summer's genial influence, he would not rest in any of the offered arms, though the fitful color went and came, and the pauses grew more and more frequent. No, with a heavy sigh he admitted, "'Tis a very, very long walk _now_; but Francie must not be tired: sure the summer is come." And so, determined not to admit fatigue in the face of the season's bright proofs around him, he succeeded in accomplishing his little task at last.

Thus the summer passed away, and again came the changing autumn, acting on poor little Francie to a degree he had never reckoned on, and with its chill, damp airs, nearly throwing him back again. With a greater effort even than before, he had again tried the walk to the holly bower, the scene of his self-accusing misdemeanor as the cause of all his sufferings. He sat down to rest; above his head, as the autumnal breeze swept through them, "the polished leaves and berries red did rustling play;" and as little Francie looked upward toward them, a memory of the former year, and of all the time that had passed since then, seemed for the first time mournfully to steal over his heart. He nestled in closer to his mother's side; and still looking up, but with more thoughtful eyes, he said, "Mamma, is the summer _quite_ gone?"

"Yes, my darling. Don't you see the scarlet berries, the food of winter for the little birds?"

"Quite gone, mamma, and Francie not quite well?"

His mother looked away; she could not bear her child to see the tell-tale tears his mournful little words called up, or know the sad echo returned by her own desponding thoughts. There was a moment's silence, only broken by the blackbird's song; and then she felt a soft, a little kiss, upon her hand, and looking down, she saw her darling's face--yes, surely now it was as an angel's--gazing upward to her, brightly beaming, brighter than ever; and his rosy lips just parted with their own sweet smile again, as he exclaimed in joyous tones, "Mamma, the summer will come again!"

Precious was that heaven-born word of childish faith to the careworn mother, to cheer her then, and, with its memory of hope, still to sustain her through many an after-experiment and anxious watch, until, at last, she reaped her rich reward in the complete realization of her bright one's hope. Precious to more than her such words may be, if bravely stemming our present trouble, whatsoe'er it be--bravely enduring, persevering, encouraging others and ourselves, even as that little child--we hold the thought, that as the revolving year brings round its different seasons, as day succeeds to night--and even as surely as we look for this, and know it--so to the trusting heart there comes a time--it may be soon or late, it may be now, or it may be _then_--when this grief or grievance will have passed away; and so 'twill all seem nothing--when the summer comes!

[From Chambers's Edinburgh Journal.]

VILLAINY OUTWITTED--FROM THE RECOLLECTIONS OF A POLICE OFFICER.

The respectable agent of a rather eminent French house arrived one morning in great apparent distress at Scotland Yard, and informed the superintendent that he had just sustained a great, almost ruinous loss, in notes of the Bank of England, and commercial bills of exchange, besides a considerable sum in gold. He had, it appeared, been absent in Paris about ten days, and on his return but a few hours previously, discovered that his iron chest had been completely rifled during his absence. False keys must have been used, as the empty chest was found locked, and no sign of violence could be observed. He handed in full written details of the property carried off, the numbers of the notes, and every other essential particular. The first step taken was to ascertain if any of the notes had been tendered at the bank. Not one had been presented; payment was of course stopped, and advertisements descriptive of the bills of exchange, as well as of the notes, were inserted in the evening and following morning papers. A day or two afterward, a considerable reward was offered for such information as might lead to the apprehension of the offenders. No result followed; and in spite of the active exertions of the officers employed, not the slightest clew could be obtained to the perpetrators of the robbery. The junior partner in the firm, M. Bellebon, in the mean time arrived in England, to assist in the investigation, and was naturally extremely urgent in his inquiries; but the mystery which enveloped the affair remained impenetrable. At last a letter, bearing the St. Martin-le-Grand post-mark, was received by the agent, M. Alexandre le Breton, which contained an offer to surrender the whole of the plunder, with the exception of the gold, for the sum of one thousand pounds. The property which had been abstracted was more than ten times that sum, and had been destined by the French house to meet some heavy liabilities falling due in London very shortly. Le Breton had been ordered to pay the whole amount into Hoare's to the account of the firm, and had indeed been severely blamed for not having done so as he received the different notes and bills; and it was on going to the chest immediately on his return from Paris, for the purpose of fulfilling the peremptory instructions he had received, that M. le Breton discovered the robbery.

The letter went on to state that should the offer be acceded to, a mystically-worded advertisement--of which a copy was inclosed--was to be inserted in the "Times," and then a mode would be suggested for safely--in the interest of the thieves of course--carrying the agreement into effect. M. Bellebon was half-inclined to close with this proposal, in order to save the credit of the house, which would be destroyed unless its acceptances, now due in about fourteen days, could be met; and without the stolen moneys and bills of exchange, this was, he feared, impossible. The superintendent, to whom M. Bellebon showed the letter, would not hear of compliance with such a demand, and threatened a prosecution for composition of felony if M. Bellebon persisted in doing so. The advertisement was, however, inserted, and an immediate reply directed that Le Breton, the agent, should present himself at the Old Manor-House, Green Lanes, Newington, unattended, at four o'clock on the following afternoon, bringing with him of course the stipulated sum _in gold_. It was added, that to prevent any possible treason (_trahison_, the letter was written in French), Le Breton would find a note for him at the tavern, informing him of the spot--a solitary one, and far away from any place where an ambush could be concealed--where the business would be concluded, and to which he must proceed unaccompanied, and on foot! This proposal was certainly quite as ingenious as it was cool, and the chance of out-witting such cunning rascals seemed exceedingly doubtful. A very tolerable scheme was, however, hit upon, and M. le Breton proceeded at the appointed hour to the Old Manor-House. No letter or message had been left for him, and nobody obnoxious to the slightest suspicion could be seen near or about the tavern. On the following day another missive arrived, which stated that the writer was quite aware of the trick which the police had intended playing him, and he assured M. Bellebon that such a line of conduct was as unwise as it would be fruitless, inasmuch as if "good faith" was not observed, the securities and notes would be inexorably destroyed or otherwise disposed of, and the house of Bellebon and Company be consequently exposed to the shame and ruin of bankruptcy.

Just at this crisis of the affair I arrived in town from an unsuccessful hunt after some fugitives who had slipped through my fingers at Plymouth. The superintendent laughed heartily, not so much at the trick by which I had been duped, as at the angry mortification I did not affect to conceal. He presently added, "I have been wishing for your return, in order to intrust you with a tangled affair, in which success will amply compensate for such a disappointment. You know French too, which is fortunate; for the gentleman who has been plundered understands little or no English." He then related the foregoing particulars, with other apparently slight circumstances; and after a long conversation with him, I retired to think the matter over, and decide upon the likeliest mode of action. After much cogitation, I determined to see M. Bellebon _alone_; and for this purpose I dispatched the waiter of a tavern adjacent to his lodgings, with a note expressive of my wish to see him instantly on pressing business. He was at home, and immediately acceded to my request. I easily introduced myself; and after about a quarter of an hour's conference, said carelessly--for I saw he was too heedless of speech, too quick and frank, to be intrusted with the dim suspicions which certain trifling indices had suggested to me--"Is Monsieur le Breton at the office where the robbery was committed?"

"No: he is gone to Greenwich on business, and will not return till late in the evening. But if you wish to re-examine the place, I can of course enable you to do so."

"It will, I think, be advisable; and you will, if you please," I added, as we emerged into the street, "permit me to take you by the arm, in order that the _official_ character of my visit may not be suspected by any one there."

He laughingly complied, and we arrived at the house arm-in-arm. We were admitted by an elderly woman; and there was a young man--a mustached clerk--seated at a desk in an inner room writing. He eyed me for a moment, somewhat askance, I thought, but I gave him no opportunity for a distinct view of my features; and I presently handed M. Bellebon a card, on which I had contrived to write, unobserved, "send away the clerk." This was more naturally done than I anticipated; and in answer to M. Bellebon's glance of inquiry, I merely said, "that as I did not wish to be known there as a police-officer, it was essential that the minute search I was about to make should be without witnesses." He agreed; and the woman was also sent away upon a distant errand. Every conceivable place did I ransack; every scrap of paper that had writing on it I eagerly perused. At length the search was over, apparently without result.

"You are quite sure, Monsieur Bellebon, as you informed the superintendent, that Monsieur le Breton has no female relations or acquaintances in this country?"

"Positive," he replied. "I have made the most explicit inquiries on the subject both of the clerk Dubarle, and of the woman-servant."

Just then the clerk returned, out of breath with haste, I noticed, and I took my leave without even now affording the young gentleman so clear a view of my face as he was evidently anxious to obtain.

"No female acquaintance!" thought I, as I re-entered the private room of the tavern I had left an hour before. "From whom came, then, these scraps of perfumed note-paper I have found in his desk, I wonder?" I sat down and endeavored to piece them out, but after considerable trouble, satisfied myself that they were parts of different notes, and so small, unfortunately, as to contain nothing which separately afforded any information except that they were all written by one hand, and that a female one.

About two hours after this I was sauntering along in the direction of Stoke-Newington, where I was desirous of making some inquiries as to another matter, and had passed the Kingslaw Gate a few hundred yards, when a small discolored printed handbill, lying in a haberdasher's shop window, arrested my attention. It ran thus: "Two guineas reward.--Lost, an Italian gray-hound. The tip of its tail has been chopped off, and it answers to the name of Fidèle." Underneath, the reader was told in writing to "inquire within."

"Fidèle!" I mentally exclaimed. "Any relation to M. le Breton's fair correspondent Fidèle, I wonder?" In a twinkling my pocket-book was out, and I reperused by the gas-light on one of the perfumed scraps of paper the following portion of a sentence, "_ma pauvre Fidèle est per_--" The bill, I observed, was dated nearly three weeks previously. I forthwith entered the shop, and pointing to the bill, said I knew a person who had found such a dog as was there advertised for. The woman at the counter said she was glad to hear it, as the lady, formerly a customer of theirs, was much grieved at the animal's loss.

"What is the lady's name?" I asked.

"I can't rightly pronounce the name," was the reply. "It is French, I believe; but here it is, with the address, in the day-book, written by herself."

I eagerly read--"Madame Levasseur, Oak Cottage; about one mile on the road from Edmonton to Southgate." The handwriting greatly resembled that on the scraps I had taken from M. le Breton's desk; and the writer was French too! Here were indications of a trail which might lead to unhoped-for success, and I determined to follow it up vigorously. After one or two other questions, I left the shop, promising to send the dog to the lady the next day. My business at Stoke-Newington was soon accomplished. I then hastened westward to the establishment of a well-known dog-fancier, and procured the loan, at a reasonable price, of an ugly Italian hound: the requisite loss of the tip of its tail was very speedily accomplished, and so quickly healed, that the newness of the excision could not be suspected. I arrived at the lady's residence about twelve o'clock on the following day, so thoroughly disguised as a vagabond Cockney dog-stealer, that my own wife, when I entered the breakfast parlor just previous to starting, screamed with alarm and surprise. The mistress of Oak Cottage was at home, but indisposed, and the servant said she would take the dog to her, though, if I would take it out of the basket, she herself could tell me if it was Fidèle or not. I replied that I would only show the dog to the lady, and would not trust it out of my hands. This message was carried up-stairs, and after waiting some time outside--for the woman, with natural precaution, considering my appearance, for the safety of the portable articles lying about, had closed the street-door in my face--I was re-admitted, desired to wipe my shoes carefully, and walk up. Madame Levasseur, a showy-looking woman, though not over-refined in speech or manners, was seated on a sofa, in vehement expectation of embracing her dear Fidèle; but my vagabond appearance so startled her, that she screamed loudly for her husband, M. Levasseur. This gentleman, a fine, tall, whiskered, mustached person, hastened into the apartment half-shaved, and with his razor in his hand.

"Qu'est ce qu'il y a donc?" he demanded.

"Mais voyez cette horreur là," replied the lady, meaning me, not the dog, which I was slowly emancipating from the basket-kennel. The gentleman laughed; and reassured by the presence of her husband, Madame Levasseur's anxieties concentrated themselves upon the expected Fidèle.

"Mais, mon Dieu!" she exclaimed again as I displayed the aged beauty I had brought for her inspection, "why, that is not Fidèle!"

"Not, marm?" I answered, with quite innocent surprise. "Vy, ere is her wery tail;" and I held up the mutilated extremity for her closer inspection. The lady was not, however, to be convinced even by that evidence; and as the gentleman soon became impatient of my persistence, and hinted very intelligibly that he had a mind to hasten my passage down stairs with the toe of his boot, I, having made the best possible use of my eyes during the short interview, scrambled up the dog and basket, and departed.

"No female relative or acquaintance hasn't he?" was my exulting thought as I gained the road. "And yet if that is not M. le Breton's picture between those of the husband and wife, I am a booby, and a blind one." I no longer in the least doubted that I had struck a brilliant trail; and I could have shouted with exultation, so eager was I not only to retrieve my, as I fancied, somewhat tarnished reputation for activity and skill, but to extricate the plundered firm from their terrible difficulties; the more especially as young M. Bellebon, with the frankness of his age and nation, had hinted to me--and the suddenly-tremulous light of his fine expressive eyes testified to the acuteness of his apprehensions--that his marriage with a long-loved and amiable girl depended upon his success in saving the credit of his house.

That same evening, about nine o'clock, M. Levasseur, expensively, but withal snobbishly attired, left Oak Cottage, walked to Edmonton, hailed a cab, and drove off rapidly toward town, followed by an English swell as stylishly and snobbishly dressed, wigged, whiskered, and mustached as himself: this English swell being no other than myself, as prettily metamorphosed and made up for the part I intended playing as heart could wish.

M. Levasseur descended at the end of the Quadrant, Regent-street, and took his way to Vine-street, leading out of that celebrated thoroughfare. I followed; and observing him enter a public-house, unhesitatingly did the same. It was a house of call and general rendezvous for foreign servants out of place. Valets, couriers, cooks, of many varieties of shade, nation, and respectability, were assembled there, smoking, drinking, and playing at an insufferably noisy game, unknown, I believe, to Englishmen, and which must, I think, have been invented in sheer despair of cards, dice, or other implements of gambling. The sole instruments of play were the gamesters' fingers, of which the two persons playing suddenly and simultaneously uplifted as many, or as few as they pleased, each player alternately calling a number; and if he named precisely how many fingers were held up by himself and opponent, he marked a point. The hubbub of cries--"cinq," "neuf," "dix," &c.--was deafening. The players--almost every body in the large room--were too much occupied to notice our entrance; and M. Levasseur and myself seated ourselves, and called for something to drink, without, I was glad to see, exciting the slightest observation. M. Levasseur, I soon perceived, was an intimate acquaintance of many there; and somewhat to my surprise, for he spoke French very well, I found that he was a Swiss. His name was, I therefore concluded, assumed. Nothing positive rewarded my watchfulness that evening; but I felt quite sure Levasseur had come there with the expectation of meeting some one, as he did not play, and went away about half-past eleven o'clock with an obviously discontented air. The following night it was the same; but the next, who should peer into the room about half-past ten, and look cautiously round, but M. Alexandre le Breton! The instant the eyes of the friends met, Levasseur rose and went out. I hesitated to follow, lest such a movement might excite suspicion; and it was well I did not, as they both presently returned, and seated themselves close by my side. The anxious, haggard countenance of Le Breton--who had, I should have before stated, been privately pointed out to me by one of the force early on the morning I visited Oak Cottage--struck me forcibly, especially in contrast with that of Levasseur, which wore only an expression of malignant and ferocious triumph, slightly dashed by temporary disappointment. Le Breton staid but a short time; and the only whispered words I caught were--"He has, I fear, some suspicion."

The anxiety and impatience of M. Bellebon while this was going on became extreme, and he sent me note after note--the only mode of communication I would permit--expressive of his consternation at the near approach of the time when the engagements of his house would arrive at maturity, without any thing having in the meantime been accomplished. I pitied him greatly, and after some thought and hesitation, resolved upon a new and bolder game. By affecting to drink a great deal, occasionally playing, and in other ways exhibiting a reckless, devil-may-care demeanor, I had striven to insinuate myself into the confidence and companionship of Levasseur, but hitherto without much effect; and although once I could see, startled by a casual hint I dropped to another person--one of ours--just sufficiently loud for him to hear--that I knew a sure and safe market for stopped Bank of England notes, the cautious scoundrel quickly subsided into his usual guarded reserve. He evidently doubted me, and it was imperatively necessary to remove those doubts. This was at last effectually, and, as I am vain enough to think, cleverly done. One evening a rakish-looking man, who ostentatiously and repeatedly declared himself to be Mr. Trelawney, of Conduit-street, and who was evidently three parts intoxicated, seated himself directly in front of us, and with much braggart impudence boasted of his money, at the same time displaying a pocket-book, which seemed pretty full of Bank of England notes. There were only a few persons present in the room besides us, and they were at the other end of the room. Levasseur I saw noticed with considerable interest the look of greed and covetousness which I fixed on that same pocket-book. At length the stranger rose to depart. I also hurried up and slipped after him, and was quietly and slyly followed by Levasseur. After proceeding about a dozen paces, I looked furtively about, but _not_ behind; robbed Mr. Trelawney of his pocket-book, which he had placed in one of the tails of his coat; crossed over the street, and walked hurriedly away, still, I could hear, followed by Levasseur. I entered another public-house, strode into an empty back-room, and was just in the act of examining my prize, when in stepped Levasseur. He looked triumphant as Lucifer, as he clapped me on the shoulder, and said in a low exulting voice, "I saw that pretty trick, Williams, and can, if I like, transport you!"

My consternation was naturally extreme, and Levasseur laughed immensely at the terror he excited. "_Soyez tranquille_," he said at last, at the same time ringing the bell, "I shall not hurt you." He ordered some wine, and after the waiter had fulfilled the order, and left the room, said, "Those notes of Mr. Trelawney's will of course be stopped in the morning, but I think I once heard you say you knew of a market for such articles?"

I hesitated, coyly unwilling to further commit myself. "Come, come," resumed Levasseur, in a still low but menacing tone, "no nonsense. I have you now; you are, in fact, entirely in my power: but be candid, and you are safe. Who is your friend?"

"He is not in town now," I stammered.

"Stuff--humbug! I have myself some notes to change. There, now we understand each other. What does he give, and how does he dispose of them?"

"He gives about a third generally, and gets rid of them abroad. They reach the Bank through _bonâ-fide_ and innocent holders, and in that case the Bank is of course bound to pay."

"Is that the law also with respect to bills of exchange?"

"Yes, to be sure it is."

"And is _amount_ of any consequence to your friend?"

"None, I believe, whatever."

"Well, then, you must introduce me to him."

"No, that I can't," I hurriedly answered. "He won't deal with strangers."

"You _must_, I tell you, or I will call an officer." Terrified by this threat, I muttered that his name was Levi Samuel.

"And where does Levi Samuel live?"

"That," I replied, "I _can not_ tell; but I know how to communicate with him."

Finally, it was settled by Levasseur that I should dine at Oak Cottage the next day but one, and that I should arrange with Samuel to meet us there immediately afterward. The notes and bills he had to dispose of, I was to inform Samuel, amounted to nearly twelve thousand pounds, and I was promised £500 for effecting the bargain.

"Five hundred pounds, remember, Williams," said Levasseur, as we parted; "or, if you deceive me, transportation. You can prove nothing regarding _me_, whereas, I could settle _you_ offhand."

The superintendent and I had a long and rather anxious conference the next day. We agreed that, situated as Oak Cottage was, in an open space away from any other building, it would not be advisable that any officer except myself and the pretended Samuel should approach the place. We also agreed as to the probability of such clever rogues having so placed the notes and bills that they could be consumed or otherwise destroyed on the slightest alarm, and that the open arrest of Levasseur, and a search of Oak Cottage, would in all likelihood prove fruitless. "There will be only two of them," I said, in reply to a remark of the superintendent as to the somewhat dangerous game I was risking with powerful and desperate men, "even should Le Breton be there; and surely Jackson and I, aided by the surprise and our pistols, will be too many for them." Little more was said, the superintendent wished us luck, and I sought out and instructed Jackson.

I will confess that, on setting out the next day to keep my appointment, I felt considerable anxiety. Levasseur _might_ have discovered my vocation, and set this trap for my destruction. Yet that was hardly possible. At all events, whatever the danger, it was necessary to face it; and having cleaned and loaded my pistols with unusual care, and bade my wife a more than usually earnest farewell, which, by the way, rather startled her, I set off, determined, as we used to say in Yorkshire, "to win the horse or lose the saddle."

I arrived in good time at Oak Cottage, and found my host in the highest possible spirits. Dinner was ready, he said, but it would be necessary to wait a few minutes for the two friends he expected.

"_Two_ friends!" I exclaimed, really startled. "You told me last evening there was to be only one, a Monsieur le Breton."