LITTLE CLASSICS 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 KOSSITER JOHNSON 
 
 STORIES OF 
 FORTUNE 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 
 re0$ Cambribge 
 1914
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1875, BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO. 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGM 
 THE GOLD-BUG Edgar Allan Foe ... 7 
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER Samuel Loner ... 58 
 
 . MURAD THE UNLUCKY . . . Maria Edgeworth . . 86 
 
 THE CHILDREN OP THE PUBLIC Edward Everett Hale 134 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS . . . JohnBanim . . . 179 
 THE THREEFOLD DESTINY . . Nathaniel Hawthorne . 204
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 
 
 BY EDGAR ALLAN POE. 
 
 What ho ! what ho ! this fellow is dancing mad ! 
 He hath been bitten by the Tarantula. 
 
 All in the Wra*g. 
 
 years ago I contracted an intimacy with a 
 Mr. William Legrand. He was of an ancient 
 Huguenot family, and had once been wealthy ; 
 but a series of misfortunes had reduced him to want. 
 To avoid the mortification consequent upon his disasters, 
 he left New Orleans, the city of his forefathers, and 
 took up his residence at Sullivan's Island, near Charles- 
 ton, South Carolina. 
 
 This island is a very singular one. It consists of 
 little else than the sea-sand, and is about three miles 
 long. Its breadth at no point exceeds a quarter of a 
 mile. It is separated from the mainland by a scarcely 
 perceptible creek oozing its way through a wilderness of 
 reeds and slime, a favorite resort of the marsh-hen. The 
 vegetation, as might be supposed, is scant, or at least 
 dwarfish. No trees of any magnitude are to be seen. 
 Near the western extremity, where Port Moultrie stands, 
 and where are some miserable frame buildings, tenanted,
 
 8 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 during summer, by the fugitives from Charleston dust 
 and fever, may be found, indeed, the bristly palmetto; 
 but the whole island, with the exception of this western 
 point, and a line of hard, white beach on the sea-coast, 
 is covered with a dense undergrowth of the sweet myrtle, 
 so much prized by the horticulturists of England. The 
 shrub here often attains the height of fifteen or twenty 
 feet, and forms an almost impenetrable coppice, burden- 
 ing the air with its fragrance. 
 
 In the inmost recesses of this coppice, not far from 
 the eastern or more remote end of the island, Legrand 
 had built himself a small hut, which he occupied when 
 I first, by mere accident, made his acquaintance. This 
 soon ripened into friendship, for there was much in 
 the recluse to excite interest and esteem. I found him 
 well educated, with unusual powers of mind, but in- 
 fected with misanthropy, and subject to perverse moods 
 of alternate enthusiasm and melancholy. He had with 
 him many books, but rarely employed them. His chief 
 amusements were gunning and fishing, or sauntering 
 along the beach and through the myrtles, in quest of 
 shells or entomological specimens ; his collection of 
 the latter might have been envied by a Swammer- 
 dam. In these excursions he was usually accompanied 
 by an old negro, called Jupiter, who had been manu- 
 mitted before the reverses of the family, but who could 
 be induced, neither by threats nor by promises, to aban- 
 don what he considered his right of attendance upon the 
 footsteps of his young " Massa Will." It is not improb- 
 able that the relatives of Legrand, conceiving him to be 
 somewhat unsettled in intellect, had contrived to instil
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 9 
 
 this obstinacy into Jupiter, with a view to the supervis- 
 ion and guardianship of the wanderer. 
 
 The winters in the latitude of Sullivan's Island are 
 seldom very severe, and in the fall of the year it is a 
 rare event indeed when a fire is considered necessary. 
 About the middle of October, 18 , there occurred, how- 
 ever, a day of remarkable chilliness. Just before sun- 
 set I scrambled my way through the evergreens to the 
 hut of my friend, whom I had not visited for several 
 weeks, my residence being, at that time, in Charleston, 
 a distance of nine miles from the island, while the fa- 
 cilities of passage and re-passage were very far behind 
 those of the present day. Upon reaching the hut I 
 rapped, as was my custom, and getting no reply, sought 
 for the key where I knew it was secreted, unlocked 
 the door, and went in. A fine fire was blazing upon the 
 hearth. It was a novelty, and by no means an ungrate- 
 ful one. I threw off an overcoat, took an arm-chair by 
 the crackling logs, and awaited patiently the arrival of 
 my hosts. 
 
 Soon after dark they arrived, and gave me a most 
 cordial welcome. Jupiter, grinning from ear to ear, 
 bustled about to prepare some marsh-hens for supper. 
 Legrand was in one of his fits how else shall I term 
 them ? of enthusiasm. He had found an unknown 
 bivalve, forming a new genus, and, more than this, he 
 had hunted down and secured, with Jupiter's assistance, 
 a scarabeeus which he believed to be totally new, but in 
 respect to which he wished to have my opinion on the 
 morrow. 
 
 " And why not to-night ? " I asked, rubbing my hands 
 1*
 
 10 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 over the blaze, and wishing the whole tribe of scarabeet 
 at the devil. 
 
 "Ah, if I had only known you were here ! " said Le- 
 grand, " but it 's so long since I saw you ; and how 
 could I foresee that you would pay me a visit this very 
 night of all others? As I was coming home I met 
 
 Lieutenant G , from the fort, and, very foolishly, 
 
 I lent him the bug ; so it will be impossible for you to 
 see it until the morning. Stay here to-night, and I will 
 send Jup down for it at sunrise. It is the loveliest 
 thing in creation ! " 
 
 "What? sunrise?" 
 
 " Nonsense ! no ! the bug. It is of a brilliant gold 
 color, about the size of a large hickory-nut, with two 
 jet-black spots near one extremity of the back, and 
 another, somewhat longer, at the other. The antenna 
 are " 
 
 " Dey aint no tin in him, Massa Will, I keep a tellin 
 on you," here interrupted Jupiter ; " de bug is a 
 goole-bug, solid, ebery bit of him, inside and all, sep 
 nim wing, neber feel half so hebby a bug in my 
 life." 
 
 "Well, suppose it is, Jup," replied Legrand, some- 
 what more earnestly, it seemed to me, than the case 
 demanded, " is that any reason for your letting the birds 
 burn ? The color " here he turned to me "is really 
 almost enough to warrant Jupiter's idea. You never 
 saw a more brilliant metallic lustre than the scales emit, 
 but of this you cannot judge till to-morrow. In the 
 mean time I can give you some idea of the shape." 
 Saying this, he seated himself at a small table, on which
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 11 
 
 were a pen and ink, but no paper. He looked for some 
 in a drawer, but found none. 
 
 " Never mind," said he at length, " this will answer " ; 
 and he drew from his waistcoat-pocket a scrap of what 
 I took to be very dirty foolscap, and made upon it a 
 rough drawing with the pen. While he did this, I re- 
 tained my seat by the fire, for I was still chilly. When 
 the design was complete, he handed it to me without 
 rising. As I received it, a loud growl was heard, suc- 
 ceeded by a scratching at the door. Jupiter opened it, 
 and a large Newfoundland, belonging to Legrand, rushed 
 in, leaped upon my shoulders, and loaded me with ca- 
 resses ; for I had shown him much attention during pre- 
 vious visits. When his gambols were over, I looked at 
 the paper, and, to speak the truth, found myself not a 
 , little puzzled at what my friend had depicted. 
 
 " Well ! " I said, after contemplating it for some min- 
 utes, " this is a strange scarabeeus, I must confess : new 
 to me: never saw anything like it before, unless it 
 was a skull, or a death's-head, which it more nearly 
 resembles than anything else that has come under my 
 observation." 
 
 " A death's-head ! " echoed Legrand "0 yes 
 well, it has something of that appearance upon paper, 
 no doubt. The two upper black spots look like eyes, 
 eh ? and the longer one at the bottom like a mouth, 
 and then the shape of the whole is oval." 
 
 " Perhaps so," said I ; " but, Legrand, I fear you 
 are no artist. I must wait until I see the beetle itself, if 
 I am to form any idea of its personal appearance." 
 
 " Well, I don't know," said he, a little nettled, " I
 
 12 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 draw tolerably, should do it at least, have had good 
 masters, and flatter myself that I am not quite a block- 
 head." 
 
 "But, my dear fellow, you are joking, then," said I, 
 " this is a very passable skull, indeed, I may say that 
 it is a very excellent skull, according to the vulgar no- 
 tions about such specimens of physiology, and your 
 scarab&us must be the queerest scarabeeus in the world 
 if it resembles it. Why, we may get up a very thrilling 
 bit of superstition upon this hint. I presume you will 
 call the bug scarabceus caput hominis, or something of 
 that kind, there are many similar titles in the Natural 
 Histories. But where are the antenna you spoke of ? " 
 
 " The antennae ! " said Legrand, who seemed to be 
 getting unaccountably warm upon the subject ; " I am 
 sure you must see the antenna. I made them as dis- 
 tinct as they are in the original insect, and I presume 
 that is sufficient." 
 
 "Well, well," I said, "perhaps you have, still I 
 don't see them " ; and I handed him the paper without 
 additional remark, not wishing to ruffle his temper ; but 
 I was much surprised at the turn affairs had taken ; his 
 ill-humor puzzled me; and, as for the drawing of the 
 beetle, there were positively no antenna visible, and the 
 whole did bear a very close resemblance to the ordinary 
 cuts of a death's-head. 
 
 He received the paper very peevishly, and was about 
 to crumple it, apparently to throw it in the fire, when a 
 casual glance at the design seemed suddenly to rivet 
 his attention. In an instant his face grew violently red, 
 in another as excessively pale. For some minutes he
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 13 
 
 continued to scrutinize the drawing minutely where he 
 sat. At length he arose, took a candle from the table, 
 and proceeded to seat himself upon a sea-chest in the 
 farthest corner of the room. Here again he made an 
 anxious examination of the paper, turning it in all di- 
 rections. He said nothing, however, and his conduct 
 greatly astonished me ; yet I thought it prudent not to 
 exacerbate the growing moodiness of his temper by any 
 comment. Presently he took from his coat-pocket a 
 wallet, placed the paper carefully in it, and deposited 
 both in a writing-desk, which he locked. He now grew 
 more composed in his demeanor ; but his original air of 
 enthusiasm had quite disappeared. Yet he seemed not 
 so much sulky as abstracted. As the evening wore away 
 he became more and more absorbed in revery, from 
 which no sallies of mine could arouse him. It had been 
 my intention to pass the night at the hut, as I had fre- 
 quently done before, but, seeing my host in this mood, 
 I deemed it proper to take leave. He did not press me 
 to remain, but, as I departed, he shook my hand with 
 even more than his usual cordiality. 
 
 It was about a month after this (and during the in- 
 terval I had seen nothing of Legrand) when I received 
 a visit, at Charleston, from his man, Jupiter. I had 
 never seen the good old negro look so dispirited, and 
 I feared that some serious disaster had befallen my 
 friend. 
 
 "Well, Jup," said I, "what is the matter now? 
 how is your master ? " 
 
 "Why, to speak de troof, massa, him not so berry 
 veil as mought be."
 
 14 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Not well ! I am truly sorry to hear it. What does 
 he complain of ? " 
 
 "Dar! dat's it! him neber plain of notin, but 
 him berry sick for all dat." 
 
 " Very sick, Jupiter ! why did n't you say so at 
 once ? Is he confined to bed ? " 
 
 " No, dat he aint ! he aint find nowhar, dat 's just 
 whar de shoe pinch, my mind is got to be berry 
 hebby bout poor Massa Will." 
 
 " Jupiter, I should like to understand what it is you 
 are talking about. You say your master is sick. Has 
 n't he told you what ails him ? " 
 
 " Why, massa, taint worf while for to git mad about 
 de matter, Massa Will say nofiin at all aint de matter 
 wid him, but den what make him go about looking dis 
 here way, wid he head down and he soldiers up, and 
 as white as a gose ? And den he keep a syphon all de 
 time " 
 
 " Keeps a what, Jupiter ? " 
 
 " Keeps a syphon wid de figgurs on de slate, de 
 queerest figgurs I ebber did see. Ise gittin to be skeered, 
 I tell you. Hab for to keep mighty tight eye pon him 
 noovers. Todder day he gib me slip fore de sun up and 
 was gone de whole ob de blessed day. I had a big 
 stick ready cut for to gib him deuced good beating when 
 he did come, but Ise sich a fool dat I had n't de heart 
 arter all, he look so berry poorly." 
 
 " Eh ? what ? ah yes ! upon the whole I think 
 you had better not be too severe with the poor fellow, 
 don't flog him, Jupiter, he can't very well stand it, 
 but can you form no idea of what has occasioned this
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 15 
 
 illness, or rather this change of conduct ? Has anything 
 unpleasant happened since I saw you ? " 
 
 " No, massa, dey aint bin noffin onpleasant since den, 
 'twas fore den I 'm feared, 't was de berry day you 
 was dare." 
 
 " How ? what do you mean ? " 
 
 " Why, massa, I mean de bug dare now." 
 
 " The what ? " 
 
 " De bug, I 'm berry sartain dat Massa Will bin 
 bit somewhere bout de head by dat goole-bug." 
 
 " And what cause have you, Jupiter, for such a suppo- 
 sition?" 
 
 " Claws enuff, massa, and mouff too. I nebber did see 
 sich a deuced bug, he kick and he bite ebery ting what 
 cum near him. Massa Will cotch him fuss, but had for 
 to let him go gin mighty quick, I tell you den was de 
 time he must ha got de bite. I did n't like de look ob 
 de bug mouff, myself, no how, so I would n't take hold 
 ob him wid my finger, but I cotch him wid a piece ob 
 paper dat I found. I rap him up in de paper and stuff 
 piece ob it in he mouff, dat was de way." 
 
 "And you think, then, that your master was really 
 bitten by the beetle, and that the bite made him sick ? " 
 
 "I don't tink noffin about it, I nose it. What 
 make him dream bout de goole so much, if taint cause he 
 bit by de goole-bug? Ise heerd bout dem goole-bugs 
 fore dis." 
 
 " But how do you know he dreams about gold ? " 
 
 "How I know? why cause he talk about it in he 
 sleep, dat 's how I nose." 
 
 " Well, Jup, perhaps you are right ; but to what for-
 
 16 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 tunate circumstance am I to attribute the honor of a visit 
 
 from you to-day ? " 
 
 "What de matter, massa ? " 
 
 " Did you bring any message from Mr. Legrand ? " 
 
 " No, massa, I bring dis here pissel " ; and here Jupiter 
 
 handed me a note which ran thus : 
 
 MY DEAE : Why have I not seen you for so long a 
 
 time ? I hope you have not been so foolish as to take offence 
 at any little brusquerie of mine ; but no, that is improbable. 
 
 Since I saw you I have had great cause for anxiety. I have 
 something to tell you, yet scarcely know how to tell it, or 
 whether I should tell it at all. 
 
 I have not been quite well for some days past, and poor old 
 Jup annoys me, almost beyond endurance, by his well-meant 
 attentions. Would you believe it ? he had prepared a huge 
 stick, the other day, with which to chastise me for giving him 
 the slip, and spending the day, solus, among the hills on the 
 mainland. I verily believe that my ill looks aloue saved me a 
 
 I have made no addition to my cabinet since we met. 
 
 If you can in any way make it convenient, come over with 
 Jupiter. Do come. I wish to see you to-night, upon business 
 of importance. I assure you that it is of the highest impor- 
 tance. Ever yours, 
 
 WILLIAM LEGRAND. 
 
 There was something in the tone of this note which 
 gave me great uneasiness. Its whole style differed 
 materially from that of Legrand. What could he be 
 dreaming of? What new crotchet possessed his excita- 
 ble brain ? What " business of the highest importance " 
 could he possibly have to transact? Jupiter's account
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 17 
 
 of him boded no good. I dreaded lest the continued 
 pressure of misfortune had, at length, fairly unsettled the 
 reason of my friend. Without a moment's hesitation, 
 therefore, I prepared to accompany the negro. 
 
 Upon reaching the wharf, I noticed a scythe and three 
 spades, all apparently new, lying in the bottom of the 
 boat in which we were to embark. 
 
 " What is the meaning of all this, Jup ? " I inquired. 
 
 " Him syfe, massa, and spade." 
 
 " Very true ; but what are they doing here ? " 
 
 " Him de syfe and de spade what Massa Will sis pon 
 my buying for him in de town, and de debbil's own lot of 
 money I had to gib for em." 
 
 "But what, in the name of all that is mysterious, 
 is your ' Massa Will ' going to do with scythes and 
 spades ? " 
 
 "Dat's more dan / know, and debbil take me if I 
 don't blieve 't is more dan he know, too. But it 's all 
 cum ob de bug." 
 
 Finding that no satisfaction was to be obtained of 
 Jupiter, whose whole intellect seemed to be absorbed by 
 " de bug," I now stepped into the boat and made sail. 
 With a fair and strong breeze we soon ran into the little 
 cove to the northward of Fort Moultrie, and a walk of 
 some two miles brought us to the hut. It was about 
 three in the afternoon when we arrived. Legrand had 
 been awaiting us in eager expectation. He grasped my 
 hand with a nervous empressement which alarmed me and 
 strengthened the suspicions already entertained. His 
 countenance was pale even to ghastliness, and his deep- 
 set eyes glared with unnatural lustre. After some in- 
 
 B
 
 18 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 quiries respecting his health, I asked him, not knowing 
 what better to say, if he had yet obtained the scarabeeus 
 from Lieutenant G . 
 
 "0 yes," he replied, coloring violently, "I got it 
 from him the next morning. Nothing should tempt me 
 to part with that scarabaus. Do you know that Jupiter 
 is quite right about it ? " 
 
 " In what way ? " I asked, with a sad foreboding at 
 heart. 
 
 " In supposing it to be a bug of real gold." He said 
 this with an air of profound seriousness, and I felt inex- 
 pressibly shocked. 
 
 " This bug is to make my fortune," he continued, with 
 a triumphant smile, " to reinstate me in my family pos- 
 sessions. Is it any wonder, then, that I prize it ? Since 
 Fortune has thought fit to bestow it upon me, I have 
 only to use it properly and I shall arrive at the gold of 
 which it is the index. Jupiter, bring me that scara- 
 
 " What ! de bug, massa ? I M rudder not go fer 
 trubble dat bug, you mus git him for your own self." 
 Hereupon Legrand arose, with a grave and stately air, 
 and brought me the beetle from a glass case in which it 
 was enclosed. It was a beautiful scarabeeus, and, at that 
 time, unknown to naturalists, of course a great prize in 
 a scientific point of view. There were two round black 
 spots near one extremity of the back, and a long one 
 near the other. The scales were exceedingly hard and 
 glossy, with all the appearance of burnished gold. The 
 weight of the insect was very remarkable, and, taking all 
 things into consideration, I could hardly blame Jupiter
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 19 
 
 for his opinion respecting it ; but what to make of Le- 
 grand's concordance with that opinion I could not for 
 the life of me tell. 
 
 " I sent for you," said he, in a grandiloquent tone, 
 when I had completed my examination of the beetle, 
 "I sent for you, that I might have your counsel and 
 assistance in furthering the views of Fate and of the 
 bug-" 
 
 " My dear Legrand," I cried, interrupting him, " you 
 are certainly unwell, and had better use some little pre- 
 cautions. You shall go to bed, and I will remain with 
 you a few days, until you get over this. You are feverish, 
 and " 
 
 " Feel my pulse," said he. 
 
 I felt it, and, to say the truth, found not the slightest 
 indication of fever. 
 
 " But you may be ill and yet have no fever. Allow 
 me this once to prescribe for you. In the first place, go 
 to bed. In the next " 
 
 " You are mistaken," he interposed ; " I am as well as 
 I can expect to be under the excitement which I suffer. 
 If you really wish me well, you will relieve this excite- 
 ment." 
 
 " And how is this to be done ? " 
 
 " Very easily. Jupiter and myself are going upon an 
 expedition into the hills, upon the mainland, and, in this 
 expedition, we shall need the aid of some person in whom 
 we can confide. You are the only one we can trust. 
 Whether we succeed or fail, the excitement which you 
 now perceive in me will be equally allayed." 
 
 " I am anxious to oblige you in any way," I replied ;
 
 20 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " but do you mean to say that this infernal beetle has 
 any connection with your expedition into the hills ? " 
 
 "It has." 
 
 "Then, Legrand, I can become a party to no such 
 absurd proceeding." 
 
 " I am sorry very sorry for we shall have to try 
 it by ourselves." 
 
 " Try it by yourselves ! The man is surely mad ! 
 but stay ! how long do you propose to be absent ? " 
 
 " Probably all night. We shall start immediately, and 
 be back, at all events, by sunrise." 
 
 "And will you promise me, upon your honor, that 
 when this freak of yours is over, and the bug business 
 (good God !) settled to your satisfaction, you will then 
 return home and follow my advice implicitly, as that of 
 your physician ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I promise ; and now let us be off, for we have 
 no time to lose." 
 
 With a heavy heart I accompanied my friend. We 
 started about four o'clock, Legrand, Jupiter, the dog, 
 and myself. Jupiter had with him the scythe and spades, 
 the whole of which he insisted upon carrying, more 
 through fear, it seemed to me, of trusting either of the 
 implements within reach of his master, than from any 
 excess of industry or complaisance. His demeanor was 
 dogged in the extreme, and " dat deuced bug " were the 
 sole words which escaped his lips during the journey. 
 For my own part, I had charge of a couple of dark-lan- 
 terns, while Legrand contented himself with the scara- 
 l<eus, which he carried attached to the end of a bit of 
 whip-cord; twirling it to and fro, with the air of a
 
 THE GOLD-BTJa. 21 
 
 conjurer, as he went. When I observed this last plain 
 evidence of my friend's aberration of mind, I could 
 scarcely refrain from tears. I thought it best, however, 
 to humor his fancy, at least for the present, or until I 
 could adopt some more energetic measures with a chance 
 of success. In the mean time I endeavored, but all in 
 vain, to sound him in regard to the object of the expedi- 
 tion. Having succeeded in inducing me to accompany 
 him, he seemed unwilling to hold conversation upon any 
 topic of minor importance, and to all my questions vouch- 
 safed no other reply than " we shall see ! " 
 
 We crossed the creek at the head of the island by 
 means of a skiff, and, ascending the high grounds on the 
 shore of the mainland, proceeded in a northwesterly 
 direction, through a tract of country excessively wild 
 and desolate, where no trace of a human footstep was to 
 be seen. Legrand led the way with decision ; pausing 
 only for an instant, here and there, to consult what 
 appeared to be certain landmarks of his own contrivance 
 upon a former occasion. 
 
 In this manner we journeyed for about two hours, and 
 the sun was just setting when we entered a region infi- 
 nitely more dreary than any yet seen. It was a species of 
 table-land, near the summit of an almost inaccessible hill, 
 densely wooded from base to pinnacle, and interspersed 
 with huge crags that appeared to lie loosely upon the 
 soil, and in many cases were prevented from precipitating 
 themselves into the valleys below, merely by the support 
 of the trees against which they reclined. Deep ravines, 
 in various directions, gave an air of still sterner solemnity 
 to the scene.
 
 22 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 The natural platform to which we had clambered was 
 thickly overgrown with brambles, through which we soon 
 discovered that it would have been impossible to force 
 our way but for the scythe ; and Jupiter, by direction of 
 his master, proceeded to clear for us a path to the foot 
 of an enormously tall tulip-tree, which stood, with some 
 eight or ten oaks, upon the level, and far surpassed them 
 all, and all other trees which I had then ever seen, in the 
 beauty of its foliage and form, in the wide spread of its 
 branches, and in the general majesty of its appearance. 
 When we reached this tree, Legrand turned to Jupiter, 
 and asked him if he thought he could climb it. The old 
 man seemed a little staggered by the question, and for 
 some moments made no reply. At length he approached 
 the huge trunk, walked slowly around it, and examined 
 it with minute attention. When he had completed his 
 scrutiny, he merely said, 
 
 " Yes, massa, Jup climb any tree he ebber see in he 
 life." 
 
 "Then up with you as soon as possible, for it will 
 soon be too dark to see what we are about." 
 
 " How far mus go up, massa ? " inquired Jupiter. 
 
 " Get up the main trunk first, and then I will you 
 tell you which way to go and here stop ! take this 
 beetle with you." 
 
 " De bug, Massa Will ! de goole-bug ! " cried the 
 negro, drawing back in dismay " what for mus tote de 
 bug way up de tree ? d n if I do ! " 
 
 " If you are afraid, Jup, a great big negro like you, 
 to take hold of a harmless little dead beetle, why you 
 can carry it up by this string ; but, if you do not take
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 28 
 
 it up with you in some way, I shall be under the neces- 
 sity of breaking your head with this shovel." 
 
 " What de matter now, massa ? " said Jup, evidently 
 shamed into compliance ; " always want for to raise fuss 
 wid old nigger. Was only funnin anyhow. Me feered 
 de bug ! what I keer for de bug ? " Here he took 
 cautiously hold of the extreme end of the string, and, 
 maintaining the insect as far from his person as 
 circumstances would permit, prepared to ascend the 
 tree. 
 
 In youth, the tulip-tree, or Liriodendron tulipiferum, 
 the most magnificent of American foresters, has a trunk 
 peculiarly smooth, and often rises to a great height with- 
 out lateral branches ; but, in its riper age, the bark be- 
 comes gnarled and uneven, while many short limbs make 
 their appearance on the stem. Thus the difficulty of 
 ascension, in the present case, lay more in semblance 
 than in reality. Embracing the huge cylinder, as closely 
 as possible, with his arms and knees, seizing with his 
 hands some projections, and resting his naked toes upon 
 others, Jupiter, after one or two narrow escapes from 
 falling, at length wriggled himself into the first great 
 fork, and seemed to consider the whole business as vir- 
 tually accomplished. The risk of the achievement was, in 
 fact, now over, although the climber was some sixty or 
 seventy feet from the ground. 
 
 " Which way mus go now, Massa Will ? " he asked. 
 
 " Keep up the largest branch, the one on this side," 
 said Legrand. The negro obeyed him promptly, and 
 apparently with but little trouble ; ascending higher and 
 higher, until no glimpse of his squat figure could be
 
 24 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 obtained through the dense foliage which enveloped it. 
 Presently his voice was heard in a sort of halloo. 
 
 " How much fudder is got for go ? " 
 
 " How high up are you ? " asked Legrand. 
 
 " Ebber so fur," replied the negro ; " can see de sky 
 fru de top ob de tree." 
 
 " Never mind the sky, but attend to what I say. 
 Look down the trunk and count the limbs below you on 
 this side. How many limbs have you passed ? " 
 
 " One, two, tree, four, fibe, I done pass fibe big 
 limb, massa, pon dis side." 
 
 " Then go one limb higher." 
 
 In a few minutes the voice was heard again, an- 
 nouncing that the seventh limb was attained. 
 
 "Now, Jup," cried Legrand, evidently much excited, 
 " I want you to work your way out upon that limb as far 
 as you can. If you see anything strange, let me know." 
 
 By this time what little doubt I might have entertained 
 of my poor friend's insanity was put finally at rest. I 
 had no alternative but to conclude him stricken with 
 lunacy, and I became seriously anxious about getting 
 him home. While I was pondering upon what was best 
 to be done, Jupiter's voice was again heard. 
 
 " Mos feerd for to ventur pon dis limb berry far, 
 't is dead limb putty much all de way." 
 
 " Did you say it was a dead limb, Jupiter ? " cried 
 Legrand in a quavering voice. 
 
 " Yes, massa, him dead as de door-nail done up for 
 sartain done departed dis here life." 
 
 " What in the name of Heaven shall I do P " asked 
 Legrand, seemingly in the greatest distress.
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 25 
 
 "Do ! " said I, glad of an opportunity to interpose a 
 word ; " why come home and go to bed. Come, now ! 
 that 's a fine fellow. It 's getting late, and, besides, 
 you remember your promise." 
 
 " Jupiter," cried he, without heeding me in the least, 
 " do you hear me ? " 
 
 " Yes, Massa Will, hear you ebber so plain." 
 
 " Try the wood well, then, with your knife, and see if 
 you think it very rotten." 
 
 " Him rotten, massa, sure miff," replied the negro in a 
 few moments, " but not so berry rotten as mought be. 
 Mought ventur out leetle way pon de limb by myself, 
 dat 's true." 
 
 " By yourself ! what do you mean ? " 
 
 " Why I mean de bug. 'T is berry hebby bug. Spose 
 I drop him down fuss, and den de limb won't break wid 
 just de weight ob one nigger." 
 
 " You infernal scoundrel ! " cried Legrand, apparently 
 much relieved, " what do you mean by telling me such 
 nonsense as that ? As sure as you drop that beetle I '11 
 break your neck. Look here, Jupiter, do you hear 
 me?" 
 
 " Yes, massa, need n't hollo at poor nigger dat style." 
 
 " Well ! now listen ! if you will Venture out on the 
 limb as far as you think safe, and not let go the beetle, 
 I '11 make you a present of a silver dollar as soon as you 
 get down." 
 
 " I 'm gwine, Massa Will, deed I is," replied the 
 negro very promptly, " mos out to the eend now." 
 
 " Out to the end! " here fairly screamed Legrand ; " do 
 you say you are out to the end of that limb ? " 
 
 VOL. XII. 2
 
 26 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Soon be to de eend, massa, o-o-o-o-oh ! Lor-gol-a- 
 marcy ! what is dis here pon de tree ? " 
 
 " Well ! " cried Legrand, highly delighted, " what is 
 it?" 
 
 " Why, taint noffin but a skull somebody bin lef him 
 head up de tree, and de crows done gobble ebery bit ob 
 de meat off." , 
 
 " A skull, you say ! very well ! how is it fastened 
 to the limb ? what holds it on ? " 
 
 " Sure nuff, massa ; mus look. Why dis berry curous 
 sarcumstance, pon my word, dare 's a great big nail in 
 de skull, what fastens ob it on to de tree." 
 
 " Well, now, Jupiter, do exactly as I tell you, do 
 you hear ? " 
 
 " Yes, massa." 
 
 " Pay attention, then ! find the left eye of the 
 skull." 
 
 " Hum ! hoo ! dat 's good ! why, dare aint no eye lef 
 at all." 
 
 " Curse your stupidity ! do you know your right hand 
 from your left ? " 
 
 " Yes, I nose dat, nose all bout dat, 't is my lef 
 hand what I chops de wood wid." 
 
 " To be sure ! you are left-handed ; and your left 
 eye is on the same side as your left hand. Now, I 
 suppose, you can find the left eye of the skull, or the 
 pkce where the left eye has been. Have you found 
 it?" 
 
 Here was a long pause. At length the negro asked, 
 
 " Is de lef eye of de skull pon de same side as de lef 
 hand of de skull, too ? cause de skull aint got not a
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 27 
 
 bit ob a hand at all, nebber mind ! I got de lef eye 
 now, here de lef eye ! what mus do wid it ? " 
 
 " Let the beetle drop through it, as far as the string 
 will reach, but be careful and not let go your hold of 
 the string." 
 
 " All dat done, Massa Will ; mighty easy ting for to 
 put de bug fru de hole, look out for him dare below ! " 
 
 During this colloquy no portion of Jupiter's person 
 could be seen ; but the beetle, which he had suffered to 
 descend, was now visible at the end of the string, and 
 glistened, like a globe of burnished gold, in the last rays 
 of the setting sun, some of which still faintly illumined 
 the eminence upon which we stood. The scarabceus 
 hung quite clear of any branches, and, if allowed to fall, 
 would have fallen at our feet. Legrand immediately 
 ,took the scythe, and cleared with it a circular space, 
 three or four yards in diameter, just beneath the insect, 
 and, having accomplished this, ordered Jupiter to let go 
 the string and come down from the tree. 
 
 Driving a peg, with great nicety, into the ground, at 
 the precise spot where the beetle fell, my friend now pro- 
 duced from his pocket a tape-measure. Fastening one 
 end of this at that point of the trunk of the tree which 
 was nearest the peg, he unrolled it till it roached the peg, 
 and thence farther unrolled it, in the direction already 
 established by the two points of the tree and the peg, 
 for the distance of fifty feet, Jupiter clearing away the 
 brambles with the scythe. At the spot thus attained 
 a second peg was driven, and about this, as a centre, 
 a rude circle, about four feet in diameter, described. 
 Taking now a spade himself, and giving one to Jupiter
 
 28 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 and one to me, Legrand begged us to set about digging 
 as quickly as possible. 
 
 To speak the truth, I had no especial relish for such 
 amusement at any time, and, at that particular moment, 
 would most willingly have declined it; for the night was 
 coming on, and I felt much fatigued with the exercise 
 already taken ; but I saw no mode of escape, and was 
 fearful of disturbing my poor friend's equanimity by a 
 refusal. Could I have depended, indeed, upon Jupiter's 
 aid, I would have had no hesitation in attempting to get 
 the lunatic home by force ; but I was too well assured 
 of the old negro's disposition, to hope that he would 
 assist me, under any circumstances, in a personal con- 
 test with his master. I made no doubt that the lat- 
 ter had been infected with some of the innumerable 
 Southern superstitions about money buried, and that 
 his fantasy had received confirmation by the finding of 
 the scarabteus, or, perhaps, by Jupiter's obstinacy in 
 maintaining it to be "a bug of real gold." A mind 
 disposed to lunacy would readily be led away by such 
 suggestions, especially if chiming in with favorite 
 preconceived ideas, and then I called to mind the 
 poor fellow's speech about the beetle's being " the 
 index of his fortune." Upon the whole, I was sadly 
 vexed and puzzled, but, at length, I concluded to 
 make a virtue of necessity, to dig with a good will, 
 and thus the sooner to convince the visionary, by ocu- 
 lar demonstration, of the fallacy of the opinions he 
 entertained. 
 
 The lanterns having been lit, we all fell to work with 
 a zeal worthy a more rational cause ; and, as the glare
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 29 
 
 fell upon our persons and implements, I could not help 
 thinking how picturesque a group we composed, and 
 how strange and suspicious our labors must have ap- 
 peared to any interloper who, by chance, might have 
 stumbled upon our whereabouts. 
 
 We dug very steadily for two hours. Little was 
 said; and our chief embarrassment lay in the yelpings 
 of the dog, who took exceeding interest in our pro- 
 ceedings. He, at length, became so obstreperous that 
 we grew fearful of his giving the alarm to some strag- 
 glers in the vicinity ; or, rather, this was the apprehen- 
 sion of Legrand ; for myself, I should have rejoiced at 
 any interruption which might have enabled me to get 
 the wanderer home. The noise was, at length, very 
 effectually silenced by Jupiter, who, getting out of the 
 -hole with a dogged air of deliberation, tied the brute's 
 mouth up with one of his suspenders, and then returned, 
 with a grave chuckle, to his task. 
 
 When the time mentioned had expired, we had reached 
 a depth of five feet, and yet no signs of any treasure be- 
 came manifest. A general pause ensued, and I began 
 to hope that the farce was at an end. Legrand, how- 
 ever, although evidently much disconcerted, wiped his 
 brow thoughtfully and recommenced. We had exca- 
 vated the entire circle of four feet diameter, and now 
 we slightly enlarged the limit, and went to the far- 
 ther depth of two feet. Still nothing appeared. The 
 gold-seeker, whom I sincerely pitied, at length clam- 
 bered from the pit, with the bitterest disappointment 
 imprinted upon every feature, and proceeded, slowly 
 and reluctantly, to put on his coat, which he had thrown
 
 30 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 off at the beginning of his labor. In the mean time 1 
 made no remark. Jupiter, at a signal from his master, 
 began to gather up his tools. This done, and the dog 
 having been unmuzzled, we turned in profound silence 
 towards home. 
 
 We had taken, perhaps, a dozen steps in this direc- 
 tion, when, with a loud oath, Legrand strode up to 
 Jupiter, and seized him by the collar. The astonished 
 negro opened his eyes and mouth to the fullest extent, 
 let fall the spades, and fell upon his knees. 
 
 " You scoundrel," said Legrand, hissing out the sylla- 
 bles from between his clinched teeth, " you infernal 
 black villain ! speak, I tell you ! answer me this 
 instant, without prevarication ! which which is your 
 left eye ? " 
 
 " O, my golly, Massa Will ! aint dis here my lef eye 
 for sartin ? " roared the terrified Jupiter, placing his 
 hand upon his right organ of vision, and holding it 
 there with a desperate pertinacity, as if in immediate 
 dread of his master's attempt at a gouge. 
 
 " I thought so ! I knew it ! hurrah ! " vociferated 
 Legrand, letting the negro go, and executing a series of 
 curvets and caracoles, much to the astonishment of his 
 valet, who, arising from his knees, looked, mutely, from 
 his master to myself, and then from myself to his master. 
 
 " Come ! we must go back," said the latter, " the 
 game's not up yet." And he again led the way to the 
 tulip-tree. 
 
 " Jupiter," said he, when we reached its foot, " come 
 here ! Was the skull nailed to the limb with the face 
 outwards, or with the face to the limb ? "
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 31 
 
 " De face was out, massa, so dat de crows could get 
 at de eyes good, widout any trouble." 
 
 " Well, then, was it this eye or that through which 
 you dropped the beetle ? " here Legrand touched each 
 of Jupiter's eyes. 
 
 " 'Twas dis eye, massa, de lef eye, jis as you tell 
 me," and here it was his right eye that the negro indicated. 
 
 " That will do, we must try it again." 
 
 Here my friend, about whose madness I now saw, or 
 fancied that I saw, certain indications of method, re- 
 moved the peg which marked the spot where the beetle 
 fell, to a spot about three inches to the westward of its 
 former position. Taking, now, the tape-measure from 
 the nearest point of the trunk to the peg, as before, 
 and continuing the extension in a straight line to the 
 distance of fifty feet, a spot was indicated, removed, by 
 several yards, from the point at which we had been 
 digging. 
 
 Around the new position a circle, somewhat larger 
 than in the former instance, was now described, and we 
 again set to work with the spades. I was dreadfully 
 weary, but, scarcely understanding what had occasioned 
 the change in my thoughts, I felt no longer any great 
 aversion from the labor imposed. I had become most 
 unaccountably interested, nay, even excited. Perhaps 
 there was something, amid all the extravagant demeanor 
 of Legrand, some air of forethought, or of delibera- 
 tion, which impressed me. I dug eagerly, and now 
 and then caught myself actually looking, with something 
 that very much resembled expectation, for the fancied 
 treasure, the vision of which had demented my unfortu-
 
 32 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 nate companion. At a period when such vagaries of 
 thought most fully possessed me, and when we had been 
 at work perhaps an hour and a half, we were again inter- 
 rupted by the violent howlings of the dog. His uneasi- 
 ness, in the first instance, had been, evidently, but the 
 result of playfulness or caprice, but he now assumed a 
 bitter and serious tone. Upon Jupiter's again attempt- 
 ing to muzzle him, he made furious resistance, and, 
 leaping into the hole, tore up the mould frantically with 
 his claws. In a few seconds he had uncovered a mass 
 of human bones, forming two complete skeletons, inter- 
 mingled with several buttons of metal, and what ap- 
 peared to be the dust of decayed woollen. One or two 
 strokes of a spade upturned the blade of a large Spanish 
 knife, and, as we dug farther, three or four loose pieces 
 of gold and silver coin came to light. 
 
 At sight of these, the joy of Jupiter could scarcely be 
 restrained, but the countenance of his master wore an 
 air of extreme disappointment. He urged us, however, 
 to continue our exertions, and the words were hardly 
 uttered, when I stumbled and fell forward, having caught 
 the toe of my boot in a large ring of iron that lay half 
 buried in the loose earth. 
 
 We now worked in earnest, and never did I pass ten 
 minutes of more intense excitement. During this inter- 
 val we had fairly unearthed an oblong chest of wood, 
 which, from its perfect preservation and wonderful 
 hardness, had plainly been subjected to some mineraliz- 
 ing process, perhaps that of the bichloride of mer- 
 cury. This box was three feet and a half long, three 
 feet broad, and two and a half feet deep. It was firmly
 
 
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 33 
 
 secured by bands of wrought-iron, riveted, and forming 
 a kind of open trellis-work over the whole. On each 
 side of the chest, near the top, were three rings of iron, 
 six in all, by means of which a firm hold could be 
 obtained by six persons. Our utmost united endeavors 
 served only to disturb the coffer very slightly in its bed. 
 We at once saw the impossibility of removing so great 
 a weight. Luckily, the sole fastenings of the lid con- 
 sisted of two sliding bolts. These we drew back, 
 trembling and panting with anxiety. In an instant, a 
 treasure of incalculable value lay gleaming before us. 
 As the rays of the lanterns fell within the pit, there 
 flashed upwards a glow and a glare, from a confused 
 heap of gold and of jewels, that absolutely dazzled our 
 eyes. 
 
 I shall not pretend to describe the feelings with which 
 I gazed. Amazement was, of course, predominant. Le- 
 grand appeared exhausted with excitement, and spoke 
 very few words. Jupiter's countenance wore, for some 
 minutes, as deadly a pallor as it is possible, in the na- 
 ture of things, for any negro's visage to assume. He 
 seemed stupefied, thunder-stricken. Presently he fell 
 upon his knees in the pit, and, burying his naked arms 
 up to the elbows in gold, let them there remain, as if 
 enjoying the luxury of a bath. At length, with a deep 
 sigh, he exclaimed, as if in a soliloquy, 
 
 " And dis all cum ob de goole-bug ! de putty goole- 
 bug! de poor little goole-bug, what I boosed in dat 
 sabage kind ob style ! Aint you shamed ob yourself, nig- 
 ger ? answer me dat ! " 
 
 It became necessary, at last, that I should arouse both 
 2* a
 
 34 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 master and valet to the expediency of removing the 
 treasure. It was growing late, and it behooved us to 
 make exertion, that we might get everything housed 
 before daylight. It was difficult to say what should be 
 done, and much time was spent in deliberation, so 
 confused were the ideas of all. We finally lightened 
 the box by removing two thirds of its contents, when we 
 were enabled, with some trouble, to raise it from the 
 hole. The articles taken out were deposited among the 
 brambles, and the dog left to guard them, with strict 
 orders from Jupiter neither, upon any pretence, to stir 
 from the spot, nor to open his mouth until our return. 
 We then hurriedly made for home with the chest ; reach- 
 ing the hut in safety, but after excessive toil, at one 
 o'clock in the morning. Worn out as we were, it was 
 not in human nature to do more immediately. We 
 rested until two, and had supper ; starting for the hills 
 immediately afterwards, armed with three stout sacks, 
 which, by good luck, were upon the premises. A little 
 before four we arrived at the pit, divided the remainder 
 of the booty, as equally as might be, among us, and, 
 leaving the holes unfilled, again set out for the hut, at 
 which, for the second time, we deposited our golden 
 burdens, just as the first faint streaks of the dawn gleamed 
 from over the tree-tops in the east. 
 
 We were now thoroughly broken down ; but the in- 
 tense excitement of the time denied us repose. After an 
 unquiet slumber of some three or four hours' duration, 
 we arose, as if by preconcert, to make examination of 
 our treasure. 
 
 The chest had been full to the brim, and we spent the
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 35 
 
 whole day and the greater part of the next night in a 
 scrutiny of its contents. There had been nothing like 
 order or arrangement. Everything had been heaped in 
 promiscuously. Having assorted all with care, we found 
 ourselves possessed of even vaster wealth than we had 
 at first supposed. In coin there was rather more than 
 four hundred and fifty thousand dollars, estimating 
 the value of the pieces, as accurately as we could, by 
 the tables of the period. There was not a particle of 
 silver. All was gold of antique date and of great va- 
 riety, French, Spanish, and German money, with a 
 few English guineas, and some counters, of which we 
 had never seen specimens before. There were several 
 very large and heavy coins, so worn that we could make 
 nothing of their inscriptions. There was no American 
 money. The value of the jewels we found more diffi- 
 culty in estimating. There were diamonds, some of 
 them exceedingly large and fine, a hundred and ten 
 in all, and not one of them small ; eighteen rubies of re- 
 markable brilliancy ; three hundred and ten emeralds, 
 all very beautiful; and twenty-one sapphires, with an 
 opal. These stones had all been broken from their set- 
 tings and thrown loose in the chest. The settings them- 
 selves, which we picked out from among the other gold, 
 appeared to have been beaten up with hammers, as if to 
 prevent identification. Besides all this, there was a vast 
 quantity of solid gold ornaments ; nearly two hundred 
 massive finger and ear rings ; rich chains, thirty of 
 these, if I remember ; eighty -three very large and 
 heavy crucifixes ; five gold censers of great value ; 
 a prodigious golden punch-bowl, ornamented with richly
 
 36 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 chased vine-leaves and Bacchanalian figures; with two 
 sword-handles exquisitely embossed, and many other 
 smaller articles which I cannot recollect. The weight 
 of these valuables exceeded three hundred and fifty 
 pounds avoirdupois ; and in this estimate I have not 
 included one hundred and ninety-seven superb gold 
 watches; three of the number being worth each five 
 hundred dollars, if one. Many of them were very old, 
 and as time-keepers valueless ; the works having suf- 
 fered, more or less, from corrosion, but all were richly 
 jewelled and in cases of great worth. We estimated the 
 entire contents of the chest, that night, at a million and 
 a half of dollars ; and, upon the subsequent disposal of 
 the trinkets and jewels (a few being retained for our own 
 use), it was found that we had greatly undervalued the 
 treasure. 
 
 When, at length, we had concluded our examination, 
 and the intense excitement of the time had in some 
 measure subsided, Legrand, who saw that I was dying 
 with impatience for a solution of this most extraordinary 
 riddle, entered into a full detail of all the circumstances 
 connected with it. 
 
 " You remember," said he, " the night when I handed 
 you the rough sketch I had made of the scarabceus. You 
 recollect, also, that I became quite vexed at you for in- 
 sisting that my drawing resembled a death's-head. When 
 you first made this assertion I thought you were jesting ; 
 but afterwards I called to mind the peculiar spots on 
 the back of the insect, and admitted to myself that your 
 remark had some little foundation in fact. Still, the 
 sneer at my graphic powers irritated me, for I am
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 37 
 
 considered a good artist, and, therefore, when you 
 handed me the scrap of parchment, I was about to 
 crumple it up and throw it angrily into the fire." 
 
 " The scrap of paper, you mean," said I. 
 
 " No ; it had much of the appearance of paper, and 
 at first I supposed it to be such, but when I came to 
 draw upon it, I discovered it, at once, to be a piece of 
 very thin parchment. It was quite dirty, you remember. 
 Well, as I was in the very act of crumpling it up, my 
 glance fell upon the sketch at which you had been look- 
 ing, and you may imagine my astonishment when I per- 
 ceived, in fact, the figure of a death's-head just where, it 
 seemed to me, I had made the drawing of the beetle. 
 For a moment I was too much amazed to think with 
 accuracy. I knew that my design was very different in 
 -detail from this, although there was a certain similar- 
 ity hi general outline. Presently I took a candle, and 
 seating myself at the other end of the room, proceeded 
 to scrutinize the parchment more closely. Upon turning 
 it over, I saw my own sketch upon the reverse, just as 
 I had made it. My first idea, now, was mere surprise 
 at the really remarkable similarity of outline, at the 
 singular coincidence involved in the fact that, unknown 
 to me, there should have been a skull upon the other 
 side of the parchment, immediately beneath my figure 
 of the scarabaus, and that his skull, not only in outline, 
 but in size, should so closely resemble my drawing. I 
 say the singularity of this coincidence absolutely stupe- 
 fied me for a time. This is the usual effect of such co- 
 incidences. The mind struggles to establish a connection, 
 a sequence of cause and effect, and, being unable
 
 38 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to do so, suffers a species of temporary paralysis. But, 
 when I recovered from this stupor, there dawned upon 
 me gradually a conviction which startled me even far 
 more than the coincidence. I began distinctly, positively, 
 to remember that there had been no drawing upon the 
 parchment when I made my sketch of the scarabeeus. 
 I became perfectly certain of this; for I recollected 
 turning up first one side and then the other, in search 
 of the cleanest spot. Had the skull been there then, of 
 course I could not have failed to notice it. Here was 
 indeed a mystery which I felt it impossible to explain ; 
 but, even at that early moment, there seemed to glimmer, 
 faintly, within the most remote and secret chambers of 
 my intellect, a glow-worm-like conception of that truth 
 which last night's adventure brought to so magnificent 
 a demonstration. I arose at once, and putting the 
 parchment securely away, dismissed all further reflection 
 until I should be alone. 
 
 "When you had gone, and when Jupiter was fast 
 asleep, I betook myself to a more methodical investiga- 
 tion of the affair. In the first place I considered the 
 manner in which the parchment had come into my pos- 
 session. The spot where we discovered the scarabeeus 
 was on the coast of the mainland, about a mile east- 
 ward of the island, and but a short distance above high- 
 water mark. Upon my taking hold of it, it gave me 
 a sharp bite, which caused me to let it drop. Jupiter, 
 with his accustomed caution, before seizing the insect, 
 which had flown towards him, looked about him for a 
 leaf, or something of that nature, by which to take hold 
 of it. It was at this moment that his eyes, and mine
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 89 
 
 also, fell upon the scrap of parchment, which I then sup- 
 posed to be paper. It was lying half buried in the sand, 
 a corner sticking up. Near the spot where we found it 
 I observed the remnants of the hull of what appeared to 
 have been a ship's long-boat. The wreck seemed to 
 have been there for a very great while ; for the resem- 
 blance to boat timbers could scarcely be traced. 
 
 " Well, Jupiter picked up the parchment, wrapped 
 the beetle in it, and gave it to me. Soon afterwards we 
 turned to go home, and on the way met Lieutenant 
 
 G . I showed him the insect, and he begged me to let 
 
 him take it to the fort. Upon my consenting, he thrust 
 it forthwith into his waistcoat-pocket, without the parch- 
 ment in which it had been wrapped, and which I had 
 continued to hold in my hand during his inspection. 
 Perhaps he dreaded my changing my mind, and thought 
 it best to make sure of the prize at once, you know 
 how enthusiastic he is on all subjects connected with 
 Natural History. At the same time, without being con- 
 scious of it, I must have deposited the parchment in my 
 own pocket. 
 
 " You remember that when I went to the table, for 
 the purpose of making a sketch of the beetle, I found 
 no paper where it was usually kept. I looked in the 
 drawer, and found none there. I searched my pockets, 
 hoping to find an old letter, when my hand fell upon the 
 parchment. I thus detail the precise mode in which it 
 came into my possession ; for the circumstances impressed 
 me with peculiar force. 
 
 " No doubt you will think me fanciful, but I had 
 already established a kind of connection, I had put
 
 40 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 together two links of a great chain. There was a boat 
 lying upon a sea-coast, and not far from the boat was a 
 parchment not a paper with a skull depicted upon 
 it. You will, of course, ask, ' Where is the connection ? ' 
 I reply that the skull, or death's-head, is the well-known 
 emblem of the pirate. Th flag of the death's-head is 
 hoisted in all engagements. 
 
 " I have said that the scrap was parchment, and not 
 paper. Parchment is durable, almost imperishable. 
 Matters of little moment are rarely consigned to parch- 
 ment ; since, for the mere ordinary purposes of drawing 
 or writing, it is not nearly so well adapted as paper. 
 This reflection suggested some meaning some rele- 
 vancy in the death's-head. I did not fail to observe, 
 also, the form of the parchment. Although one of its 
 corners had been, by some accident, destroyed, it could 
 be seen that the original form was oblong. It was just 
 such a slip, indeed, as might have been chosen for a 
 memorandum, for a record of something to be long 
 remembered and carefully preserved." 
 
 " But," I interposed, " you say that the skull was not 
 upon the parchment when you made the drawing of the 
 beetle. How then do you trace any connection between 
 the boat and the skull, since this latter, according to 
 your own admission, must have been designed (God only 
 knows how or by whom) at some period subsequent to 
 your sketching the scarabeeus ? " 
 
 "Ah, hereupon turns the whole mystery; although 
 the secret, at this point, I had comparatively little diffi- 
 culty in solving. My steps were sure, and could afford 
 but a single result. I reasoned, for example, thus:
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 41 
 
 When I drew the scarab&us, there was no skull apparent 
 upon the parchment. When I had completed the draw- 
 ing I gave it to you, and observed you narrowly until 
 you returned it. You, therefore, did not design the 
 skull, and no one else was present to do it. Then it was 
 not done by human agency. And nevertheless it was 
 done. 
 
 "At this stage of my reflections I endeavored to 
 remember, and did remember, with entire distinctness, 
 every incident which occurred about the period in ques- 
 tion. The weather was chilly, (0 rare and happy acci- 
 dent !) and a fire was blazing upon the hearth. I was 
 heated with exercise, and sat near the table. You, how- 
 ever, had drawn a chair close to the chimney. Just as I 
 placed the parchment in your hand, and as you were in 
 the act of inspecting it, Wolf, the Newfoundland, entered, 
 and leaped upon your shoulders. With your left hand 
 you caressed him and kept him off, while your right, 
 holding the parchment, was permitted to fall listlessly 
 between your knees, and in close proximity to the fire. 
 At one moment I thought the blaze had caught it, and 
 was about to caution you, but, before I could speak, you 
 had withdrawn it, and were engaged in its examination. 
 When I considered all these particulars, I doubted not 
 for a moment that heat had been the agent in bringing 
 to light, upon the parchment, the skull which I saw 
 designed upon it. You are well aware that chemical 
 preparations exist, and have existed time out of mind, by 
 means of which it is possible to write upon either paper 
 or vellum, so that the characters shall become visible only 
 when subjected to the action of fire. Zaffre, digested in
 
 42 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 aqua regia, and diluted with four times its weight of 
 Water, is sometimes employed; a green tint results. The 
 regulus of cobalt, dissolved in spirit of nitre, gives a red. 
 These colors disappear at longer or shorter intervals after 
 the material written upon cools, but again become ap- 
 parent upon the re-application of heat. 
 
 " I now scrutinized the death's-head with care. Its 
 outer edges the edges of the drawing nearest the edge 
 of the vellum were far more distinct than the others. 
 It was clear that the action of the caloric had been im- 
 perfect or unequal. I immediately kindled a fire, and 
 subjected every portion of the parchment to a glowing 
 heat. At first, the only effect was the strengthening of 
 the faint lines in the skull ; but, upon persevering in the 
 experiment, there became visible, at the corner of the 
 slip, diagonally opposite to the spot in which the death's- 
 head was delineated, the figure of what I at first supposed 
 to be a goat. A closer scrutiny, however, satisfied me 
 that it was intended for a kid." 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! " said I, " to be sure I have no right to 
 laugh at you, a million and a half of money is too 
 serious a matter for mirth, but you are not about to 
 establish a third link in your chain, you will not find 
 any especial connection between your pirates and a goat, 
 pirates, you know, have nothing to do with goats; 
 they appertain to the farming interest." 
 
 " But I have just said that the figure was not that of a 
 goat." 
 
 " Well, a kid then, pretty much the same thing." 
 
 " Pretty much, but not altogether," said Legrand. 
 " You may have heard of one Captain Kidd. I at once
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 43 
 
 looked upon the figure of the animal as a kind of punning 
 or hieroglyphical signature. I say signature ; because 
 its position upon the vellum suggested this idea. The 
 death's-head at the corner diagonally opposite had, in 
 the same manner, the air of a stamp, or seal. But I was 
 sorely put out by the absence of all else of the body 
 to my imagined instrument of the text for my con- 
 text." 
 
 " I presume you expected to find a letter between the 
 stamp and the signature." 
 
 " Something of that kind. The fact is, I felt irresisti- 
 bly impressed with a presentiment of some vast good 
 fortune impending. I can scarcely say why. Perhaps, 
 after all, it was rather a desire than an actual belief; 
 but do you know that Jupiter's silly words, about the 
 bug being of solid gold, had a remarkable effect upon my 
 fancy ? And then the series of accidents and coinci- 
 dences, these were so very extraordinary. Do you 
 observe how mere an accident it was that these events 
 should have occurred upon the sole day of all the year in 
 which it has been, or may be, sufficiently cool for fire, 
 and that without the fire, or without the intervention of 
 the dog at the precise moment in which he appeared, I 
 should never have become aware of the death's-head, and 
 so never the possessor of the treasure ? " 
 
 " But proceed, I am all impatience." 
 
 "Well; you have heard, of course, the many stories 
 current, the thousand vague rumors afloat about money 
 buried, somewhere upon the Atlantic coast, by Kidd and 
 his associates. These rumors must have had some foun- 
 dation in fact. And that the rumors have existed so
 
 44 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 long and so continuously could have resulted, it appeared 
 to me, only from the circumstance of the buried treasure 
 still remaining entombed. Had Kidd concealed his plun- 
 der for a time, and afterwards reclaimed it, the rumors 
 would scarcely have reached us in their present unvary- 
 ing form. You will observe that the stories told are all 
 about money-seekers, not about money-finders. Had the 
 pirate recovered his money, there the affair would have 
 dropped. It seemed to me that some accident say the 
 loss of a memorandum indicating its locality had de- 
 prived him of the means of recovering it, and that this 
 accident had become known to his followers, who other- 
 wise might never have heard that treasure had been 
 concealed at all, and who, busying themselves in vain, 
 because unguided, attempts to regain it, had given first 
 birth, and then universal currency, to the reports which 
 are now so common. Have you ever heard of any im- 
 portant treasure being unearthed along the coast ? " 
 
 "Never." 
 
 " But that Kidd's accumulations were immense, is well 
 known. I took it for granted, therefore, that the earth 
 still held them ; and you will scarcely be surprised when 
 I tell you that I felt a hope, nearly amounting to cer- 
 tainty, that the parchment so strangely found, involved 
 a lost record of the place of deposit." 
 
 " But how did you proceed ? " 
 
 " I held the vellum again to the fire, after increasing 
 the heat ; but nothing appeared. I now thought it pos- 
 sible that the coating of dirt might have something to 
 do with the failure ; so I carefully rinsed the parchment 
 by pouring warm water over it, and, having done this, I
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 45 
 
 placed it in a tin pan, with the skull downwards, and put 
 the pan upon a furnace of lighted charcoal. In a few 
 minutes, the pan having become thoroughly heated, I 
 removed the slip, and, to my inexpressible joy, found it 
 spotted, in several places, with what appeared to be 
 figures arranged in lines. Again I placed it in the pan, 
 and suffered it to remain another minute. Upon taking 
 it off, the whole was just as you see it now." 
 
 Here Legrand, having re-heated the parchment, sub- 
 mitted it to my inspection. The following characters 
 were rudely traced, in a red tint, between the death's-head 
 and the goat: 
 
 53ttt305j)6*;4826)4t.)4|);806*;48t81[60))85;li(;:i*8t83 
 (88)5*t;46(;88*96*?;8)*i(;485);5*t2:*i(;4956*2(5* 4)8^8* 
 ;4069285);) 6t8)4J{ ;l(i9;48081;8:8il;48t85;4)485t528806* 
 81(t9;48;(88;4(t?34;48)4t;161;:188;+?; 
 
 " But," said I, returning him the slip, " I am as much 
 in the dark as ever. Were all the jewels of Golconda 
 awaiting me upon my solution of this enigma, I am 
 quite sure that I should be unable to earn them." 
 
 " And yet," said Legrand, " the solution is by no 
 means so difficult as you might be led to imagine from 
 the first hasty inspection of the characters. These char- 
 acters, as any one might readily guess, form a cipher, 
 that is to say, they convey a meaning ; but then, from 
 what is known of Kidd, I could not suppose him capable 
 of constructing any of the more abstruse cryptographs. 
 I made up my mind, at once, that this was of a simple 
 species, such, however, as would appear, to the crude 
 intellect of the sailor, absolutely insoluble without the 
 key."
 
 46 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " And you really solved it ? " 
 
 " Readily ; I have solved others of an abstruseness ten 
 thousand times greater. Circumstances, and a certain 
 bias of mind, have led me to take interest in such 
 riddles, and it may well be doubted whether human in- 
 genuity can construct an enigma of the kind which human 
 ingenuity may not, by proper application, resolve. In 
 fact, having once established connected and legible char- 
 acters, I scarcely gave a thought to the mere difficulty of 
 developing their import. 
 
 " In the present case indeed in all cases of secret 
 writing the first question regards the language of the 
 cipher ; for the principles of solution, so far, especially, 
 as the more simple ciphers are concerned, depend upon, 
 and are varied by, the genius of the particular idiom. 
 In general, there is no alternative but experiment (di- 
 rected by probabilities), of every tongue known to him 
 who attempts the solution, until the true one be attained. 
 But, with the cipher now before us, all difficulty was 
 removed by the signature. The pun upon the word 
 ' Kidd ' is appreciable in no other language than the Eng- 
 lish. But for this consideration I should have begun my 
 attempts with the Spanish and French, as the tongues in 
 which a secret of this kind would most naturally have 
 been written by a pirate of the Spanish main. As it 
 was, I assumed the cryptograph to be English. 
 
 "You observe there are no divisions between the 
 words. Had there been divisions, the task would have 
 been comparatively easy. In such case I should have 
 commenced with a collation and analysis of the shorter 
 words, and, had a word of a single letter occurred, as is
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 47 
 
 most likely (a or I, for example), I should have consid- 
 ered the solution as assured. But, there being no di- 
 vision, my first step was to ascertain the predominant 
 letters, as well as the least frequent. Counting all, I 
 constructed a table, thus : 
 
 Of the character 8 there are 33. 
 ; " 26. 
 
 4 " 19. 
 
 t ) " 16. 
 
 * " 13. 
 
 5 " 12. 
 
 6 " 11. 
 t 1 8. 
 
 " 6. 
 
 92" 5. 
 
 : 3 4. 
 
 ? " 3. 
 
 11 " 2. 
 
 1 
 
 -L . 
 
 "Now, in English, the letter which most frequently 
 occurs is e. Afterwards, the succession runs thus : a o i 
 dhnrstuy cf glmwbkpqxz. E predominates 
 so remarkably that an individual sentence of any length 
 is rarely seen, in which it is not the prevailing character. 
 
 " Here, then, we have, in the very beginning, the ground- 
 work for something more than a mere guess. The general 
 use which may be made of the table is obvious ; but, in 
 this particular cipher, we shall only very partially require 
 its aid. As our predominant character is 8, we will com- 
 mence by assuming it as the e of the natural alphabet. 
 To verify the supposition, let us observe if the 8 be seen
 
 48 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 often in couples, for e is doubled with great frequency 
 in English, in such words, for example, as ' meet,' 
 'fleet,' 'speed,' 'seen,' 'been,' 'agree,' etc. In the pres- 
 ent instance we see it doubled no less than five times, 
 although the cryptograph is brief. 
 
 " Let us assume 8, then, as e. Now, of all words in 
 the language, ' the ' is most usual ; let us see, there- 
 fore, whether there are not repetitions of any three char- 
 acters, in the same order of collocation, the last of them 
 being 8. If we discover repetitions of such letters, so 
 arranged, they will most probably represent the word 
 ' the.' Upon inspection, we find no less than seven such 
 arrangements, the characters being ;48. We may, there- 
 fore, assume that ; represents t, 4 represents h, and 8 
 represents e, the last being now well confirmed. Thus 
 a great step has been taken. 
 
 " But, having established a single word, we are enabled 
 to establish a vastly important point ; that is to say, sev- 
 eral commencements and terminations of other words. Let 
 us refer, for example, to the last instance but one, in which 
 the combination ;48 occurs, not far from the end of 
 the cipher. We know that the ; immediately ensuing 
 is the commencement of a word, and, of the six charac- 
 ters succeeding this ' the,' we are cognizant of no less 
 than five. Let us set these characters down, thus, by 
 the letters we know them to represent, leaving a space 
 for the unknown 
 
 t eeth. 
 
 " Here we are enabled, at once, to discard the ' t&,' as 
 forming no portion of the word commencing with the 
 first t ; since, by experiment of the entire alphabet for
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 49 
 
 a letter adapted to the vacancy, we perceive that no word 
 can be formed of which this th can be a part. "We are 
 thus narrowed into 
 
 t ee, 
 
 and, going through the alphabet, if necessary, as before, 
 we arrive at the word ' tree,' as the sole possible reading. 
 We thus gain another letter, r, represented by (, with 
 the words ' the tree ' in juxtaposition. 
 
 "Looking beyond these words, for a short distance, 
 we again see the combination ;48, and employ it by way 
 of termination to what immediately precedes. We have 
 thus this arrangement : 
 
 the tree ;4(J?34 the, 
 
 or, substituting the natural letters, where known, it reads 
 thus : 
 
 the tree thr+?3h the. 
 
 " Now, if, in place of the unknown characters, we 
 leave blank spaces, or substitute dots, we read thus : 
 
 the tree thr...h the, 
 
 when the word ' through ' makes itself evident at once. 
 But this discovery gives us three new letters, 0, , and g, 
 represented by J ? and 3. 
 
 " Looking, now, narrowly, through the cipher for com- 
 binations of known characters, we find, not very far from 
 the beginning, this arrangement, 
 
 83(88, or egree, 
 
 which, plainly, is the conclusion of the word ' degree/ and 
 gives us another letter, d, represented by f.
 
 50 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Four letters beyond the word ' degree/ we perceive 
 the combination 
 
 ;46(;88*. 
 
 " Translating the known characters, and representing 
 the unknown by dots, as before, we read thus : 
 
 th.rtee., 
 
 an arrangement immediately suggestive of the word 
 ' thirteen,' and again furnishing us with two new charac- 
 ters, * and n, represented by 6 and *. 
 
 " Referring, now, to the beginning of the cryptograph, 
 we find the combination, 
 
 " Translating, as before, we obtain 
 good, 
 
 which assures us that the first letter is A, and that the 
 first two words are ' A good.' 
 
 "It is now time that we arrange our key, as far as 
 discovered, in a tabular form, to avoid confusion. It 
 
 will stand thus : 
 
 5 represents a 
 
 t a 
 
 8 " e 
 
 3 " g 
 
 4 " h 
 
 6 " i 
 * " n 
 % " o 
 ( " r 
 ; " t
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 51 
 
 " We have, therefore, no less than ten of the most im- 
 portant letters represented, and it will be unnecessary 
 to proceed with the details of the solution. I have said 
 enough to convince you that ciphers of this nature are 
 readily soluble, and to give you some insight into the 
 rationale of their development. But be assured that the 
 specimen before us appertains to the very simplest spe- 
 cies of cryptograph. It now only remains to give you 
 the full translation of the characters upon the parchment, 
 as unriddled. Here it is : 
 
 " ' A good glass in the bishop's hostel in the devil's seat 
 forty-one degrees and thirteen minutes northeast and by 
 north main branch seventh limb east side shoot from the 
 left eye of the death's-head a bee line from the tree through 
 the shot fifty feet out.' " 
 
 "But," said I, "the enigma seems still in as bad a 
 condition as ever. How is it possible to extort a mean- 
 ing from all this jargon about ' devil's seats,' ' death's- 
 heads,' and ' bishop's hotels ' ? " 
 
 " I confess," replied Legrand, " that the matter still 
 wears a serious aspect, when regarded with a casual 
 glance. My first endeavor was to divide the sentence 
 into the natural division intended by the cryptographist." 
 
 " You mean, to punctuate it ? " 
 
 " Something of that kind." 
 
 " But how was it possible to effect this ? " 
 
 " I reflected that it had been a point with the writer 
 to run his words together without division, so as to in- 
 crease the difficulty of solution. Now, a not over-acute 
 man, in pursuing such an object, would be nearly certain
 
 52 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to overdo the matter. When, in the course of his com- 
 position, he arrived at a break in his subject which 
 would naturally require a pause, or a point, he would 
 be exceedingly apt to run his characters, at this place, 
 more than usually close together. If you will observe 
 the manuscript in the present instance, you will easily 
 detect five such cases of unusual crowding. Acting 
 upon this hint, I made the division thus : 
 
 " ' A good glass in the Bishop's hostel in the Devil's seat 
 forty-one degrees and thirteen minutes northeast and 
 by north main branch seventh limb east side shoot 
 from the left eye of the death's-head a bee-line from 
 the tree through the shot fifty feet out'" 
 
 " Even this division," said I, " leaves me still in the 
 dark." 
 
 " It left me also in the dark," replied Legrand, " for 
 a few days ; during which I made diligent inquiry, in 
 the neighborhood of Sullivan's Island, for any building 
 which went by the name of the ' Bishop's Hotel ' ; for, 
 of course, I dropped the obsolete word ' hostel.' Gain- 
 ing no information on the subject, I was on the point of 
 extending my sphere of search, and proceeding in a more 
 systematic manner, when, one morning, it entered into 
 my head, quite suddenly, that this 'Bishop's Hostel' 
 might have some reference to an old family, of the name 
 of Bessop, which, time out of mind, had held possession 
 of an ancient manor-house, about four miles to the north- 
 ward of the island. I accordingly went over to the 
 plantation, and reinstituted my inquiries among the 
 older negroes of the place. At length one of the most
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 53 
 
 aged of the women said that she had heard of such a 
 place as JSessop's Castle, and thought that she could 
 guide me to it, but that it was not a castle, nor a tavern, 
 but a high rock. 
 
 " I offered to pay her well for her trouble, and, after 
 some demur, she consented to accompany me to the 
 spot. "We found it without much difficulty, when, dis- 
 missing her, I proceeded to examine the place. The 
 ' castle ' consisted of an irregular assemblage of cliffs and 
 rocks, one of the latter being quite remarkable for 
 its height as well as for its insulated and artificial ap- 
 pearance. I clambered to its apex, and then felt much 
 at a loss as to what should be next done. 
 
 " While I was busied in reflection, my eyes fell upon 
 a narrow ledge in the eastern face of the rock, perhaps 
 a yard below the summit upon which I stood. This 
 ledge projected about eighteen inches, and was not more 
 than a foot wide, while a niche in the cliff just above it 
 gave it a rude resemblance to one of the hollow-backed 
 chairs used by our ancestors. I made no doubt that 
 here was the ' devil's-seat ' alluded to in the manuscript, 
 and now I seemed to grasp the full secret. 
 
 " The ' good glass,' I knew, could have reference to 
 nothing but a telescope ; for the word ' glass ' is rarely 
 employed in any other sense by seamen. Now here, I 
 at once saw, was a telescope to be used, and a definite 
 point of view, admitting no variation, from which to use 
 it. Nor did I hesitate to believe that the phrases, ' for- 
 ty-one degrees and thirteen minutes,' and ' northeast and 
 by north,' were intended as directions for the levelling of 
 the glass. Greatly excited by these 'discoveries, I hur-
 
 54 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 ried home, procured a telescope, and returned to the 
 rock. 
 
 "I let myself down to the ledge, and found that it 
 was impossible to retain a seat upon it except in one 
 particular position. This fact confirmed my preconceived 
 idea. I proceeded to use the glass. Of course, the 
 ' forty-one degrees and thirteen minutes ' could allude to 
 nothing but elevation above the visible horizon, since the 
 horizontal direction was clearly indicated by the words, 
 'northeast and by north.' This latter direction I at 
 once established by means of a pocket-compass; then, 
 pointing the glass as nearly at an angle of forty-one 
 degrees of elevation as I could do it by guess, I moved 
 it cautiously up or down, until my attention was arrested 
 by a circular rift or opening in the foliage of a large tree 
 that overtopped its fellows in the distance. In the cen- 
 tre of this rift I perceived a white spot, but could not, 
 at first, distinguish what it was. Adjusting the focus of 
 the telescope, I again looked, and now made it out to be 
 a human skull. 
 
 "Upon this discovery I was so sanguine as to con- 
 sider the enigma solved ; for the phrase, ' main branch, 
 seventh limb, east side/ could refer only to the position 
 of the skull upon the tree, while ' shoot from the left eye 
 of the death's-head ' admitted, also, of but one interpre- 
 tation, in regard to a search for buried treasure. I per- 
 ceived that the design was to drop a bullet from the left 
 eye of the skull, and that a bee-line, or, in other words, 
 a straight line, drawn from the nearest point of the 
 trunk through ' the shot ' (or the spot where the bullet 
 fell), and thence extended to a distance of fifty feet,
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 55 
 
 would indicate a definite point, and beneath this point 
 I thought it at least possible that a deposit of value lay 
 concealed." 
 
 "All this," I said, "is exceedingly clear, and, al- 
 though ingenious, still simple and explicit. When you 
 left the Bishop's Hotel, what then ? " 
 
 " Why, having carefully taken the bearings of the tree, 
 I turned homewards. The instant that I left ' the dev- 
 il's seat,' however, the circular rift vanished ; nor could 
 I get a glimpse of it afterwards, turn as I would. What 
 seems to me the chief ingenuity in this whole business 
 is the fact (for repeated experiment has convinced me it 
 is a fact) that the circular opening in question is visible 
 from no other attainable point of view than that afforded 
 by the narrow ledge upon the face of the rock. 
 
 "In this expedition to the 'Bishop's Hotel' I had 
 been attended by Jupiter, who had, no doubt, observed, 
 for some weeks past, the abstraction of my demeanor, 
 and took especial care not to leave me alone. But, on 
 the next day, getting up very early, I contrived to give 
 him the slip, and went into the hills in search of the 
 tree. After much toil I found it. When I came home 
 at night my valet proposed to give me a flogging. With 
 the rest of the adventure I believe you are as well ac- 
 quainted as myself." 
 
 "I suppose," said I, "you missed the spot, in the 
 first attempt at digging, through Jupiter's stupidity in 
 letting the bug fall through the right instead of through 
 the left eye of the skull." 
 
 " Precisely. This mistake made a difference of about 
 two inches and a half in the ' shot ', that is to say, in
 
 56 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 the position of the peg nearest the tree ; and had the 
 treasure been beneath the 'shot,' the error would have 
 been of little moment ; but ' the shot/ together with the 
 nearest point of the tree, were merely two points for 
 the establishment of a line of direction ; of course the 
 error, however trivial in the beginning, increased as we 
 proceeded with the line, and by the time we had gone 
 fifty feet threw us quite off the scent. But for my deep- 
 seated impressions that treasure was here somewhere 
 actually buried, we might have had all our labor in 
 vain." 
 
 " But your grandiloquence, and your conduct in swing- 
 ing the beetle, how excessively odd ! I was sure you 
 were mad. And why did you insist upon letting fall the 
 bug, instead of a bullet, from the skull ? " 
 
 " Why, to be frank, I felt somewhat annoyed by your 
 evident suspicions touching my sanity, and so resolved 
 to punish you quietly, in my own way, by a little bit of 
 sober mystification. For this reason I swung the beetle, 
 and for this reason I let it fall from the tree. An ob- 
 servation of yours about its great weight suggested the 
 latter idea." 
 
 " Yes, I perceive ; and now there is only one point 
 which puzzles me. What are we to make of the skele- 
 tons found in the hole ? " 
 
 " That is a question I am no more able to answer than 
 yourself. There seems, however, only one plausible way 
 of accounting for them, and yet it is dreadful to be- 
 lieve in such atrocity as my suggestion would imply. It 
 is clear that Kidd, if Kidd indeed secreted this treas- 
 ure, which I doubt not, it is clear that he must hava
 
 THE GOLD-BUG. 
 
 57 
 
 had assistance in the labor. But, this labor concluded, 
 he may have thought it expedient to remove all partici- 
 pants in his secret. Perhaps a couple of blows with a 
 mattock were sufficient, while his coadjutors were busy 
 in the pit; perhaps it required a dozen, who shall 
 tell?"
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 
 
 BY SAMUEL LOVER. 
 
 INDING a fortune," is a phrase often heard 
 amongst the peasantry of Ireland. If any man 
 from small beginnings arrives at wealth, in a 
 reasonable course of time, the fact is scarcely ever con- 
 sidered as the result of perseverance, superior intelli- 
 gence, or industry ; it passes as a byword through the 
 country that " he found a fortin " ; whether by digging 
 up a " crock o' goold " in the ruins of an old abbey, or 
 by catching a Leprechaun and forcing him to " deliver 
 or die," or discovering it behind an old wainscot, is 
 quite immaterial : the when or where is equally unim- 
 portant, and the thousand are satisfied with the rumor, 
 " He found a fortin." Besides, going into particulars 
 destroys romance, and the Irish are essentially roman- 
 tic, and their love of wonder is more gratified in con- 
 sidering the change from poverty to wealth as the result 
 of superhuman aid, than in attributing it to the mere 
 mortal causes of industry and prudence. 
 
 The crone of every village has plenty of stories to 
 make her hearers wonder, how fortunes have been
 
 THE FAIEY-FINDEE. 59 
 
 arrived at by extraordinary short cuts ; and as it has 
 been laid down as an axiom, " That there never was 
 a fool who had not a greater fool to admire him," so 
 there never was any old woman who told such stories 
 without plenty of listeners. 
 
 Now, Darby Kelleher was one of the latter class, and 
 there was a certain collioch* who was an extensive 
 dealer in the marvellous, and could supply " wholesale, 
 retail, and for exportation " any customer such as Dar- 
 by Kelleher, who not only was a devoted listener, but 
 also made an occasional offering at the cave of the 
 sibyl, in return for her oracular communications. This 
 tribute generally was tobacco, as the collioch was par- 
 tial to chewing the weed ; and thus Darby returned a 
 quid pro quo, without having any idea that he was 
 giving a practical instance of the foregoing well-known 
 pun. 
 
 Another constant attendant at the hut of the hag was 
 Oonah Lenehan, equally prone to the marvellous with 
 Darby Kelleher, and quite his equal in idleness. A day 
 never passed without Darby and Oonah paying the old 
 woman a visit. She was sure to be " at home," for age 
 and decrepitude rendered it impossible for her to be 
 otherwise ; the utmost limit of her ramble from her own 
 chimney-corner being the seat of sods outside the door 
 of her hut, where, in the summer time, she was to be 
 found, so soon as the sunbeams fell on the front of her 
 abode, and made the seat habitable for one whose ac- 
 customed vicinity to the fire rendered heat indispensable 
 
 * Old woman.
 
 60 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to comfort. Here she would sit and rock herself to and 
 fro in the hot noons of July and August, her own ap- 
 pearance and that of her wretched cabin being in admi- 
 rable keeping. To a fanciful beholder the question 
 might have suggested itself, whether the hag was made 
 for the hovel, or it for her ; or whether they had grown 
 into a likeness of one another, as man and wife are said 
 to do, for there were many points of resemblance be- 
 tween them. The tattered thatch of the hut was like 
 the straggling hair of its mistress, and Time, that had 
 grizzled the latter, had covered the former with gray 
 lichens. To its mud walls, a strong likeness was to be 
 found in the tint of the old woman's shrivelled skin ; 
 they were both seriously out of the perpendicular ; and 
 the rude mud and wicker chimney of the edifice having 
 toppled over the gable, stuck out, something in the 
 fashion of the doodeen, or short pipe, that projected from 
 the old woman's upper story; and so they both were 
 smoking away from morning till night ; and to complete 
 the similitude sadly, both were poor, both lonely, 
 both fast falling to decay. 
 
 Here were Darby Kelleher and Oonah Lenehan sure 
 to meet every day. Darby might make his appearance 
 thus : 
 
 " Good morrow, kindly, granny." 
 
 " The same to you, avick," mumbled out the crone. 
 
 " Here 's some baccy for you, granny." 
 
 " Many thanks to you, Darby. I did n't lay it out 
 for seeing you so airly, the day." 
 
 " No, nor you would n't neither, only I was passin' 
 this a way, runnin' an arrand for the squire, and I
 
 THE FAIEY-FINDER. 61 
 
 thought I might as well step in and ax you how you 
 wor." 
 
 " Good boy, Darby." 
 
 " Throth an' it 's a hot day that 's in it, this blessed 
 day. Phew ! Faix, it 's out o' breath I am, and mighty 
 hot intirely ; for I was runnin' a'most half the way, be- 
 kase it 's an arrand, you see, and the squire towld me to 
 make haste, and so I did, and wint acrass the fields by 
 the short cut ; and as I was passin' by the owld castle, 
 I remembered what you towld me awhile agon, granny, 
 about the crock o' goold that is there for sartin, if any 
 one could come upon it." 
 
 " An' that 's thrue indeed, Darby, avick, and never 
 heerd any other the longest day I can remember." 
 
 " Well, well ! think o' that ! ! 0, then it 's he that '11 
 -be the lucky fellow that finds it." 
 
 " Thrue for you, Darby ; but that won't be antil it is 
 laid out for some one to rise it." 
 
 " Sure, that 's what I say to myself often ; and why 
 might n't it be my chance to be the man that it was laid 
 out for to find it ? " 
 
 " There 's no knowin'," mumbled the crone, mysteri- 
 ously, as she shook the ashes out of her tobacco-pipe, 
 and replenished the doodeen with some of the fresh stock 
 Darby had presented. 
 
 " Faix, an' that 's thrue, sure enough. 0, but you 've 
 a power o' knowledge, granny ! ! Sure enough, indeed, 
 there 's no knowin' ; but they say there 's great virtue in 
 dhrames." 
 
 " That 's ondeniable, Darby," said the hag, " and 
 by the same token maybe you 'd step into the house
 
 62 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 and bring me out a bit o' 'live turf* to light my 
 pipe." 
 
 "To be sure, granny." And away went Darby to 
 execute the commission. 
 
 While he was raking, from amongst the embers on the 
 hearth, a piece of turf sufficiently " alive " for the pur- 
 pose, Oonah made her appearance outside the hut, and 
 gave the usual cordial salutation to the old woman ; 
 just as she had done her civility, out came Darby, hold- 
 ing the bit of turf between the two extremities of an 
 osier twig, bent double for the purpose of forming rus- 
 tic tongs. 
 
 " Musha, an' is that you, Darby ? " said Oonah. 
 
 " Who else would it be ? " said Darby. 
 
 " Why, you towld me over an hour agone, down there 
 in the big field, that you wor in a hurry." 
 
 " And so I am in a hurry, and would n't be here, only 
 I jist stepped in to say God save you to the mother here, 
 and to light her pipe for her, the craythur." 
 
 " Well, don't be standin' there, lettin' the coal go 
 black out, Darby," said the woman ; " but let me light 
 my pipe at wanst." 
 
 " To be sure, granny," said Darby, applying the mor- 
 sel of lighted ember to the bowl of her pipe, until the 
 process of ignition had been effected. " And now, 
 Oonah, my darlint, if you're so sharp an other people, 
 what the dickens brings you here, when it is mindin' 
 
 * In Ireland the tobacco in a pipe is very generally ignited 
 by the application of a piece of burning turf, or, as it is figura- 
 tively called, 'live turf.
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 63 
 
 the geese in the stubbles you ought to be, and not here P 
 What would the misthriss say to that, I wondher ? " 
 
 " 0, 1 left them safe enough, and they 're able to take 
 care of themselves for a bit, and I wanted to ax the 
 granny about a dhrame I had." 
 
 " Sure, so do I," said Darby ; " and you know first come 
 first sarved is a good owld sayin'. And so, granny, you 
 own to it that there 's a power o' vartue in dhrames ? " 
 
 A long-drawn whiff of the pipe was all the hag vouch- 
 safed in return. 
 
 " O, then, but that 's the iligant tabaccy ! musha but 
 it 's fine and sthrong, and takes the breath from one 
 a'most, it 's so good. Long life to you Darby, 
 paugh ! ! " 
 
 " You 're kindly welkim, granny. An' as I was sayin' 
 about the dhrames, you say there 's a power o' virtue 
 in them." 
 
 " Who says agin it ? " said the hag, authoritatively, and 
 looking with severity on Darby. 
 
 " Sure, an' it 's not me you 'd suspect o' the like ? I 
 was only goin' to say that myself had a mighty sharp 
 dhrame last night, and sure I kem to ax you about the 
 tnaynin' av it." 
 
 " Well, avic, tell us your dhrame," said the hag, suck- 
 ing her pipe with increased energy. 
 
 " Well, you see," said Darby, " I dhremt I was goin' 
 along a road, and that all of a suddint I kem to crass 
 roads, and you know there's great vartue in crass 
 roads." 
 
 " That 's thrue, avourneen ! paugh ! ! go an." 
 
 " Well, as I was sayin', I kem to the crass roads, and
 
 64 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 soon afther I seen four walls ; now I think the four walls 
 manes the owld castle." 
 
 " Likely enough, avic." 
 
 " O," said Oonah, who was listening with her mouth 
 as wide open as if the faculty of hearing lay there, instead 
 of in her ears, " sure, you know the owld castle has only 
 three walls, and how could that be it ? " 
 
 " No matther for that," said the crone, " it ought to 
 have four, and that 's the same thing." 
 
 " Well ! well ! I never thought o' that," said Oonah, 
 lifting her hands in wonder ; " sure enough, so it 
 ought ! " 
 
 " Go an, Darby," said the hag. 
 
 " Well, I thought the greatest sight o' crows ever I 
 seen flew out o' the castle, and I think that must mane 
 the goold there is in it." 
 
 " Did you count how many there was ? " said the hag, 
 with great solemnity. 
 
 " Faith, I never thought o' that," said Darby, with an 
 air of vexation. 
 
 " Could you tell me, itself, wor they odd or even, 
 avic ? " 
 
 " Faix, an' I could not say for sartin." 
 
 " Ah, that 's it ! ! " said the crone, shaking her head 
 in token of disappointment. " How can I tell the mayn- 
 in' o' your dhrame, if you don't know how it kem out 
 exactly ? " 
 
 " Well, granny, but don't you think the crows was 
 likely for goold ? " 
 
 " Yis, if they flew heavy." 
 
 "Throth, then, an' now I remimber they did fly
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 65 
 
 heavy, and I said to myself there would be rain soon, 
 the crows was flyin' so heavy." 
 
 " I wish you did n't dhrame o' rain, Darby." 
 
 " Why, granny ? What harm is it ? " 
 
 " 0, nothin', only it comes in a crass place there." 
 
 " But it does n't spile the dhrame, I hope ? " 
 
 " no. Go an." 
 
 " Well, with that, I thought I was passin' by Doolins 
 the miller's, and says he to me, ' Will you carry home 
 this sack o' male for me ? ' Now, you know, male is 
 money, every fool knows ! " 
 
 "Right, avic." 
 
 " And so I tuk the sack o' male an my shouldher, and 
 I thought the weight iv it was killin' me, just as if it was 
 a sack o' goold." 
 , " Go an, Darby." 
 
 " And with that I thought I met with a cat, and that, 
 you know, manes an ill-nathur'd wotaan." 
 
 "Right, Darby." 
 
 "And says she to me, 'Darby Kelleher,' says she, 
 ' you 're mighty yollow, God bless you ; is it the jandhers 
 you have ? ' says she. Now was n't that mighty sharp ? 
 I think the jandhers manes goold ? " 
 
 " Yis, iv it was the yollow jandhers you dhremt iv, and 
 not the black jandhers." 
 
 " Well, it was the yollow jandhers." 
 
 " Very good, avic ; that 's makin' a fair offer at it." 
 
 " I thought so, myself," said Darby, " more by token 
 when there was a dog in my dhrame next ; and that 's a 
 frind, you know." 
 
 " Right, avic." 
 
 a
 
 66 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " And he had a silver collar an him." 
 
 " O, bad luck to that silver collar, Darby ; what made 
 you dhrame o' silver at all ? " 
 
 " Why, what harm ? " 
 
 "O, I thought you knew bether nor to dhrame o' 
 silver; why, cushla machree, sure silver is a disap- 
 pointment all the world over." 
 
 "O murther!" said Darby, in horror, "and is my 
 dhrame spylte by that blackguard collar ? " 
 
 "Nigh hand indeed, but not all out. It would be 
 spylte only for the dog, but the dog is a frind, and so 
 it will be only a frindly disappointment, or maybe a 
 fallin' out with an acquaintance." 
 
 " 0, what matther," said Darby, " so the dhrame is 
 to the good still ! ! " 
 
 " The dhrame is to the good still ; but tell me if you 
 dhremt o' three sprigs o' sparemmt at the ind iv it ? " 
 
 " Why, then, now I could not say for sartin, bekase I 
 was nigh wakin' at the time, and the dhrame was not so 
 clear to me." 
 
 " I wish you could be sartin o' that." 
 
 " Why, I have it an my mind that there was sparemint 
 in it, bekase I thought there was a garden in part iv it, 
 and the sparemint was likely to be there." 
 
 " Sure enough, and so you did dhrame o' the three 
 sprigs o' sparemint ? " 
 
 "Indeed, I could a'most make my book-oath that I 
 dhremt iv it. I 'm partly sartin, if not all out." 
 
 "Well, that's raysonable. It's a good dhrame, 
 Darby." 
 
 " Do you tell me so ! "
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 67 
 
 " 'Deed an' it is, Darby. Now wait till the next quar- 
 ther o' the new moon, and dhrame again then, and you '11 
 see what '11 come of it." 
 
 " By dad an' I will, granny. O but it 's you has taken 
 the maynin' out of it beyant everything; and faix if I 
 find the crock, it's yourself won't be the worse iv it; 
 but I must be goin', granny, for the squire bid me to 
 hurry, or else I would stay longer wid you. Good 
 mornin' to you good mornin', Oonah ! I '11 see you 
 to-morrow some time, granny." And off went Darby, 
 leisurely enough. 
 
 The foregoing dialogue shows the ready credulity of 
 poor Darby ; but it was not in his belief of the " vartue 
 of dbrames " that his weakness only lay. He likewise 
 had a most extensive creed as regarded fairies of all sorts 
 and sizes, and was always on the lookout for a Lepre- 
 chaun. Now a Leprechaun is a fairy of peculiar tastes, 
 properties, and powers, which it is necessary to acquaint 
 the reader with. His taste as to occupation is very 
 humble, for he employs himself in making shoes, and he 
 loves retirement, being fond of shady nooks where he can 
 sit alone and pursue his avocation undisturbed. He is 
 quite a hermit in this respect, for there is no instance on 
 record of two Leprechauns being seen together. But he 
 is quite a beau in his dress, notwithstanding, for he wears 
 a red square-cut coat, richly laced with gold, waistcoat 
 and inexpressibles of the same, cocked hat, shoes, and 
 buckles. He has the property of deceiving, in so great 
 a degree, those who chance to discover him, that none 
 have ever yet been known whom he has not overreached 
 in the " keen encounter of the wits," which his meeting
 
 68 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 with mortals always produces. This is occasioned by his 
 possessing the power of bestowing unbounded wealth on 
 whoever can keep him within sight until he is weary of 
 the surveillance, and gives the ransom demanded, and to 
 this end, the object of the mortal who is so fortunate as 
 to surprise one is to seize him and never withdraw his 
 eye from him, until the threat of destruction forces the 
 Leprechaun to produce the treasure; but the sprite is 
 too many for us clumsy-witted earthlings, and is sure, 
 by some device, to make us avert our eyes, when he 
 vanishes at once. 
 
 This Enchanted Cobbler of the meadows, Darby Kel- 
 leher was always on the lookout for. But though so con- 
 stantly on the watch for a Leprechaun, he never had got 
 even within sight of one, and the name of the Fairy-Finder 
 was bestowed upon him in derision. Many a trick too 
 was played upon him ; sometimes a twig stuck amongst 
 long grass, with a red rag hanging upon it, has betrayed 
 Darby into a cautious observance and approach, until a 
 nearer inspection, and a laugh from behind some neigh- 
 boring hedge, have dispelled the illusion. But this, 
 though often repeated, did not cure him, and no turkey- 
 cock had a quicker eye for a bit of red, or flew at it with 
 greater eagerness, than Darby Kelleher ; and he enter- 
 tained the belief that one day or other he would reap the 
 reward of all his watching, by finding a Leprechaun in 
 good earnest. 
 
 But that was all in the hands of Fate, and must be 
 waited for ; in the mean time there was the castle and 
 the "crock o' goold" for a certainty, and, under the 
 good omens of the " sharp dhrame " he had, he deter-
 
 THE ^-AIRY-FINDER. 69 
 
 mined on taking that affair in hand at once. For his 
 companion in the labor of digging, and pulling the pon- 
 derous walls of the castle to pieces, he selected Oonah, 
 who was, in the parlance of her own class, " a brave 
 two-handed long-sided jack," and as great a believer in 
 dreams and omens as Darby himself; besides, she prom- 
 ised profound secrecy, and agreed to take a small share 
 of the treasure for her reward in assisting to discover it. 
 
 For about two months Darby and Oonah labored in 
 vain ; but at last something came of their exertions. In 
 the course of their work, when they occasionally got 
 tired, they would sit down to rest themselves and talk 
 over their past disappointments and future hopes. Now 
 it was during one of these intervals of repose that Darby, 
 as he was resting himself on one of the coign-stones of 
 ,the ruin, suddenly discovered that he was in love with 
 Oonah. 
 
 Now Oonah happened to be thinking much in the 
 same sort of way about Darby, at that very moment, and 
 the end of the affair was, that Darby and Oonah were 
 married the Sunday following. 
 
 The calculating Englishman will ask, Did he find the 
 treasure before he married the girl? The unsophisti- 
 cated boys of the sod never calculate on these occasions ; 
 and the story goes that Oonah Lenehan was the only 
 treasure Darby discovered in the old castle. Darby's 
 acquaintances were in high glee on the occasion, and 
 swore he got a great lob ; for Oonah, be it remembered, 
 was on the grenadier scale, or what in Ireland is called 
 " the full of a door," and the news spread over the coun- 
 try in some such fashion as this :
 
 70 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Arrah, an' did you hear the news ? " 
 
 " What news ? " 
 
 "About Darby Kelleher." 
 
 "What of him?" 
 
 " Sure he found a fairy at last." 
 
 " Tare an ounty ! " 
 
 " Thruth I 'm telhn' you. He 's married to Oonah 
 Lenehan." 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! ha ! by the powers it 's she that is the rale 
 fairy ! musha, more power to you, Darby, but you 've 
 cotched it in airnest now ! " 
 
 But the fairy he had caught did not satisfy Darby so 
 far as to make him give up the pursuit* for the future. 
 He was still on the watch for a Leprechaun ; and one 
 morning, as he was going to his work, he stopped sud- 
 denly on his path, which lay through a field of standing 
 corn, and his eye became riveted on some object with the 
 most eager expression. He crouched, and crawled, and 
 was making his way with great caution towards the point 
 of his attraction, when he was visited on the back of the 
 head with a thump that considerably disturbed his visual 
 powers, and the voice of his mother, a vigorous old bel- 
 dame, saluted his ear at the same time with a hearty, 
 " Bad luck to you, you lazy thief, what are you slindging 
 there for, when it's minding your work you ought to 
 be?" 
 
 "Whisht ! whisht ! mother," said Darby, holding up his 
 hand in token of silence. 
 
 " What do you mane, you omadhaun ? " 
 
 " Mother, be quiet, I bid you ! whisht ! I see it ! " 
 
 " What do you see ? "
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDEE. 71 
 
 " Stoop down here. Straight fominst you, don't you 
 see it as plain as a pikestaff? " 
 
 " See what ? " 
 
 " That httle red thing." 
 
 "Well, what of it?" 
 
 " See there, how it stirs. murther ! it 's goin' to 
 be off afore I can catch it. murther ! why did you 
 come here at all, makin' a noise and frightenin' it 
 away ? " 
 
 " Frightenin' what, you big fool ? " 
 
 " The Leprechaun there. Whisht ! it is quiet agin ! " 
 
 " May the d 1 run a huntin' wid you for a big omad- 
 haun ; why, you born nath'ral, is it that red thing over 
 there you mane ? " 
 
 " Yis, to be sure it is ; don't spake so loud, I tell 
 you." 
 
 " Why, bad scran to you, you fool, it 's a poppy it is, 
 and nothin' else." And the old woman went over to the 
 spot where it grew, and plucking it up by the roots 
 threw it at Darby, with a great deal of abuse into the 
 bargain, and bade him go mind his work, instead of 
 being a "slindging vagabone, as he was." 
 
 It was some time after this occurrence, that Darby 
 Kelleher had a meeting with a certain Doctor Dionysius 
 Mac Finn, whose name became much more famous than 
 it had hitherto been, from the wonderful events that 
 ensued in consequence. 
 
 Of the doctor himself it becomes necessary to say 
 something. His father was one Paddy Finn, and had 
 been so prosperous in the capacity of a cow doctor, that 
 nis son Denis, seeing the dignity of a professor in the
 
 72 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 healing art must increase in proportion to the nobleness 
 of the animal he operates upon, determined to make the 
 human, instead of the brute creation, the object of his 
 care. To this end he was assisted by his father, who 
 had scraped some money together in his humble calling, 
 and having a spice of ambition in him, as well as his 
 aspiring son, he set him up in the neighboring village as 
 an apothecary. Here Denny enjoyed the reputation of 
 being an "iligant bone-setter," and cracked skulls, the 
 result of fair fighting, and whiskey fevers were treated 
 by him on the most approved principles. But Denny's 
 father was gathered unto his fathers, and the son came 
 into the enjoyment of all the old man's money : this, 
 considering his condition, was considerable, and the pos- 
 session of a few hundred pounds so inflated the apothe- 
 cary, that he determined on becoming a " Doctor " at 
 once. Tor this purpose he gave up his apothecary's 
 shop, and set off where do you think? to Spain. 
 Here he remained for some time, and returned to Ire- 
 land, declaring himself a full physician of one of the 
 Spanish universities; his name of Denny Finn trans- 
 formed into Doctor Dionysius Mac Finn, or, as his 
 neighbors chose to call it, Mac Fun, and fun enough 
 the doctor certainly gave birth to. The little money he 
 once had was spent in his pursuit of professional honors, 
 and he returned to his native place with a full title and 
 an empty purse, and his practice did not tend to fill it. 
 At the same time there was a struggle to keep up ap- 
 pearances. He kept a horse, or what he intended to be 
 considered as such, but 't was only a pony, and if he had 
 but occasion to go to the end of the village on a visit,
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 73 
 
 the pony was ordered on service. He was glad to accept 
 an invitation to dinner wherever he had the luck to get 
 one, and the offer of a bed, even, was sure to be accepted, 
 because that insured breakfast the next morning. Thus 
 poor Doctor Dionysius made out the cause ; often asked 
 to dinner from mingled motives of kindness and fun, for 
 while a good dinner was a welcome novelty to the doctor, 
 the absurdities of his pretension and manner rendered him 
 a subject of unfailing diversion to his entertainers. Now 
 he had gone the round of all the snug farmers and country 
 gentlemen in the district, but at last he had the honor to 
 receive an invitation from the squire himself, and on the 
 appointed day Doctor Dionysius bestrode his pony, attired 
 in the full dress of a Spanish physician, which happens 
 to be red from head to foot, and presented himself at 
 "The Hall." 
 
 When a groom appeared to take his " horse " to the 
 stable, the doctor requested that his steed might be 
 turned loose into the lawn, declaring it to be more 
 wholesome for the animal than being cooped up in a 
 house ; the saddle and bridle were accordingly removed, 
 and his desire complied with. 
 
 The doctor's appearance in the drawing-room, attired 
 as he was, caused no small diversion, but attention was 
 speedily called off from him by the announcement of 
 dinner, that electric sound that stimulates a company at 
 the same instant, and supersedes every other considera- 
 tion whatsoever. Moreover, the squire's dinners were 
 notoriously good, and the doctor profited largely by the 
 same that day, and lost no opportunity of filling his glass 
 with the choice wines that surrounded him. This he did 
 
 VOL. XII. 4
 
 74 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to so much purpose, that the poor little man was very 
 far gone when the guests were about to separate. 
 
 At the doctor's request the bell was rung, and his 
 horse ordered, as the last remaining few of the company 
 were about to separate, but every one of them had de- 
 parted, and still there was no announcement of the steed 
 being at the door. At length a servant made his ap- 
 pearance, and said it was impossible to catch the doctor's 
 pony. 
 
 " What do you mean by ' catch ' P " said the squire. 
 "Is it not in the stable?" 
 
 "No, sir." 
 
 Here an explanation ensued, and the squire ordered 
 a fresh attempt to be made to take the fugitive; but, 
 though many fresh hands were employed in the attempt, 
 the pony baffled all their efforts ; every manoeuvre usu- 
 ally resorted to on such occasions, was vainly put in 
 practice. He was screwed up into corners, but no 
 sooner was he there than, squealing and flinging up his 
 heels, he broke through the blockade ; again his flank 
 was turned by nimble runners, but the pony was nimbler 
 still ; a sieve full of oats was presented as an inducement, 
 but the pony was above such vulgar tricks, and defied all 
 attempts at being captured. 
 
 This was the mode by which the doctor generally 
 secured the offer of a bed, and he might have been suc- 
 cessful in this instance, but for a knowing old coachman 
 who was up to the trick, and out of pure fun chose to 
 expose it ; so, bringing out a huge blunderbuss, he said, 
 " Never mind, just let me at him, and I '11 engage 
 I '11 make him stand."
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 75 
 
 "0 my good man," said the doctor, "pray don't 
 take so much trouble ; just let me go with you." And 
 proceeding to the spot where the pony was still luxuriat- 
 ing on the rich grass of the squire's lawn, he gave a low 
 whistle, and the little animal walked up to his owner 
 with as much tractability as a dog. The saddling and 
 bridling did not take much time, and the doctor was 
 obliged to renounce his hopes of a bed and to-morrow's 
 breakfast, and ride home, or homewards, I should say, 
 for it was as little his destiny as bis wish to sleep at 
 home that night : for he was so overpowered with Ms 
 potations, that he could not guide the pony, and the 
 pony's palate was so tickled by the fresh herbage, that 
 he wished for more of it, and finding a gate that led to 
 a meadow open by the roadside, he turned into the field, 
 where he very soon turned the doctor into a ditch, so 
 that they had bed and board between them to their 
 heart's content. 
 
 The doctor and his horse slept and ate profoundly all 
 night, and even the " rosy -fingered morn," as the poets 
 have it, found them in the continuance of their enjoy- 
 ment. Now it happened that Darby Kelleher was pass- 
 ing along the path that lay by the side of the ditch 
 where the doctor was sleeping, and on perceiving him, 
 Darby made as dead a set as ever pointer did at game. 
 
 The doctor, be it remembered, was dressed in red. 
 Moreover, he was a little man, and his gold-laced hat 
 and ponderous shoe-buckles completed the resemblance 
 to the being that Darby took him for. Darby was at 
 last certain that he had discovered a Leprechaun, and 
 amaze so riveted him to the spot, and anxiety made his
 
 76 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 pulse beat so fast, that he could not move nor breathe for 
 some seconds. At last he recovered himself, and go- 
 ing stealthily to the spot where the doctor slept, every 
 inch of his approach made him more certain of the real- 
 ity of his prize ; and when he found himself within reach 
 of it, he made one furious spring, and flung himself on 
 the unfortunate little man, fastening his tremendous fist 
 on his throat, at the same time exclaiming in triumph, 
 " Hurra ! by the hoky, I have you at last ! ! " 
 
 The poor little doctor, thus rudely and suddenly 
 aroused from his tipsy sleep, looked excessively bewil- 
 dered when he opened his eyes, and met the glare of 
 ferocious delight that Darby Kelleher cast upon him, and 
 he gurgled out, " What 's the matter ? " as well as the 
 grip of Darby's hand upon his throat would permit him. 
 
 " Goold 's the matther," shouted Darby, " Goold ! 
 Goold!! Goold!!!" 
 
 " What about Goold ? " says the doctor. 
 
 " Goold ! yallow goold that 's the matther." 
 
 " Is it Paddy Goold that 's taken ill again ? " said the 
 doctor, rubbing his eyes. "Don't choke me, my good 
 man; I '11 go immediately," said he, endeavoring to rise. 
 
 " By my sowl, you won't," said Darby, tightening his 
 hold. 
 
 " For mercy's sake let me go ! " said the doctor. 
 
 " Let you go indeed ! ow ! ow ! " 
 
 " For the tender mercy " 
 
 " Goold ! goold ! you little vagabone ! " 
 
 " Well, I 'm going, if you let me." 
 
 " Divil a step." And here he nearly choked him. 
 
 " Oh ! murder ! for God's sake ! "
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 77 
 
 " Whisht ! ! you thief, how dar you say God, you 
 divil's imp ! ! ! " 
 
 The poor little man, between the suddenness of his 
 waking and the roughness of the treatment he was 
 under, was in such a state of bewilderment, that for the 
 first time he now perceived he was lying amongst grass 
 and under bushes, and, rolling his eyes about, he ex- 
 claimed, 
 
 " Where am I ? God bless me ! " 
 
 "Whisht! you little cruked ottomy by the holy 
 farmer, if you say God agin, I '11 cut your throat." 
 
 " What do you hold me so tight for ? " 
 
 " Just for fear you 'd vanish, you see. O, I know you 
 well ! " 
 
 " Then, my good man, if you know me so well, treat 
 me with proper respect, if you please." 
 
 " Divil send you respect. Respect indeed ! that 's a 
 good thing. Musha bad luck to your impidence, you 
 thievin' owld rogue." 
 
 " Who taught you to call such names to your betters, 
 fellow ? How dare you use a professional gentleman so 
 rudely ? " 
 
 " 0, do you hear this ! ! a profissionil gintleman ! 
 Arrah, do you think I don't know you, you little owld 
 cobbler ? " 
 
 " Cobbler ! Zounds, what do you mean, you ruffian ? 
 Let me go, sirrah ! " And he struggled violently to rise. 
 
 " Not a taste, 'scure to the step you '11 go out o' this 
 till you give me what I want." 
 
 " What do you want, then P " 
 
 "Goold goold!"
 
 78 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Ho ! ho ! so you 're a robber, sir ; you want to rob 
 me, do you ? " 
 
 " Oh ! what robbery it is ! ! throth that won't do, as 
 cunnin' as you think yourself; you won't frighten me 
 that way. Come, give it at wanst, you may as well. 
 I '11 never let go my grip o' you antil you hand me out 
 the goold." 
 
 " Ton the honor of a gentleman, gold nor silver is not 
 in my company. I have fourpence halfpenny in my 
 breeches-pocket, which you are welcome to if you let go 
 my throat." 
 
 " Fourpence hapny ! ! ! Why, then, do you think me 
 sitch a gom, all out, as to put me off wid fourpence 
 hapny ; throth, for three sthraws, this minit I 'd thrash 
 you within an inch o' your life for your impidence. 
 Come, no humbuggin' ; out with the goold ! " 
 
 " I have no gold. Don't choke me : if you murder 
 me, remember there 's law in the land. You 'd better 
 let me go." 
 
 " Not a fut. Gi' me the goold, I tell you, you little 
 vagabone ! ! " said Darby, shaking him violently. 
 
 " Don't murder me, for Heaven's sake ! " 
 
 " I will murdher you if you don't give me a hatful o' 
 goold this minit." 
 
 " A hatful of gold ! Why, whom do you take me 
 for?" 
 
 " Sure I know you' re a Leprechaun, you desaiver o' 
 the world ! " 
 
 " A Leprechaun ! " said the doctor, in mingled indig- 
 nation and amazement. " My good man, you mistake." 
 
 " O, how soft I am ! 'T won't do, I tell you. I have
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 79 
 
 yon, and I 'II howld you ; long I 've been lookin' for 
 you, and I cotch you at last, and by the tarnal o' war 
 I '11 have your life or the goold." 
 
 " My good man, be merciful you mistake 1 'm no 
 Leprechaun ; I 'm Doctor Mac Finn." 
 
 "That won't do either ! you think to desaive me, but 
 't won't do ; just as if I didn't know a docthor from 
 a Leprechaun. Gi' me the goold, you owld chate ! " 
 
 " I tell you I 'm Doctor Dionysius Mac Finn. Take 
 care what you 're about ! there 's law in the land; 
 and I think I begin to know you. Your name is Kelle- 
 her?" 
 
 " 0, you cunnin' owld thief ! 0, then, but you are the 
 complate owld rogue ; only I 'm too able for you. You 
 want to freken me, do you ? 0, you little scrap o' de- 
 , ception, but you are deep ! " 
 
 " Your name is Kelleher I remember. My good 
 fellow, take care ; don't you know I 'm Doctor Mac 
 Finn, don't you see I am ? " 
 
 "Why thin but you have the dirty yollow pinched 
 look iv him, sure enough ; but don't I know you 've only 
 put it an you to desaive me ; besides, the doctor has 
 dirty owld tatthers o' black clothes an him, and is n't as 
 red as a sojer,like you." 
 
 " That 's an accident, my good man." 
 
 " Gi' me the goold this minit, and no more prate wid 
 you." 
 
 "I tell you, Kelleher " 
 
 " Howld your tongue, and gi' me the goold." 
 
 "By all that's " 
 
 "Will you give it?"
 
 80 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 "How can I?" 
 
 " Very well. You '11 see what the ind of it 'ill be," 
 said Darby, rising, but still keeping his iron grip of the 
 doctor. " Now, for the last time, I ask you, will you gi' 
 me the goold ? or, by the powers o' wildfire, I '11 put you 
 where you '11 never see daylight antil you make me a rich 
 man." 
 
 " I have no gold, I tell you." 
 
 " Faix, then I '11 keep you till you find it," said Darby, 
 who tucked the little man under his arm, and ran home 
 with him as fast as he could. 
 
 He kicked at his cabin door for admittance when he 
 reached home, exclaiming, 
 
 " Let me in ! let me in ! Make haste ; I have him." 
 
 " Who have you ? " said Oonah, as she opened the 
 door. 
 
 " Look at that ! " said Darby in triumph ; " I cotch 
 him at last ! " 
 
 " Weira then, is it a Leprechaun it is ? " said Oonah. 
 
 " Divil a less," said Darby, throwing down the doctor 
 on the bed, and still holding him fast. " Open the big 
 chest, Oouah, and we '11 lock him up in it, and keep him 
 antil he gives us the goold." 
 
 " Murder ! murder ! " shouted the doctor. " Lock 
 me up in a chest ! ! " 
 
 " Gi' me the goold, then, and I won't." 
 
 " My good man, you know I have not gold to give." 
 
 " Don't believe him, Darby jewel," said Oonah ; " them 
 Leprechauns is the biggest liars in the world." 
 
 " Sure I know that ! " said Darby, " as well as you. 
 Oh ! all the throuble I 've had wid him ; throth only I 'm
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 81 
 
 aiqual to a counsellor for knowledge, he 'd have nam- 
 plushed me long ago." 
 
 " Long life to you, Darby dear ! " 
 
 " Mrs. Kelleher," said the doctor. 
 
 " Lord ! " said Oonah, in surprise, " did you ever 
 hear the like o' that ? how he knows my name ! " 
 
 " To be sure he does," said Darby, " and why nat ? 
 sure he 's a fairy, you know." 
 
 " I 'm no fairy, Mrs. Kelleher. I 'm a doctor, Doc- 
 tor Mac Finn." 
 
 " Don't b'lieve him, darlin'," said Darby. " Make 
 haste and open the chest." 
 
 " Darby Kelleher," said the doctor, " let me go, and 
 I '11 cure you whenever you want my assistance." 
 
 "Well, I want your assistance now," said Darby, 
 " for I 'm very bad this minit wid poverty ; and if you 
 cure me o' that, I '11 let you go." 
 
 " What will become of me ? " said the doctor in 
 despair, as Darby carried him towards the big chest 
 which Oonah had opened. 
 
 " I '11 tell you what '11 become o' you," said Darby, 
 seizing a hatchet that lay within his reach; "by the 
 seven blessed candles, if you don't consint before night 
 to fill that big chest full o' goold, I '11 chop you as small 
 as aribs (herbs) for the pot." And Darby crammed 
 him into the box. 
 
 " O Mrs. Kelleher, be merciful to me," said the doc- 
 tor, " and whenever you 're sick I '11 attend you." 
 
 "God forbid'." said Oonah; "it's not the likes o' 
 you I want when I 'm sick ; attind me, indeed ! bad 
 luck to you, you little imp, maybe you 'd run away with 
 4* p
 
 82 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 my babby, or it 's a Banshee you 'd turn yourself into, 
 and sing for my death. Shut him up, Darby ; it 's not 
 looky to be howldin' discoorse wid the likes iv him." 
 
 " Oh ! " roared the doctor, as his cries were stifled by 
 the lid of the chest being closed on him. The key was 
 turned, and Oonah sprinkled some holy water she had 
 in a little bottle that hung in one corner of the cabin 
 over the lock, to prevent the fairy having any power 
 upon it. 
 
 Darby and Oonah now sat down in consultation on 
 their affairs, and began forming their plans on an exten- 
 sive scale, as to what they were to do with their money, 
 for have it they must, now that the Leprechaun was 
 fairly in their power. Now and then Darby would rise 
 and go over to the chest, very much as one goes to the 
 door of a room where a naughty child has been locked 
 up, to know " if it be good yet," and giving a thump 
 on the lid would exclaim, " Well, you little vagabone, 
 will you gi' me the goold yet ? " 
 
 A groan and a faint answer of denial was all the reply 
 he received. 
 
 " Very well, stay there ; but, remember, if you don't 
 consint before night I '11 chop you to pieces." He then 
 got his bill-hook, and began to sharpen it close by the 
 chest, that the Leprechaun might hear him ; and when 
 the poor doctor heard this process going forward, he felt 
 more dead than alive ; the horrid scraping of the iron 
 against the stone being interspersed with occasional in- 
 terjectional passages from Darby, such as, " Do you hear 
 that, you thief? I 'm gettin' ready for you." Then away 
 fie 'd rasp at the grindstone again, and, as he paused to
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDER. 83 
 
 feel the edge of the weapon, exclaim, " By the powers, 
 I '11 have it as sharp as a razhir." 
 
 In the mean time it was well for the prisoner that 
 there were many large chinks in the chest, or suffocation 
 from his confinement would have anticipated Darby's 
 pious intentions upon him ; and when he found matters 
 likely to go so hard with him, the thought struck him at 
 last of affecting to be what Darby mistook him for, and 
 regaining his freedom by stratagem. 
 
 To this end, when Darby had done sharpening his bill- 
 hook, the doctor replied, in answer to one of Darby's 
 summonses for gold, that he saw it was in vain longer 
 to deny giving it, that Darby was too cunning for him, 
 and that he was ready to make him the richest man in 
 the country. 
 
 "I'll take no less than the full o' that chest," said 
 Darby. 
 
 " You '11 have ten times the full of it, Darby," said the 
 doctor, " if you '11 only do what I bid you." 
 
 "Sure I '11 do anything." 
 
 "Well, you must first prepare the mystificand-herum- 
 brandherum." 
 
 " Tare an ouns, how do I know what that is ? " 
 
 " Silence, Darby Kelleher, and attend to me : that 's 
 a magical ointment, which I will show you how to make ; 
 and whenever you want gold, all you have to do is to 
 rub a little of it on the point of a pickaxe or your spade, 
 and dig wherever you please, and you will be sure to 
 find treasure." 
 
 " 0, think o' that J faix, an' I '11 make plenty of it, 
 when you show me. How is it made?"
 
 84 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " You must go into the town, Darby, and get me three 
 things, and fold them three times in three rags torn out 
 of the left side of a petticoat that has not known water 
 for a year." 
 
 " Faith, I can do that much, anyhow," said Oonah, 
 who began tearing the prescribed pieces out of her under- 
 garment. 
 
 " And what three things am I to get you ? " 
 
 "First bring me a grain of salt from a house that 
 stands at cross-roads." 
 
 " Crass roads ! " said Darby, looking significantly at 
 Oonah. " By my sowl, but it 's my dhrame 's comin* 
 out ! " 
 
 " Silence, Darby Kelleher," said the doctor with great 
 solemnity; "mark me, Darby Kelleher." And then 
 he proceeded to repeat a parcel of gibberish to Darby, 
 which he enjoined him to remember, and repeat again ; 
 but as Darby could not, the doctor said he should only 
 write it down for him, and, tearing a leaf from his 
 pocket-book, he wrote in pencil a few words, stating the 
 condition he was in, and requesting assistance. This 
 slip of paper he desired Darby to deliver to the apothe- 
 cary in the town, who would give him a drug that would 
 complete the making of the ointment. 
 
 Darby went to the apothecary's as he was desired, and 
 it happened to be dinner-time when he arrived. The 
 apothecary had a few friends dining with him, and Darby 
 was detained until they chose to leave the table, and go, 
 in a body, to liberate the poor little doctor. He was 
 pulled out of the chest amidst the laughter of his liber- 
 ators and the fury of Darby and Oonah, who both made
 
 THE FAIRY-FINDEB. 85 
 
 considerable fight against being robbed of their prize. 
 At last the doctor's friends got him out of the house, 
 and proceeded to the town to supper, where the whole 
 party kept getting magnificently drunk, until sleep 
 plunged them into dizzy dreams of Leprechauns and 
 Fairy-Finders. 
 
 The doctor for some days swore vengeance against 
 Darby, and threatened a prosecution; but his friends 
 recommended him to let the matter rest, as it would 
 only tend to make the affair more public, and get him 
 nothing but laughter for damages. 
 
 As for Darby Kelleher, nothing could ever persuade 
 him that it was not a real Leprechaun he had caught, 
 which by some villanous contrivance, on the Fairy's 
 part, changed itself into the semblance of the doctor ; 
 and he often said the great mistake he made was " givin' 
 the little vagabone so much time, for that if he had done 
 right he 'd have set about cutting his throat at wanst."
 
 MUBAD THE UNLUCKY. 
 
 BY MARIA EDGEWORTH. 
 
 I. 
 
 jjT is well known that the grand seignior amuses 
 himself by going at night, in disguise, through 
 the streets of Constantinople ; as the caliph, 
 Haroun Alraschid, used formerly to do in Bagdad. 
 
 One moonlight night, accompanied by his grand vizier, 
 he traversed several of the principal streets of the city, 
 without seeing anything remarkable. At length, as they 
 were passing a rope-maker's, the sultan recollected the 
 Arabian story of Cogia-Hassan Alhabal, the rope-maker, 
 and his two friends, Saad and Saadi, who differed so 
 much in their opinion concerning the influence of for- 
 tune over human affairs. 
 
 "What is your opinion on this subject?" said the 
 grand seignior to his vizier. 
 
 "I am inclined, please your majesty," replied the viz- 
 ier, "to think that success in the world depends more 
 upon prudence than upon what is called luck, or fortune." 
 
 " And I," said the sultan, " am persuaded that fortune
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 87 
 
 does more for men than prudence. Do you not every 
 day hear of persons who are said to be fortunate or urn- 
 fortunate ? How comes it that this opinion should pre- 
 vail amongst men, if it be not justified by experience ? " 
 
 " It is not for me to dispute with your majesty," re- 
 plied the prudent vizier. 
 
 " Speak your mind freely ; I desire and command it," 
 said the sultan. 
 
 " Then I am of opinion," answered the vizier, " that 
 people are often led to believe others fortunate, or unfor- 
 tunate, merely because they only know the general out- 
 line of their histories ; and are ignorant of the incidents 
 and events in which they have shown prudence or im- 
 prudence. I have heard, for instance, that there are at 
 present in this city two men, who are remarkable for 
 their good and bad fortune : one is called Murad the 
 Unlucky, and the other Saladin the Lucky. Now I am 
 inclined to think, if we could hear their stories, we 
 should find that one is a prudent and the other an im- 
 prudent character." 
 
 " Where do these men live ? " interrupted the sultan. 
 " I will hear their histories from their own lips, before I 
 sleep." 
 
 " Murad the Unlucky lives in the next square," said 
 the vizier. 
 
 The sultan desired to go thither immediately. Scarcely 
 had they entered the square, when they heard the cry of 
 loud lamentations. They followed the sound till they 
 came to a house of which the door was open, and where 
 there was a man tearing his turban, and weeping bitterly. 
 They asked the cause of his distress, and he pointed to
 
 88 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 the fragments of a china vase, which lay on the pave- 
 ment at his door. 
 
 " This seems undoubtedly to be beautiful china," said 
 the sultan, taking up one of the broken pieces ; " but 
 can the loss of a china vase be the cause of such violent 
 grief and despair ? " 
 
 " Ah, gentlemen," said the owner of the vase, sus- 
 pending his lamentations, and looking at the dress of 
 the pretended merchants, " I see that you are strangers : 
 you do not know how much cause I have for grief and 
 despair! You do not know that you are speaking to 
 Murad the Unlucky ! Were you to hear all the unfor- 
 tunate accidents that have happened to me, from the 
 time I was born till this instant, you would perhaps pity 
 me, and acknowledge I have just cause for despair." 
 
 Curiosity was strongly expressed by the sultan ; and 
 the hope of obtaining sympathy inclined Murad to 
 gratify it, by the recital of his adventures. "Gentle- 
 men," said he, " I scarcely dare invite you into the 
 house of such an unlucky being as I am ; but, if you 
 will venture to take a night's lodging under my roof, 
 you shall hear at your leisure the story of my misfor- 
 tunes." 
 
 The sultan and the vizier excused themselves from 
 spending the night with Murad ; saying that they were 
 obliged to proceed to their khan, where they should be 
 expected by their companions : but they begged permis- 
 sion to repose themselves for half an hour in his house, 
 and besought him to relate the history of his life, if it 
 would not renew his grief too much tt recollect his mis- 
 fortunes.
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 89 
 
 Few men are so miserable as not to like to talk of 
 their misfortunes, where they have, or where they think 
 they have, any chance of obtaining compassion. As soon 
 as the pretended merchants were seated, Murad began 
 his story in the following manner : 
 
 " My father was a merchant of this city. The night 
 before I was born, he dreamed that I came into the 
 world with the head of a dog and the tail of a dragon ; 
 and that, in haste to conceal my deformity, he rolled me 
 up in a piece of linen, which unluckily proved to be the 
 grand seignior's turban ; who, enraged at his insolence 
 in touching his turban, commanded that his head should 
 be struck off. 
 
 " My father awaked before he lost his head, but not 
 before he had lost half his wits from the terror of his 
 dream. He considered it as a warning sent from above, 
 and consequently determined to avoid the sight of me. 
 He would not stay to see whether I should really be 
 born with the head of a dog and the tail of a dragon ; 
 but he set out, the next morning, on a voyage to 
 Aleppo. 
 
 "He was absent for upwards of seven years; and 
 during that time my education was totally neglected. 
 One day I inquired from my mother why I had been 
 named Murad the Unlucky. She told me that this 
 name was given to me in consequence of my father's 
 dream ; but she added that perhaps it might be for- 
 gotten, if I proved fortunate in my future life. My 
 nurse, a very old woman, who was present, shook her 
 head, with a look which I shall never forget, and whis- 
 pered to my mother loud enough for me to hear, ' Unlucky
 
 90 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 he was, and is, and ever will be. Those that are born to 
 ill luck cannot help themselves; nor can any, but the 
 great prophet Mahomet himself, do anything for them. 
 It is a folly for an unlucky person to strive with his 
 fate : it is better to yield to it at once.' 
 
 " This speech made a terrible impression upon me, 
 young as I then was ; and every accident that happened 
 to me afterwards confirmed my belief in my nurse's 
 prognostic. I was in my eighth year when my father 
 returned from abroad. The year after he came home 
 my brother Saladin was born, who was named Saladin 
 the Lucky, because the day he was born a vessel 
 freighted with rich merchandise for my father arrived 
 safely in port. 
 
 " I will not weary you with a relation of all the little 
 instances of good fortune by which my brother Saladin 
 was distinguished, even during his childhood. As he 
 grew up, his success in everything he undertook was as 
 remarkable as my ill luck in all that I attempted. From 
 the time the rich vessel arrived, we lived in splendor ; 
 and the supposed prosperous state of my father's affairs 
 was of course attributed to the influence of my brother 
 Saladin's happy destiny. 
 
 " When Saladin was about twenty, my father was 
 taken dangerously ill ; and as he felt that he should not 
 recover, he sent for my brother to the side of his bed, 
 and, to his great surprise, informed him that the mag- 
 nificence in which we had lived had exhausted all his 
 wealth ; that his affairs were in the greatest disorder ; 
 for, having trusted to the hope of continual success, he 
 had embarked in projects beyond his powers.
 
 MUKAD THE UNLUCKY. 91 
 
 " The sequel was, he had nothing remaining to leave 
 to his children but two large china vases, remarkable for 
 their beauty, but still more valuable on account of cer- 
 tain verses inscribed upon them in an unknown charac- 
 ter, which was supposed to operate as a talisman or 
 charm in favor of their possessors. 
 
 " Both these vases my father bequeathed to my brother 
 Saladin ; declaring he could not venture to leave either 
 of them to me, because I was so unlucky that I should 
 inevitably break it. After his death, however, my brother 
 Saladin, who was blessed with a generous temper, gave 
 me my choice of the two vases ; and endeavored to raise 
 my spirits, by repeating frequently that he had no faith 
 either in good fortune or ill fortune. 
 
 "I could not be of his opinion, though I felt and 
 acknowledged his kindness in trying to persuade me out 
 of my settled melancholy. I knew it was in vain for 
 me to exert myself, because I was sure that, do what 
 I would, I should still be Murad the Unlucky. My 
 brother, on the contrary, was nowise cast down, even 
 by the poverty in which my father left us : he said he 
 was sure he should find some means of maintaining him- 
 self, and so he did. 
 
 " On examining our china vases, he found in them a 
 powder of a bright scarlet color ; and it occurred to him 
 that it would make a fine dye. He tried it, and after 
 some trouble, it succeeded to admiration. 
 
 " During my father's lifetime, my mother had been 
 supplied with rich dresses, by one of the merchants who 
 was employed by the ladies of the grand seignior's se- 
 raglio. My brother had done this merchant some trifling
 
 92 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 favors; and, upon application to him, he readily en- 
 gaged to recommend the new scarlet dye. Indeed, it 
 was so beautiful, that, the moment it was seen, it was 
 preferred to every other color. Saladin's shop was soon 
 crowded with customers ; and his winning manners and 
 pleasant conversation were almost as advantageous to him 
 as his scarlet dye. On the contrary, I observed that the 
 first glance at my melancholy countenance was sufficient 
 to disgust every one who saw me. I perceived this 
 plainly ; and it only confirmed me the more in my be- 
 lief in my own evil destiny. 
 
 " It happened one day that a lady, richly apparelled 
 and attended by two female slaves, came to my brother's 
 house to make some purchases. He was out, and I 
 alone was left to attend to the shop. After she had 
 looked over some goods, she chanced to see my china 
 vase, which was in the room. She took a prodigious 
 fancy to it, and offered me any price if I would part 
 with it ; but this I declined doing, because I believed 
 that I should draw down upon my head some dreadful 
 calamity, if I voluntarily relinquished the talisman. Ir- 
 ritated by my refusal, the lady, according to the custom 
 of her sex, became more resolute in her purpose; but 
 neither entreaties nor money could change my determi- 
 nation. Provoked beyond measure at my obstinacy, as 
 she called it, she left the house. 
 
 " On my brother's return, I related to him what had 
 happened, and expected that he would have praised me 
 for my prudence; but, on the contrary, he blamed me 
 for the superstitious value I set upon the verses on my 
 vase ; and observed that it would be the height of folly
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 93 
 
 to lose a certain means of advancing my fortune, for the 
 uncertain hope of magical protection. I could not bring 
 myself to be of his opinion ; I had not the courage to 
 follow the advice he gave. The next day the lady re- 
 turned, and my brother sold his vase to her for ten 
 thousand pieces of gold. This money he laid out in the 
 most advantageous manner, by purchasing a new stock 
 of merchandise. I repented, when it was too late ; but 
 I believe it is part of the fatality attending certain per- 
 sons, that they cannot decide rightly at the proper mo- 
 ment. When the opportunity has been lost, I have 
 always regretted that I did not do exactly the contrary 
 to what I had previously determined upon. Often, whilst 
 I was hesitating, the favorable moment passed. Now 
 this is what I call being unlucky. But to proceed with 
 my story. 
 
 " The kdy, who bought my brother Saladin's vase, was 
 the favorite of the sultan, and all-powerful in the seraglio. 
 Her dislike to me, in consequence of my opposition to 
 her wishes, was so violent, that she refused to return to 
 my brother's house while I remained there. He was 
 unwilling to part with me ; but I could not bear to be 
 the ruin of so good a brother. Without telling him my 
 design, I left his house, careless of what should become 
 of me. Hunger, however, soon compelled me to think 
 of some immediate mode of obtaining relief. I sat down 
 upon a stone, before the door of a baker's shop ; the 
 smell of hot bread tempted me in, and with a feeble 
 voice I demanded charity. 
 
 " The master baker gave me as much bread as I could 
 eat, upon condition that I should change dresses with
 
 94 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 him, and carry the rolls for him through the city this 
 day. To this I readily consented ; but I had soon rea- 
 son to repent of my compliance. Indeed, if my ill luck 
 had not, as usual, deprived me at this critical moment 
 of memory and judgment, I should never have complied 
 with the baker's treacherous proposal. For some time 
 before, the people of Constantinople had been much 
 dissatisfied with the weight and quality of the bread 
 furnished by the bakers. This species of discontent has 
 often been the sure forerunner of an insurrection ; and, 
 in these disturbances, the master bakers frequently lose 
 their lives. All these circumstances I knew; but they 
 did not occur to my memory, when they might have 
 been useful. 
 
 " I changed dresses with the baker ; but scarcely had 
 I proceeded through the adjoining streets with my rolls, 
 before the mob began to gather round me, with re- 
 proaches and execrations. The crowd pursued me even 
 to the gates of the grand seignior's palace ; and the 
 grand vizier, alarmed at their violence, sent out an 
 order to have my head struck off; the usual remedy, in 
 such cases, being to strike off the baker's head. 
 
 " I now fell upon my knees, and protested I was not 
 the baker for whom they took me ; that I had no con- 
 nection with him ; and that I had never furnished the 
 people of Constantinople with bread that was not weight. 
 I declared I had merely changed clothes with a master 
 baker, for this day ; and that I should not have done so, 
 but for the evil destiny which governs all my actions. 
 Some of the mob exclaimed that I deserved to lose my 
 head for my folly; but others took pity on me, and
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 95 
 
 whilst the officer, who was sent to execute the vizier's 
 order, turned to speak to some of the noisy rioters, those 
 who were touched by my misfortune opened a passage 
 for me through the crowd, and, thus favored, I effected 
 my escape. 
 
 " I quitted Constantinople : my vase I had left in the 
 care of my brother. At some miles' distance from the 
 city, I overtook a party of soldiers. I joined them ; and 
 learning that they were going to embark with the rest of 
 the grand seignior's army for Egypt, I resolved to accom- 
 pany them. If it be, thought I, the will of Mahomet 
 that I should perish, the sooner I meet my fate the 
 better. The despondency into which I was sunk was 
 attended by so great a degree of indolence, that I scarcely 
 would take the necessary means to preserve my existence. 
 'During our passage to Egypt, I sat all day long upon the 
 deck of the vessel, smoking my pipe ; and I am convinced 
 that if a storm had risen, as I expected, I should not 
 have taken my pipe from my mouth, nor should I have 
 handled a rope, to save myself from destruction. Such 
 is the effect of that species of resignation or torpor, 
 whichever you please to call it, to which my strong 
 belief in fatality had reduced my mind. 
 
 " We landed, however, safely, contrary to my melan- 
 choly forebodings. By a trifling accident, not worth 
 relating, I was detained longer than any of my compan- 
 ions in the vessel when we disembarked ; and I did not 
 arrive at the camp till late at night. It was moonlight, 
 and I could see the whole scene distinctly. There was 
 a vast number of small tents scattered over a desert of 
 white sand ; a few date-trees were visible at a distance ;
 
 96 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 all was gloomy, and all still ; no sound was to be heard 
 but that of the camels, feeding near the tents ; and, as I 
 walked on, I met with no human creature. 
 
 " My pipe was now out, and 1 quickened my pace a 
 little towards a fire, which I saw near one of the tents. 
 As I proceeded, my eye was caught by something spark- 
 ling in the sand : it was a ring. I picked it up, and put 
 it on my finger, resolving to give it to the public crier 
 the next morning, who might find out its rightful owner : 
 but by ill luck, I put it on my little finger, for which it 
 was much too large ; and as I hastened towards the fire to 
 light my pipe, I dropped the ring. I stooped to search 
 for it amongst the provender on which a mule was feed- 
 ing ; and the cursed animal gave me so violent a kick on 
 the head, that I could not help roaring aloud. 
 
 " My cries awakened those who slept in the tent, near 
 which the mule was feeding. Provoked at being dis- 
 turbed, the soldiers were ready enough to think ill of 
 me ; and they took it for granted that I was a thief, who 
 had stolen the ring I pretended to have just found. The 
 ring was taken from me by force ; and the next day I 
 was bastinadoed* for having found it: the oflicer persist- 
 ing in the belief that stripes would make me confess 
 where I had concealed certain other articles of value, 
 which had lately been missed in the camp. All this was 
 the consequence of my being in a hurry to light my pipe, 
 and of my having put the ring on a finger that was too 
 little for it ; which no one but Murad the Unlucky would 
 have done. 
 
 "When I was able to walk again after my wounds 
 were healed, I went into one of the tents distinguished
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 97 
 
 by a red flag, having been told that these were coffee- 
 houses. Whilst I was drinking coffee, I heard a stranger 
 near me complaining that he had not been able to recover 
 a valuable ring he had lost ; although he had caused his 
 loss to be published for three days by the public crier, 
 offering a reward of two hundred sequins to whoever 
 should restore it. I guessed that this was the very ring 
 which I had unfortunately found. I addressed myself to 
 the stranger, and promised to point out to him the per- 
 son who had forced it from me. The stranger recovered 
 his ring ; and, being convinced that I had acted honestly, 
 he made me a present of two hundred sequins, as some 
 amends for the punishment which I had unjustly suffered 
 on his account. 
 
 " Now you would imagine that this purse of gold was 
 advantageous to me : far the contrary ; it was the cause 
 of new misfortunes. 
 
 "One night, when I thought that the soldiers who 
 were in the same tent with me were all fast asleep, J 
 indulged myself in the pleasure of counting my treasure. 
 The next day I was invited by my companions to drinli 
 sherbet with them. What they mixed with the sherbet 
 which I drank, I know not ; but I could not resist the 
 drowsiness it brought on. I fell into a profound slum- 
 ber ; and, when I awoke, I found myself lying under a 
 date-tree, at some distance from the camp. 
 
 "The first thing I thought of, when I came to my 
 recollection, was my purse of sequins. The purse I 
 found still safe in my girdle ; but, on opening it, I per- 
 ceived that it was filled with pebbles, and not a single 
 sequin was left. I had no doubt that I had been robbed 
 
 VOL. XII. 5 &
 
 98 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 by the soldiers with whom I had drunk sherbet ; and I 
 am certain that some of them must have been awake the 
 night I counted my money ; otherwise, as I had never 
 trusted the secret of my riches to any one, they could 
 not have suspected me of possessing any property ; for, 
 ever since I kept company with them, I had appeared to 
 be in great indigence. 
 
 " I applied in vain to the superior officers for redress : 
 the soldiers protested they were innocent; no positive 
 proof appeared against them, and I gained nothing by 
 my complaint but ridicule and ill-will. I called myself, 
 in the first transport of my grief, by that name which, 
 since my arrival in Egypt, I had avoided to pronounce : 
 I called myself Murad the Unlucky ! The name and the 
 story ran through the camp ; and I was accosted after- 
 wards, very frequently, by this appellation. Some indeed 
 varied their wit by calling me Murad with the purse of 
 pebbles. 
 
 " All that I had yet suffered is nothing compared to 
 my succeeding misfortunes. 
 
 " It was the custom at this time, in the Turkish camp, 
 for the soldiers to amuse themselves with firing at a 
 mark. The superior officers remonstrated against this 
 dangerous practice, but ineffectually. Sometimes a party 
 of soldiers would stop firing for a few minutes, after a 
 message was brought them from their commanders ; and 
 then they would begin again, in defiance of all orders. 
 Such was the want of discipline in our army, that this dis- 
 obedience went unpunished. In the mean time, the fre- 
 quency of the danger made most men totally regardless 
 of it. I have seen tents pierced with bullets, in which
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 99 
 
 parties -were quietly seated smoking their pipes, whilst 
 those without were preparing to take fresh aim at the 
 red flag on the top. 
 
 " This apathy proceeded, in some, from unconquerable 
 indolence of body ; in others, from the intoxication pro- 
 duced by the fumes of tobacco and of opium; but in 
 most of my brother Turks it arose from the confidence 
 which the belief in predestination inspired. When a 
 bullet killed one of their companions, they only observed, 
 scarcely taking the pipes from their mouths, ' Our hour 
 is not yet come : it is not the will of Mahomet that we 
 should fall.' 
 
 " I own that this rash security appeared to me, at first, 
 surprising ; but it soon ceased to strike me with wonder ; 
 and it even tended to confirm my favorite opinion, that 
 some were born to good and some to evil fortune. I 
 became almost as careless as my companions, from fol- 
 lowing the same course of reasoning. It is not, thought 
 I, in the power of human prudence to avert the stroke of 
 destiny. I shall perhaps die to-morrow ; let me there- 
 fore enjoy to-day. 
 
 " I now made it my study, every day, to procure as 
 much amusement as possible. My poverty, as you will 
 imagine, restricted me from indulgence and excess ; but 
 I soon found means to spend what did not actually be- 
 long to me. There were certain Jews who were follow- 
 ers of the camp, and who, calculating on the probability 
 of victory for our troops, advanced money to the soldiers ; 
 for which they engaged to pay these usurers exorbitant 
 interest. The Jew to whom I applied traded with me 
 also upon the belief that my brother Saladin, with whose
 
 100 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 character and circumstances he was acquainted, would 
 pay my debts, if I should fall. With the money I raised 
 from the Jew I continually bought coffee and opium, of 
 which I grew immoderately fond. In the delirium it 
 created, I forgot all my misfortunes, all fear of the 
 future. 
 
 " One day, when I had raised my spirits by an unusual 
 quantity of opium, I was strolling through the camp, 
 sometimes singing, sometimes dancing, like a madman, 
 and repeating that I was not now Murad the Unlucky. 
 Whilst these words were on my lips, a friendly spectator, 
 who was in possession of his sober senses, caught me 
 by the arm, and attempted to drag me from the place 
 where I was exposing myself. ' Do you not see/ said 
 he, ' those soldiers, who are firing at a mark ? I saw one 
 of them, just now, deliberately taking aim at your tur- 
 ban ; and, observe, he is now reloading his piece.' My 
 ill luck prevailed even at this instant, the only instant 
 in my life when I defied its power. I struggled with my 
 adviser, repeating, ' I am not the wretch you take me 
 for ; I am not Murad the Unlucky.' He fled from the 
 danger himself : I remained, and in a few seconds after- 
 wards a ball reached me, and I fell senseless on the 
 sand. 
 
 " The ball was cut out of my body by an awkward 
 surgeon, who gave me ten times more pain than was 
 necessary. He was particularly hurried, at this time, 
 because the army had just received orders to march in 
 a few hours, and all was confusion in the camp. My 
 wound was excessively painful, and the fear of being left 
 behind with those who were deemed incurable added to
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 101 
 
 my torments. Perhaps, if I had kept myself quiet, I 
 might have escaped some of the evils I afterwards en- 
 dured ; but, as I have repeatedly told you, gentlemen, 
 it was my ill fortune never to be able to judge what 
 was best to be done, till the time for prudence was 
 past. 
 
 " During that day, when my fever was at the height, and 
 when my orders were to keep my bed, contrary to my 
 natural habits of indolence, I rose a hundred times, and 
 went out of my tent in the very heat of the day, to sat- 
 isfy my curiosity as to the number of the tents which had 
 not been struck, and of the soldiers who had not yet 
 marched. The orders to march were tardily obeyed, and 
 many hours elapsed before our encampment was raised. 
 Had I submitted to my surgeon's orders, I might have 
 been in a state to accompany the most dilatory of the 
 stragglers ; I could have borne, perhaps, the slow motion 
 of a litter, on which some of the sick were transported ; 
 but in the evening, when the surgeon came to dress my 
 wounds, he found me in such a situation that it was 
 scarcely possible to remove me. 
 
 "He desired a party of soldiers, who were left to 
 bring up the rear, to call for me the next morning. 
 They did so ; but they wanted to put me upon the mule 
 which I recollected, by a white streak on its back, to be 
 the cursed animal that had kicked me whilst I was look- 
 ing for the ring. I could not be prevailed upon to go 
 upon this unlucky animal. I tried to persuade the sol- 
 diers to carry me, and they took me a little way ; but, 
 soon growing weary of their burden, they laid me down 
 on the sand, pretending that they were going to fill a
 
 102 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 skin with water at a spring they had discovered, and bade 
 me lie still, and wait for their return. 
 
 " I waited and waited, longing for the water to mois- 
 ten my parched lips ; but no water came, no soldiers 
 returned ; and there I lay, for several hours, expecting 
 every moment to breathe my last. I made no effort to 
 move, for I was now convinced my hour was come, and 
 that it was the will of Mahomet that I should perish in 
 this miserable manner, and lie unburied like a dog; a 
 death, thought I, worthy of Murad the Unlucky. 
 
 " My forebodings were not this tune just ; a detach- 
 ment of English soldiers passed near the place where I 
 lay : my groans were heard by them, and they humanely 
 came to my assistance. They carried me with them, 
 dressed my wound, and treated me with the utmost ten- 
 derness. Christians though they were, I must acknowl- 
 edge that I had reason to love them better than any of 
 the followers of Mahomet, my good brother only excepted. 
 
 " Under their care I recovered ; but scarcely had I 
 regained my strength before I fell into new disasters. 
 It was hot weather, and my thirst was excessive. I went 
 out with a party, in hopes of finding a spring of water. 
 The English soldiers began to dig for a well, in a place 
 pointed out to them by one of their men of science. I 
 was not inclined to such hard labor, but preferred saun- 
 tering on in search of a spring. I saw at a distance 
 something that looked like a pool of water ; and I pointed 
 it out to my companions. Their man of science warned 
 me by his interpreter not to trust to this deceitful appear- 
 ance; for that such were common in this country, and 
 that, when I came close to the spot, I should find no
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 103 
 
 water there. He added that it was at a greater distance 
 than I imagined ; and that I should, in all probability, 
 be lost in the desert, if I attempted to follow this phantom. 
 
 " I was so unfortunate as not to attend to his advice : 
 I set out in pursuit of this accursed delusion, which 
 assuredly was the work of evil spirits, who clouded my 
 reason, and allured me into their dominion. I went on, 
 hour after hour, in expectation continually of reaching 
 the object of my wishes ; but it fled faster than I pur- 
 sued, and I discovered at last that the Englishman, who 
 had doubtless gained his information from the people of 
 the country, was right ; and that the shining appearance, 
 which I had taken for water, was a mere deception. 
 
 " I was now exhausted with fatigue : I looked back in 
 vain after the companions I had left ; I could see neither 
 men, animals, nor any trace of vegetation in the sandy 
 desert. I had no resource but, weary as I was, to meas- 
 ure back my footsteps, which were imprinted in the sand. 
 
 " I slowly and sorrowfully traced them as my guides 
 in this unknown land. Instead of yielding to my in- 
 dolent inclinations, I ought, however, to have made the 
 best of my way back, before the evening breeze sprung 
 up. I felt the breeze rising, and, unconscious of my 
 danger, I rejoiced, and opened my bosom to meet it ; but 
 what was my dismay when I saw that the wind swept 
 before it all trace of my footsteps in the sand. I knew 
 not which way to proceed ; I was struck with despair, 
 tore my garments, threw off my turban, and cried aloud ; 
 but neither human voice nor echo answered me. The 
 silence was dreadful. I had tasted no food for many 
 hours, and I now became sick and faint. I recollected
 
 104 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 that I had put a supply of opium into the folds of my 
 turban ; but, alas ! when I took my turban up, I found 
 that the opium had fallen out. I searched for it in vain 
 on the sand, where I had thrown the turban. 
 
 " I stretched myself out upon the ground, and yielded 
 without further struggle to my evil destiny. What I 
 suffered from thirst, hunger, and heat cannot be de- 
 scribed ! At last I fell into a sort of trance, during 
 which images of various kinds seemed to flit before my 
 eyes. How long I remained in this state I know not ; 
 but I remember that I was brought to my senses by a 
 loud shout, which came from persons belonging to a car- 
 avan returning from Mecca. This was a shout of joy 
 for their safe arrival at a certain spring, well known to 
 them in this part of the desert. 
 
 " The spring was not a hundred yards from the spot 
 where I lay ; yet, such had been the fate of Murad the 
 Unlucky, that he missed the reality, whilst he had been 
 hours in pursuit of the phantom. Feeble and spiritless 
 as I was, I sent forth as loud a cry as I could, in hopes 
 of obtaining assistance; and I endeavored to crawl to 
 the place from which the voices appeared to come. The 
 caravan rested for a considerable time whilst the slaves 
 filled the skins with water, and whilst the camels took in 
 their supply. I worked myself on towards them ; yet, 
 notwithstanding my efforts, I was persuaded that, accord- 
 ing to my usual ill fortune, I should never be able to 
 make them hear my voice. I saw them mount their 
 camels ! I took off my turban, unrolled it, and waved it 
 in the air. My signal was seen! The caravan came 
 towards me!
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 105 
 
 " I had scarcely strength to speak : a slave gave me 
 some water ; and, after I had drunk, I explained to them 
 who I was, and how I came into this situation. 
 
 " Whilst I was speaking, one of the travellers observed 
 the purse which hung to my girdle : it was the same the 
 merchant, for whom I recovered the ring, had given to 
 me ; I had carefully preserved it, because the initials of 
 my benefactor's name, and a passage from the Koran, 
 were worked upon it. When he gave it to me, he said 
 that perhaps we should meet again in some other part 
 of the world, and he should recognize me by this token. 
 The person who now took notice of the purse was his 
 brother ; and when I related to him how I had obtained 
 it, he had the goodness to take me under his protection. 
 He was a merchant, who was now going with the caravan 
 to Grand Cairo : he offered to take me with him, and I 
 willingly accepted the proposal, promising to serve him 
 as faithfully as any of his slaves. The caravan pro- 
 ceeded, and I was carried with it. 
 
 II. 
 
 " THE merchant, who was become my master, treated 
 me with great kindness ; but, on hearing me relate the 
 whole series of my unfortunate adventures, he exacted 
 a promise from me, that I would do nothing without first 
 consulting him. ' Since you are so unlucky, Murad,' 
 said he, ' that you always choose for the worst when you 
 choose for yourself, you should trust entirely to the 
 judgment of a wiser or a more fortunate friend.' 
 
 "I fared well in the service of this merchant, who 
 5*
 
 106 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 was a man of a mild disposition, and who was so rich 
 that he could afford to be generous to all his dependants. 
 It was my business to see his camels loaded and un- 
 loaded at proper places, to count his bales of merchan- 
 dise, and to take care that they were not mixed with 
 those of his companions. This I carefully did, till the 
 day we arrived at Alexandria ; when, unluckily, I neg- 
 lected to count the bales, taking it for granted that they 
 were all right, as I had found them so the preceding 
 day. However, when we were to go on board the ves- 
 sel that was to take us to Cairo, I perceived that three 
 bales of cotton were missing. 
 
 " I ran to inform my master, who, though a good deal 
 provoked at my negligence, did not reproach me as I 
 deserved. The public crier was immediately sent round 
 the city, to offer a reward for the recovery of the mer- 
 chandise ; and it was restored by one of the merchants' 
 slaves, with whom we had travelled. The vessel was 
 now under sail ; my master and I and the bales of cot- 
 ton were obliged to follow in a boat ; and when we were 
 taken on board, the captain declared he was so loaded 
 that he could not tell where to stow the bales of cotton. 
 After much difficulty, he consented to let them remain 
 upon deck: and I promised my master to watch them 
 night and day. 
 
 " We had a prosperous voyage, and were actually in 
 sight of shore, which the captain said we could not fail 
 to reach early the next morning. I stayed, as usual, 
 this night upon deck ; and solaced myself by smoking 
 my pipe. Ever since I had indulged in this practice at 
 the camp at El Arish, I could not exist without opium
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 107 
 
 and tobacco. I suppose that my reason was this night 
 a little clouded with the dose I took ; but, towards mid- 
 night, I was sobered by terror. I started up from the 
 deck on which I had stretched myself ; my turban was 
 in flames ; the bale of cotton on which I had rested was 
 all on fire. I awakened two sailors, who were fast 
 asleep on deck. The consternation became general, and 
 the confusion increased the danger. The captain and my 
 master were the most active, and suffered the most in ex- 
 tinguishing the flames : my master was terribly scorched. 
 
 " For my part, I was not suffered to do anything ; the 
 captain ordered that I should be bound to the mast ; and, 
 when at last the flames were extinguished, the passen- 
 gers, with one accord, besought him to keep me bound 
 hand and foot, lest I should be the cause of some new 
 disaster. All that had happened was, indeed, occasioned 
 by my ill luck. I had laid my pipe down, when I was 
 falling asleep, upon the bale of cotton that was beside 
 me. The fire from my pipe fell out, and set the cotton, 
 in flames. Such was the mixture of rage and terror with 
 which I had inspired the whole crew, that I am sure 
 they would have set me ashore on a desert island, rather 
 than have had me on board for a week longer. Even 
 my humane master, I could perceive, was secretly im- 
 patient to get rid of Murad the Unlucky, and his evil 
 fortune. 
 
 " You may believe that I was heartily glad when we 
 landed, and when I was unbound. My master put a 
 purse containing fifty sequins into my hand, and bade me 
 farewell. 'Use this money prudently, Murad, if you 
 can,' said he, ' and perhaps your fortune may change.'
 
 108 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 Of this I had little hopes, but determined to lay out my 
 money as prudently as possible. 
 
 "As I was walking through the streets of Grand 
 Cairo, considering how I should lay out my fifty sequins 
 to the greatest advantage, I was stopped by one who 
 called me by my name, and asked me if I could pretend 
 to have forgotten his face. I looked steadily at him, and 
 recollected to my sorrow that he was the Jew Rachub, 
 from whom I had borrowed certain sums of money at 
 the camp at El Arish. What brought him to Grand 
 Cairo, except it was my evil destiny, I cannot tell. He 
 would not quit me ; he would take no excuses ; he said 
 he knew that I had deserted twice, once from the Turk- 
 ish and once from the English army ; that I was not 
 entitled to any pay; and that he could not imagine it 
 possible that my brother Saladin would own me, or pay 
 my debts. 
 
 " I replied, for I was vexed by the insolence of this 
 Jewish dog, that I was not, as he imagined, a beggar ; 
 that I had the means of paying him my just debt, but 
 that I hoped he would not extort from me all that exor- 
 bitant interest which none but a Jew could exact. He 
 smiled, and answered that, if a Turk loved opium better 
 than money, this was no fault of his ; that he had sup- 
 plied me with what I loved best in the world ; and that 
 I ought not to complain, when he expected I should re- 
 turn the favor. 
 
 " I will not weary you, gentlemen, with all the argu- 
 ments that passed between me and Rachub. At last we 
 compromised matters ; he would take nothing less than 
 the whole debt : but he let me have at a very cheap rate
 
 MTJEAD THE UNLUCKY. 109 
 
 a chest of second-hand clothes, by which he assured me 
 I might make my fortune. He brought them to Grand 
 Cairo, he said, for the purpose of selling them to slave- 
 merchants, who at this time of the year were in want of 
 them to supply their slaves ; but he was in haste to get 
 home to his wife and family, at Constantinople, and 
 therefore he was willing to make over to a friend the 
 profits of this speculation. I should have distrusted 
 Rachub's professions of friendship and especially of dis- 
 interestedness ; but he took me with him to the khan, 
 where his goods were, and unlocked the chest of clothes 
 to show them to me. They were of the richest and fin- 
 est materials, and had been but little worn. I could not 
 doubt the evidence of my senses ; the bargain was con- 
 cluded, and the Jew sent porters to my inn with the 
 chest. 
 
 " The next day I repaired to the public market-place ; 
 and, when my business was known, I had choice of cus- 
 tomers before night : my chest was empty, and my 
 purse was full. The profit I made, upon the sale of 
 these clothes, was so considerable, that I could not help 
 feeling astonishment at Rachub's having brought himself 
 so readily to relinquish them. 
 
 " A few days after I had disposed of the contents of 
 my chest, a Damascene merchant, who had bought two 
 suits of apparel from me, told me, with a very melan- 
 choly face, that both the female slaves who had put on 
 these clothes were sick. I could not conceive that the 
 clothes were the cause of their sickness ; but soon after- 
 wards, as I was crossing the market, I was attacked by 
 at least a dozen merchants, who made similar complaints.
 
 110 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 They insisted upon knowing how I came by the gar- 
 ments, and demanded whether I had worn any of them 
 myself. This day I had for the first time indulged my- 
 self with wearing a pair of yellow slippers, the only fin- 
 ery I had reserved for myself out of all the tempting 
 goods. Convinced by my wearing these slippers that I 
 could have had no insidious designs, since I shared the 
 danger, whatever it might be, the merchants were a little 
 pacified ; but what was my terror and remorse the next 
 day, when one of them came to inform me that plague- 
 boils had broken out under the arms of all the slaves 
 who had worn this pestilential apparel ! On looking 
 carefully into the chest, we found the word Smyrna writ- 
 ten, and half effaced, upon the lid. Now, the plague 
 had for some time raged at Smyrna ; and, as the mer- 
 chants suspected, these clothes had certainly belonged to 
 persons who had died of that distemper. This was the 
 reason why the Jew was willing to sell them to me so 
 cheap ; and it was for this reason that he would not stay 
 at Grand Cairo himself to reap the profits of his specula- 
 tion. Indeed, if I had paid attention to it at the proper 
 time, a slight circumstance might have revealed the truth 
 to me. Whilst I was bargaining with the Jew, before 
 he opened the chest, he swallowed a large dram of 
 brandy, and stuffed his nostrils with sponge dipped in 
 vinegar : this he told me he did to prevent his perceiv- 
 ing the smell of musk, which always threw him into con- 
 vulsions. 
 
 "The horror I felt, when I discovered that I had 
 spread the infection of the plague, and that I had prob- 
 ably caught it myself, overpowered my senses; a cold
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. Ill 
 
 dew spread over all my limbs, and I fell upon the lid 
 of the fatal chest in a swoon. It is said that fear dis- 
 poses people to take the infection ; however this may be, 
 I sickened that evening, and soon was in a raging fever. 
 It was worse for me whenever the delirium left me, and 
 I could reflect upon the miseries my ill fortune had oc- 
 casioned. In my first lucid interval, I looked round 
 and saw that I had been removed from the khan to a 
 wretched hut. An old woman, who was smoking her 
 pipe in the farthest corner of my room, informed me 
 that I had been sent out of the town of Grand Cairo by 
 order of the cadi, to whom the merchants had made their 
 complaint. The fatal chest was burnt, and the house in 
 which I had lodged razed to the ground. 'And if it 
 had not been for me,' continued the old woman, ' you 
 would have been dead, probably, at this instant ; but I 
 have made a vow to our great prophet, that I would 
 never neglect an opportunity of doing a good action : 
 therefore, when you were deserted by all the world, 
 I took care of you. Here, too, is your purse, which I 
 saved from the rabble ; and, what is more difficult, from 
 the officers of justice : I will account to you for every 
 para that I have expended; and will moreover tell 
 you the reason of my making such an extraordinary 
 vow.' 
 
 " As I believed that this benevolent old woman took 
 great pleasure in talking, I made an inclination of my 
 head to thank her for her promised history, and she pro- 
 ceeded ; but I must confess I did not listen with all the 
 attention her narrative doubtless deserved. Even curi- 
 osity, the strongest passion of us Turks, was dead within
 
 112 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 me. I have no recollection of the old woman's story. 
 It is as much as I can do to finish my own. 
 
 " The weather became excessively hot ; it was affirmed, 
 by some of the physicians, that this heat would prove 
 fatal to their patients ; but, contrary to the prognostics 
 of the physicians, it stopped the progress of the plague. 
 I recovered, and found my purse much lightened by my 
 illness. I divided the remainder of my money with my 
 humane nurse, and sent her out into the city, to inquire 
 how matters were going on. 
 
 "She brought me word that the fury of the plague 
 had much abated ; but that she had met several funerals, 
 and that she had heard many of the merchants cursing 
 the folly of Murad the Unlucky, who, as they said, had 
 brought all this calamity upon the inhabitants of Cairo. 
 Even fools, they say, learn my experience. I took care 
 to burn the bed on which I had lain, and the clothes I 
 had worn: I concealed my real name, which I knew 
 would inspire detestation, and gamed admittance, with a 
 crowd of other poor wretches, into a lazaretto, where I 
 performed quarantine, and offered up prayers daily for 
 the sick. 
 
 " When I thought it was impossible I could spread 
 the infection, I took my passage home. I was eager to 
 get away from Grand Cairo, where I knew I was an 
 object of execration. I had a strange fancy haunting my 
 mind ; I imagined that all my misfortunes, since I left 
 Constantinople, had arisen from my neglect of the talis- 
 man upon the beautiful china vase. I dreamed three 
 times, when I was recovering from the plague, that a 
 genius appeared to me, and said, in a reproachful tone,
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 113 
 
 'Murad, where is the vase that was intrusted to thy 
 care ? ' 
 
 " This dream operated strongly upon my imagination. 
 As soon as we arrived at Constantinople, which we did, 
 to my great surprise, without meeting with any untoward 
 accidents, I went in search of my brother Saladin, to 
 inquire for my vase. He no longer lived in the house 
 in which I left him, and I began to be apprehensive that 
 he was dead; but a porter, hearing my inquiries, ex- 
 claimed, ' Who is there in Constantinople that is igno- 
 rant of the dwelling of Saladin the Lucky ? Come with 
 me, and I will show it to you.' 
 
 "The mansion to which he conducted me looked so 
 magnificent, that I was almost afraid to enter lest there 
 should be some mistake. But, whilst I was hesitating, 
 the doors opened, and I heard my brother Saladin's 
 voice. He saw me almost at the same instant that I 
 fixed my eyes upon him, and immediately sprang for- 
 ward to embrace me. He was the same good brother as 
 ever, and I rejoiced in his prosperity with all my heart. 
 ' Brother Saladin,' said I, ' can you now doubt that some 
 men are born to be fortunate, and others to be unfortu- 
 nate ? How often you used to dispute this point with 
 me! ' 
 
 " ' Let us not dispute it now in the public street,' 
 said he, smiling ; ' but come in and refresh yourself, and 
 we will consider the question afterwards at leisure.' 
 
 " ' No, my dear brother,' said I, drawing back, ' you 
 are too good : Murad the Unlucky shall not enter your 
 house, lest he should draw down misfortunes upon you 
 and yours. I come only to ask for my vase.' 
 
 H
 
 114 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " ' It is safe,' cried he ; ' come in, and you shall see it ; 
 but I will not give it up till I have you in my house. I 
 have none of these superstitious fears: pardon me the 
 expression, but I have none of these superstitious fears.' 
 
 " I yielded, entered his house, and was astonished at 
 all I saw ! My brother did not triumph in his pros- 
 perity; but, on the contrary, seemed intent only upon 
 making me forget my misfortunes : he listened to the 
 account of them with kindness, and obliged me by the 
 recital of his history ; which was, I must acknowledge, 
 far less wonderful than my own. He seemed, by his 
 own account, to have grown rich in the common course 
 of things ; or, rather, by his own prudence. I allowed 
 for his prejudices, and, unwilling to dispute further with 
 him, said, ' You must remain of your opinion, brother ; 
 and I of mine : you are Saladin the Lucky, and I Murad 
 the Unlucky ; and so we shall remain to the end of our 
 lives.' 
 
 " I had not been in his house four days when an acci- 
 dent happened, which showed how much I was in the 
 right. The favorite of the sultan, to whom he had for- 
 merly sold his china vase, though her charms were now 
 somewhat faded by time, still retained her power, and 
 her taste for magnificence. She commissioned my brother 
 to bespeak for her, at Venice, the most splendid looking- 
 glass that money could purchase. The mirror, after 
 many delays and disappointments, at length arrived at 
 my brother's house. He unpacked it, and sent to let 
 the lady know it was in perfect safety. It was late in 
 the evening, and she ordered it should remain where it 
 was that night; and that it should be brought to the
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 115 
 
 seraglio the next morning. It stood in a sort of ante- 
 chamber to the room in which I slept ; and with it were 
 left some packages, containing glass chandeliers for an 
 unfinished saloon in my brother's house. Saladin charged 
 all his domestics to be vigilant this night, because he had 
 money to a great amount by him, and there had been 
 frequent robberies in our neighborhood. Hearing these 
 orders, I resolved to be in readiness at a moment's warn- 
 ing. I laid my scimitar beside me upon a cushion ; and 
 left my door half open, that I might hear the slightest 
 noise in the antechamber or the great staircase. About 
 midnight I was suddenly awakened by a noise in the 
 antechamber. I started up, seized my scimitar, and the 
 instant I got to the door, saw, by the light of the lamp 
 which was burning in the room, a man standing opposite 
 -to me, with a drawn sword in his hand. I rushed 
 forward, demanding what he wanted, and received no 
 answer ; but, seeing him aim at me with his scimitar, I 
 gave him, as I thought, a deadly blow. At this instant, 
 I heard a great crash ; and the fragments of the looking- 
 glass, which I had shivered, fell at my feet. At the 
 fame moment something black brushed by my shoulder : 
 I pursued it, stumbled over the packages of glass, and 
 rolled over them down the stairs. 
 
 " My brother came out of his room, to inquire the 
 cause of all this disturbance ; and when he saw the fine 
 mirror broken, and me lying amongst the glass chande- 
 liers at the bottom of the stairs, he could not forbear 
 exclaiming, ' Well, brother ! you are indeed Murad the 
 Uulucky.' 
 
 "When the first emotion was over, he could not,
 
 116 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 however, forbear laughing at my situation. With a 
 degree of goodness, which made me a thousand times 
 more sorry for the accident, he came down stairs to help 
 me up, gave me his hand, and said, 'Forgive me, if I 
 was angry with you at first. I am sure you did not 
 mean to do me any injury ; but tell me how all this has 
 happened.' 
 
 " Whilst Saladin was speaking, I heard the same kind 
 of noise which had alarmed me in the antechamber ; but, 
 on looking back, I saw only a black pigeon, which flew 
 swiftly by me, unconscious of the mischief he had occa- 
 sioned. This pigeon I had unluckily brought into the 
 house the preceding day ; and had been feeding and 
 trying to tame it for my young nephews. I little thought 
 it would be the cause of such disasters. My brother, 
 though he endeavored to conceal his anxiety from me, 
 was much disturbed at the idea of meeting the favorite's 
 displeasure, who would certainly be grievously disap- 
 pointed by the loss of her splendid looking-glass. I saw 
 that I should inevitably be his ruin, if I continued in his 
 house ; and no persuasions could prevail upon me to 
 prolong my stay. My generous brother, seeing me 
 determined to go, said to me, ' A factor, whom I have 
 employed for some years to sell merchandise for me, died 
 a few days ago. Will you take his place? I am rich 
 enough to bear any little mistakes you may fall into, from 
 ignorance of business ; and you will have a partner who 
 is able and willing to assist you.' 
 
 " I was touched to the heart by this kindness, espe, 
 cially at such a time as this. He sent one of his slaves 
 with me to the shop in which you now see me, gentle-
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 117 
 
 men. The slave, by my brother's directions, brought 
 with us my china vase, and delivered it safely to me, 
 with this message : ' The scarlet dye that was found in 
 this vase, and in its fellow, was the first cause of Saladiii's 
 making the fortune he now enjoys : he therefore does no 
 more than justice, in sharing that fortune with his brother 
 Murad.' 
 
 " I was now placed in as advantageous a situation as 
 possible ; but my mind was ill at ease, when I reflected 
 that the broken mirror might be my brother's ruin. 
 The lady by whom it had been bespoken was, I well 
 knew, of a violent temper; and this disappointment 
 was sufficient to provoke her to vengeance. My brother 
 sent me word this morning, however, that, though her 
 displeasure was excessive, it was in my power to pre- 
 vent any ill consequences that might ensue. ' In my 
 power ! ' I exclaimed ; ' then, indeed, I am happy ! Tell 
 my brother there is nothing I will not do to show him 
 my gratitude, and to save him from the consequences of 
 my folly.' 
 
 " The slave who was sent by my brother seemed un- 
 willing to name what was required of me, saying that his 
 master was afraid I should not like to grant the request. 
 I urged him to speak freely, and he then told me the 
 favorite declared nothing would make her amends for 
 the loss of the mirror but the fellow vase to that which 
 she had bought from Saladin. It was impossible for me 
 to hesitate ; gratitude for my brother's generous kind- 
 ness overcame my superstitious obstinacy ; and I sent 
 him word I would carry the vase to him myself. 
 
 " I took it down this evening from the shelf on which
 
 118 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 it stood ; it was covered with dust, and I washed it, but 
 unluckily, in endeavoring to clean the inside from the 
 remains of the scarlet powder, I poured hot water into 
 it, and immediately I heard a simmering noise, and my 
 vase, in a few instants, burst asunder with a loud explo- 
 sion. These fragments, alas ! are all that remain. The 
 measure of my misfortunes is now completed ! Can you 
 wonder, gentlemen, that I bewail my evil destiny ? Am 
 I not justly called Murad the Unlucky ? Here end all 
 my hopes in this world ! Better would it have been if 
 I had died long ago ! Better that I had never been 
 born! Nothing I ever have done or attempted has 
 prospered. Murad the Unlucky is my name, and ill 
 fate has marked me for her own." 
 
 m. 
 
 THE lamentations of Murad were interrupted by the 
 entrance of Saladin. Having waited in vain for some 
 hours, he now came to see if any disaster had happened 
 to his brother Murad. He was surprised at the sight 
 of the two pretended merchants, and could not refrain 
 from exclamations on beholding the broken vase. How- 
 ever, with his usual equanimity and good-nature, he 
 began to console Murad ; and, taking up the fragments, 
 examined them carefully, one by one joined them to- 
 gether again, found that none of the edges of the china 
 were damaged, and declared he could have it mended so 
 as to look as well as ever. 
 
 Murad recovered his spirits upon this. "Brother," 
 said he, "I comfort myself for being Murad the Uii-
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 119 
 
 lucky, when I reflect that you are Saladin the Lucky. 
 See, gentlemen," continued he, turning to the pretended 
 merchants, "scarcely has this most fortunate of men 
 been five minutes in company before he gives a happy 
 turn to affairs. His presence inspires joy : I observe 
 your countenances, which had been saddened by my 
 dismal history, have brightened up since he has made 
 his appearance. Brother, I wish you would make these 
 gentlemen some amends for the time they have wasted 
 in listening to my catalogue of misfortunes, by relating 
 your history, which, I am sure, they will find rather 
 more exhilarating." 
 
 Saladin consented, on condition that the strangers 
 would accompany him home, and partake of a social 
 banquet. They at first repeated the former excuse of 
 -their being obliged to return to their inn ; but at length 
 the sultan's curiosity prevailed, and he and his vizier 
 went home with Saladin the Lucky, who, after supper, 
 related his history in the following manner : 
 
 " My being called Saladin the Lucky first inspired me 
 with confidence in myself ; though I own that I cannot 
 remember any extraordinary instances of good luck in 
 my childhood. An old nurse of my mother's, indeed, 
 repeated to me, twenty times a day, that nothing I un- 
 dertook could fail to succeed, because I was Saladin the 
 Lucky. I became presumptuous and rash ; and my 
 nurse's prognostics might have effectually prevented 
 their accomplishment, had I not, when I was about 
 fifteen, been roused to reflection during a long con- 
 finement, which was the consequence of my youthful 
 conceit and imprudence
 
 120 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " At this time there was at the Porte a Frenchman, 
 an ingenious engineer, who was employed and favored 
 by the sultan, to the great astonishment of many of my 
 prejudiced countrymen. On the grand seignior's birth- 
 day he exhibited some extraordinarily fine fireworks ; 
 and I, with numbers of the inhabitants of Constantino- 
 ple, crowded to see them. I happened to stand near 
 the place where the Frenchman was stationed ; the 
 crowd pressed upon him, and I amongst the rest; he 
 begged we would, for our own sakes, keep at a greater 
 distance, and warned us that we might be much hurt by 
 the combustibles which he was using. I, relying upon 
 my good fortune, disregarded all these cautions ; and 
 the consequence was, that as I touched some of the 
 materials prepared for the fireworks, they exploded, 
 dashed me upon the ground with great violence, and I 
 was terribly burnt. 
 
 " This accident, gentlemen, I consider as one of the 
 most fortunate circumstances of my life ; for it checked 
 and corrected the presumption of my temper. During 
 the time I was confined to my bed, the French gentle- 
 man came frequently to see me. He was a very sensible 
 man; and the conversations he had with me enlarged 
 my mind, and cured me of many foolish prejudices, 
 especially of that which I had been taught to entertain, 
 concerning the predominance of what is called luck, or 
 fortune, in human affairs. ' Though you are called Saladin 
 the Lucky,' said he, ' you find that your neglect of pru- 
 dence has nearly brought you to the grave even in the 
 bloom of youth. Take my advice, and henceforward trust 
 more to prudence than to fortune. Let the multitude,
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 121 
 
 if they will, call you Saladin the Lucky ; but call your- 
 self, and make yourself, Saladin the Prudent.' 
 
 " These words left an indelible impression on my mind, 
 and gave a new turn to my thoughts and character. My 
 brother, Murad, has doubtless told you that our differ- 
 ence of opinion, on the subject of predestination, pro- 
 duced between us frequent arguments; but we could 
 never convince one another, and we each have acted, 
 through life, in consequence of our different beliefs. 
 To this I attribute my success and his misfortunes. 
 
 "The first rise of my fortune, as you have probably 
 heard from Murad, was owing to the scarlet dye, which 
 I brought to perfection with infinite difiiculty. The 
 powder, it is true, was accidentally found by me in our 
 china vases ; but there it might have remained to this 
 instant, useless, if I had not taken the pains to make it 
 useful. I grant that we can only partially foresee and 
 command events ; yet on the use we make of our own 
 powers, I think, depends our destiny. But, gentlemen, 
 you would rather hear my adventures, perhaps, than my 
 reflections ; and I am truly concerned, for your sakes, 
 that I have no wonderful events to relate. I am sorry 
 I cannot tell you of my having been lost in a sandy 
 desert. I have never had the plague, nor even been 
 shipwrecked : I have been all my life an inhabitant of 
 Constantinople, and have passed my time in a very 
 quiet and uniform manner. 
 
 " The money I received from the sultan's favorite for 
 my china vase, as my brother may have told you, enabled 
 me to trade on a more extensive scale. I went on 
 steadily with my business ; and made it my whole study 
 
 \OL. XII. 6
 
 122 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to please my employers, by all fair and honorable 
 means. This industry and civility succeeded beyond my 
 expectations : in a few years, I was rich for a man in 
 my way of business. 
 
 " I will not proceed to trouble you with the journal 
 of a petty merchant's life ; I pass on to the incident 
 which made a considerable change in my affairs. 
 
 " A terrible fire broke out near the walls of the grand 
 seignior's seraglio : as you are strangers, gentlemen, you 
 may not have heard of this event, though it produced 
 so great a sensation in Constantinople. The vizier's su- 
 perb palace was utterly consumed ; and the melted lead 
 poured down from the roof of the mosque of St. Sophia. 
 Various were the opinions formed by my neighbors re- 
 specting the cause of the conflagration. Some supposed 
 it to be a punishment for the sultan's having neglected, 
 one Friday, to appear at the mosque of St. Sophia ; oth- 
 ers considered it as a warning sent by Mahomet, to 
 dissuade the Porte from persisting in a war in which we 
 were just engaged. The generality, however, of the 
 coffee-house politicians contented themselves with ob- 
 serving that it was the will of Mahomet that the palace 
 should be consumed. Satisfied by this supposition, they 
 took no precaution to prevent similar accidents in their 
 own houses. Never were fires so common in the city as 
 at this period ; scarcely a night passed without our being 
 wakened by the cry of fire. 
 
 " These frequent fires were rendered still more dread- 
 ful by villains, who were continually on the watch to 
 increase the confusion by which they profited, and to 
 pillage the houses of the sufferers. It was discovered
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 123 
 
 that these incendiaries frequently skulked, towards even- 
 ing, in the neighborhood of the bezestein, where the 
 richest merchants store their goods; some of these 
 wretches were detected in throwing coundaks, or matches, 
 into the windows ; and if these combustibles remained a 
 sufficient time, they could not fail to set the house on 
 fire. 
 
 " Notwithstanding all these circumstances, many even 
 of those who had property to preserve continued to re- 
 peat, ' It is the will of Mahomet,' and consequently to 
 neglect all means of preservation. I, on the contrary, 
 recollecting the lesson I had learned from the sensible 
 foreigner, neither suffered my spirits to sink with super- 
 stitious fears of ill luck, nor did I trust presumptuously 
 to my good fortune. I took every possible means to se- 
 , cure myself. I never went to bed without having seen 
 that all the lights and fires in the house were extin- 
 guished, and that I had a supply of water in the cistern. 
 I had likewise learned from my Frenchman that wet 
 mortar was the most effectual thing for stopping the 
 progress of flames : I therefore had a quantity of mortar 
 made up in one of my outhouses, which I could use at 
 a moment's warning. These precautions were all useful 
 to me : my own house, indeed, was never actually on 
 fire, but the houses of my next-door neighbors were no 
 less than five times in flames, in the course of one win- 
 ter. By my exertions, or rather by my precautions, they 
 suffered but little damage ; and all my neighbors looked 
 upon me as their deliverer and friend : they loaded me 
 with presents, and offered more, indeed, than I would 
 accept. All repeated that I was Saladin the Lucky.
 
 124 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 This compliment I disclaimed, feeling more ambitious of 
 being called Saladin the Prudent. It is thus that what 
 we call modesty is often only a more refined species of 
 pride. But to proceed with my story. 
 
 " One night I had been later than usual at supper, at 
 a friend's house : none but the watch were in the streets, 
 and even they, I believe, were asleep. 
 
 " As I passed one of the conduits, which convey water 
 to the city, I heard a trickling noise ; and, upon exami- 
 nation, I found that the cock of the water-spout was 
 half turned, so that the water was running out. I 
 turned it back to its proper place, thought it had been 
 left unturned by accident, and walked on; but I had 
 not proceeded far before I came to another spout and 
 another, which were in the same condition. I was con- 
 vinced that this could not be the effect merely of acci- 
 dent, and suspected that some ill-intentioned persons 
 designed to let out and waste the water of the city, 
 that there might be none to extinguish any fire that 
 should break out in the course of the night. 
 
 " I stood still for a few moments, to consider how it 
 would be most prudent to act. It would be impossible 
 for me to run to all parts of the city, that I might stop 
 the pipes that were running to waste. I first thought of 
 wakening the watch and the firemen, who were most of 
 them slumbering at their stations; but I reflected that 
 they were perhaps not to be trusted, and that they were 
 in a confederacy with the incendiaries ; otherwise, they 
 would certainly, before this hour, have observed and 
 stopped the running of the sewers in their neighborhood. 
 I determined to waken a rich merchant, called Damat
 
 MURAD THE UNLUCKY. 125 
 
 Zade, who lived near me, and who had a number of 
 slaves whom he could send to different parts of the city, 
 to prevent mischief, and give notice to the inhabitants of 
 their danger. 
 
 "He was a very sensible, active man, and one that 
 could easily be wakened : he was not, like some Turks, 
 an hour in recovering their lethargic senses. He was 
 quick in decision and action ; and his slaves resembled 
 their master. He despatched a messenger immediately 
 to the grand vizier, that the sultan's safety might be se- 
 cured ; and sent others to the magistrates, in each quar- 
 ter of Constantinople. The large drums in the janissary 
 aga's tower beat to rouse the inhabitants ; and scarcely 
 had this been heard to beat half an hour before the fire 
 broke out in the lower apartments of Damat Zade's 
 -house, owing to a coundak, which had been left behind 
 one of the doors. 
 
 "The wretches who had prepared the mischief came 
 to enjoy it, and to pillage ; but they were disappointed. 
 Astonished to find themselves taken into custody, they 
 could not comprehend how their designs had been frus- 
 trated. By timely exertions, the fire in my friend's 
 house was extinguished; and though fires broke out, 
 during the night, in many parts of the city, but little 
 damage was sustained, because there was time for pre- 
 cautions; and by the stopping of the spouts, sufficient 
 water was preserved. People were awakened, and warned 
 of the danger, and they consequently escaped unhurt. 
 
 " The next day, as soon as I made my appearance at 
 the bezestein, the merchants crowded round, called me 
 their benefactor, and the preserver of their lives and
 
 126 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 fortunes. Damat Zade, the merchant whom I had 
 awakened the preceding night, presented to me a heavy 
 purse of gold, and put upon my finger a diamond ring 
 of considerable value ; each of the merchants followed 
 his example, in making me rich presents: the magis- 
 trates also sent me tokens of their approbation ; and the 
 grand vizier sent me a diamond of the first water, with 
 a line written by his own hand : ' To the man who has 
 saved Constantinople.' Excuse me, gentlemen, for the 
 vanity I seem to show in mentioning these circumstan- 
 ces. You desired to hear my history, and I cannot 
 therefore omit the principal circumstance of my life. In 
 the course of four-and-twenty hours, I found myself 
 raised, by the munificent gratitude of the inhabitants of 
 this city, to a state of affluence far beyond what I had 
 ever dreamed of attaining. 
 
 " I now took a house suited to my circumstances, and 
 bought a few slaves. As I was carrying my slaves home, 
 I was met by a Jew, who stopped me, saying, in his lan- 
 guage, ' My lord, I see, has been purchasing slaves : I 
 could clothe them cheaply.' There was something mys- 
 terious in the manner of this Jew, and I did not like his 
 countenance ; but I considered that I ought not to be 
 governed by caprice in my dealings, and that, if this 
 man could really clothe my slaves more cheaply than 
 another, I ought not to neglect his offer merely because 
 I took a dislike to the cut of his beard, the turn of his 
 eye, or the tone of his voice. I therefore bade the Jew 
 follow me home, saying that I would consider of his 
 proposal. 
 
 " When we came to talk over the matter, I was SUF
 
 MTJEAD THE UNLUCKY. 127 
 
 prised to find him so reasonable in his demands. On one 
 point, indeed, he appeared unwilling to comply. I re- 
 quired not only to see the clothes I was offered, but also 
 to know how they came into 'his possession. On this 
 subject he equivocated ; I therefore suspected there must 
 be something wrong. I reflected what it could be, and 
 judged that the goods had been stolen, or that they had 
 been the apparel of persons who had died of some con- 
 tagious distemper. The Jew showed me a chest, from 
 which he said I might choose whatever suited me best. 
 I observed, that, as he was going to unlock the chest, he 
 stuffed his nose with some aromatic herbs. He told me 
 that he did so to prevent his smelling the musk with 
 which the chest was perfumed: musk, he said, had an 
 extraordinary effect upon his nerves. I begged to have 
 some of the herbs which he used himself; declaring that 
 musk was likewise offensive to me. 
 
 " The Jew, either struck by his own conscience, or ob- 
 serving my suspicions, turned as pale as death. He pre- 
 tended he had not the right key, and could not unlock 
 the chest ; said he must go in search of it, and that he 
 would call on me again. 
 
 " After he had left me, I examined some writing upon 
 the lid of the chest, that had been nearly effaced. I made 
 out the word Smyrna, and this was sufficient to confirm 
 all my suspicions. The Jew returned no more : he sent 
 some porters to carry away the chest, and I heard noth- 
 ing of him for some time, till one day, when I was at the 
 house of Damat Zade, I saw a glimpse of the Jew pass- 
 ing hastily through one of the courts, as if he wished to 
 avoid me. ' My friend,' said I to Damat Zade, ' do not
 
 128 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 attribute my question to impertinent curiosity, or to a 
 desire to intermeddle with your affairs, if I venture to 
 ask the nature of your business with the Jew, who has 
 just now crossed your court.' 
 
 " ' He has engaged to supply me with clothing for my 
 slaves/ replied my friend, ' cheaper than I can purchase 
 it elsewhere. I have a design to surprise my daughter, 
 Fatima, on her birthday, with an entertainment in the 
 pavilion in the garden; and all her female slaves shall 
 appear in new dresses on the occasion.' 
 
 " I interrupted my friend, to tell him what I suspected 
 relative to this Jew and his chest of clothes. It is cer- 
 tain that the infection of the plague can be communicated 
 by clothes, not only after months but after years have 
 elapsed. The merchant resolved to have nothing more 
 to do with this wretch, who could thus hazard the lives 
 of thousands of his fellow-creatures for a few pieces of 
 gold: we sent notice of the circumstance to the cadi, 
 but the cadi was slow in his operations ; and, before he 
 could take the Jew into custody, the cunning fellow had 
 effected his escape. When his house was searched, he 
 and his chest had disappeared : we discovered that he 
 sailed for Egypt, and rejoiced that we had driven him 
 from Constantinople. 
 
 " My friend, Damat Zade, expressed the warmest 
 gratitude to me. ' You formerly saved my fortune : you 
 have now saved my life ; and a life yet dearer than my 
 own, that of my daughter Fatima.' 
 
 " At the sound of that name I could not, I believe, 
 avoid showing some emotion. I had accidentally seen 
 this lady, and I had been captivated by her beauty, and
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 129 
 
 by the sweetness of her countenance ; but as I knew she 
 was destined to be the wife of another, I suppressed my 
 feeling, and determined to banish the recollection of the 
 fair Fatima forever from my imagination. Her father, 
 however, at this instant, threw into my way a temptation 
 which it required all my fortitude to resist. ' Saladin,' 
 continued he, 'it is but just that you, who have saved 
 our lives, should share our festivity. Come here on the 
 birthday of my Fatima : I will place you in a balcony, 
 which overlooks the garden, and you shall see the whole 
 spectacle. We shall have a feast of tulips, in imitation 
 of that which, as you know, is held in the grand seign- 
 ior's gardens. I assure you, the sight will be worth 
 seeing ; and besides, you will have a chance of beholding 
 my Fatima, for a moment, without her veil.' 
 
 " ' That,' interrupted I, ' is the thing I most wish to 
 avoid. I dare not indulge myself in a pleasure which 
 might cost me the happiness of my life. I will conceal 
 nothing from you, who treat me with so much confi- 
 dence. I have already beheld the charming countenance 
 of your Fatima, but I know that she is destined to be 
 the wife of a happier man.' 
 
 " Damat Zade seemed much pleased by the frankness 
 with which I explained myself; but he would not give 
 up the idea of my sitting with him, in the balcony, on 
 the day of the feast of tulips, and I, on my part, could 
 not consent to expose myself to another view of the 
 charming Fatima. My friend used every argument, or 
 rather every sort of persuasion, he could imagine to 
 prevail upon me : he then tried to laugh me out of my 
 resolution; and, when all failed, he said, in a voice of 
 6* I
 
 130 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 anger, ' Go, then, Saladin ; I am sure you are deceiving 
 me : you have a passion for some other woman, and you 
 would conceal it from me, and persuade me you refuse 
 the favor I offer you from prudence, when, in fact, it is 
 from indifference and contempt. Why could you not 
 speak the truth of your heart to me with that frankness 
 with which one friend should treat another? ' 
 
 "Astonished at this unexpected charge, and at the 
 anger which flashed from the eyes of Damat Zade, who 
 till this moment had always appeared to me a man of a 
 mild and reasonable temper, I was for an instant tempted 
 to fly into a passion and leave him : but friends, once 
 lost, are not easily regained. This consideration had 
 power sufficient to make me command my temper. ' My 
 friend,' replied I, ' we will talk over tliis affair to-morrow : 
 you are now angry, and cannot do me justice ; but to- 
 morrow you will be cool : you will then be convinced 
 that I have not deceived you ; and that I have no design 
 but to secure my own happiness by the most prudent 
 means in my power, by avoiding the sight of the danger- 
 ous Fatima. I have no passion for any other woman.' 
 
 " ' Then,' said my friend, embracing me, and quitting 
 the tone of anger which he had assumed only to try 
 my resolution to the utmost, ' then, Saladin, Fatima is 
 yours.' 
 
 " I scarcely dared to believe my senses ! I could not 
 express my joy ! ' Yes, my friend,' continued the mer- 
 chant, ' I have tried your prudence to the utmost ; it has 
 been victorious, and I resign my Fatima to you, certain 
 that you will make her happy. It is true, I had a greater 
 alliance in view for her: the pacha of Maksoud has
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 131 
 
 demanded her from me ; but I have found, upon private 
 inquiry, he is addicted to the intemperate use of opium : 
 and my daughter shall never be the wife of one who is a 
 violent madman one half the day, and a melancholy idiot 
 during the remainder. I have nothing to apprehend 
 from the pacha's resentment, because I have powerful 
 friends with the grand vizier who will oblige him to lis- 
 ten to reason, and to submit quietly to a disappointment 
 he so justly merits. And now, Saladin, have you any 
 objection to seeing the feast of tulips ? ' 
 
 " I replied only by falling at the merchant's feet, and 
 embracing his knees. The feast of tulips came, and on 
 that day I was married to the charming Fatima ! The 
 charming Eatima I continue still to think her, though 
 she has now been my wife some years. She is the joy 
 and pride of my heart ; and, from our mutual affection, I 
 have experienced more felicity than from all the other 
 circumstances of my life, which are called so fortunate. 
 Her father gave me the house in which I now live, and 
 joined his possessions to ours ; so that I have more 
 wealth even than I desire. My riches, however, give 
 me continually the means of relieving the wants of oth- 
 ers; and therefore I cannot affect to despise them. I 
 must persuade my brother Murad to share them with me, 
 and to forget his misfortunes : I shall then think myself 
 completely happy. As to the sultana's looking-glass, 
 and your broken vase, my dear brother," continued Sa- 
 ladin, " we must think of some means " 
 
 " Think no more of the sultana's looking-glass, or of 
 the broken vase," exclaimed the sultan, throwing aside 
 his merchant's habit, and showing beneath it his own
 
 132 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 imperial vest. " Saladin, I rejoice to have heard, from 
 your own lips, the history of your life. I acknowledge, 
 vizier, I have been in the wrong, in our argument," con- 
 tinued the sultan, turning to his vizier. " I acknowledge 
 that the histories of Saladin the Lucky and Murad the 
 Unlucky favor your opinion, that prudence has more 
 influence than chance in human affairs. The success and 
 happiness of Saladin seem to me to have arisen from his 
 prudence: by that prudence, Constantinople has been 
 saved from flames, and from the plague. Had Murad 
 possessed his brother's discretion, he would not have 
 been on the point of losing his head, for selling rolls 
 which he did not bake : he would not have been kicked 
 by a mule, or bastinadoed for finding a ring : he would 
 Hot have been robbed by one party of soldiers, or shot 
 by another : he would not have been lost in a desert, or 
 cheated by a Jew ; he would not have set a ship on fire ; 
 nor would he have caught the plague, and spread it 
 through Grand Cairo : he would not have run my sul- 
 tana's looking-glass through the body, instead of a rob- 
 ber : he would not have believed that the fate of his life 
 depended on certain verses on a china vase : nor would 
 he, at last, have broken this precious talisman, by wash- 
 ing it with hot water. Henceforward, let Murad the 
 Unlucky be named Murad the Imprudent: let Saladin 
 preserve the surname he merits, and be henceforth called 
 Saladin the Prudent." 
 
 So spake the sultan, who, unlike the generality of 
 monarchs, could bear to find himself in the wrong ; and 
 could discover his vizier to be in the right, without cut- 
 ting off his head. History further informs us that the
 
 MUEAD THE UNLUCKY. 133 
 
 sultan offered to make Saladin a pacha, and to commit 
 to him the government of a province ; but Saladin the 
 Prudent declined this honor, saying he had no ambition, 
 was perfectly happy in his present situation, and that, 
 when this was the case, it would be folly to change, 
 because no one can be more than happy. What further 
 adventures befell Murad the Imprudent are not recorded ; 
 it is known only that he became a daily visitor to the 
 Teriaky ; and that he died a martyr to the immoderate 
 use of opium.
 
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 
 
 BY EDWARD EVERETT HALE. 
 
 MY LIFE TO ITS CRISIS. 
 
 EW-YORKERS of to-day see so many proces- 
 sions, and live through so many sensations, and 
 hurrah for so many heroes in every year, that it 
 is only the oldest of fogies who tells you of the triumphant 
 procession of steamboats which, in the year 1824, wel- 
 comed General Lafayette on his arrival from his tour 
 through the country he had so nobly served. But, if the 
 reader wishes to lengthen out this story, he may button 
 the next silver-gray friend he meets, and ask him to tell 
 of the broken English and broken French of the Mar- 
 quis, of Levasseur, and the rest of them ; of the enthu- 
 siasm of the people and the readiness of the visitors, and 
 he will please bear in mind that of all that am I. 
 
 For it so happened that on the morning when, for 
 want of better lions to show, the mayor and governor 
 and the rest of them took the Marquis and his secretary, 
 and the rest of them, to see the orphan asylum in Deer-
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 135 
 
 ing Street, as they passed into the first ward, after 
 having had " a little refreshment " in the managers' room, 
 Sally Eaton, the head nurse, dropped the first courtesy 
 to them, and Sally Eaton, as it happened, held me scream- 
 ing in her arms. I had been sent to the asylum that 
 morning with a paper pinned to my bib, which said my 
 name was Felix Carter. 
 
 "Eet ees verra fine," said the Marquis, smiling blandly. 
 
 " Bavissant ! " said Levasseur, and he dropped a five- 
 franc piece into Sally Eaton's hand. And so the proces- 
 sion of exhibiting managers talking bad French, and of 
 exhibited Frenchmen talking bad English, passed on ; all 
 but good old Elkanah Ogden, God bless him ! who 
 happened to have come there with the governor's party, 
 and who loitered a minute to talk with Sally Eaton about 
 me. 
 
 Years afterwards she told me how the old man kissed 
 me, how his eyes watered when he asked my story, how 
 she told again of the moment when I was heard screaming 
 on the doorstep, and how she offered to go and bring the 
 paper which had been pinned to my bib. But the old 
 man said it was no matter, " only we would have called 
 him Marquis," said he, " if his name was not provided 
 for him. We must not leave him here," he said ; " he 
 shall grow up a farmer's lad, and not a little cockney." 
 And so, instead of going the grand round of infirma- 
 ries, kitchens, bakeries, and dormitories with the rest, 
 the good old soul went back into the managers' room, 
 and wrote at the moment a letter to John Myers, who 
 took care of his wild land in St. Lawrence County for 
 him, to ask him if Mrs. Myers would not bring up an
 
 136 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 orphan baby by hand for him; and if, both together, 
 they would not train this baby till he said " Stop " ; if, 
 on the other hand, he allowed them, in the yearly account, 
 a hundred dollars each year for th* charge. 
 
 Anybody who knows how far a hundred dollars goes 
 in the backwoods, in St. Lawrence County, will know that 
 any settler would be glad to take a ward so recommended. 
 Anybody who knew Betsy Myers as well as old Elkanah 
 Ogden did, would know she would have taken any orphan 
 brought to her door, even if he were not recommended 
 at all. 
 
 So it happened, thanks to Lafayette and the city coun- 
 cil ! that I had not been a " Child of the Public " a day, 
 before, in its great, clumsy, liberal way, it had provided 
 for me. I owed my healthy, happy home of the next 
 fourteen years in the wilderness to those marvellous hab- 
 its, which I should else call absurd, with which we lionize 
 strangers. Because our hospitals and poorhouses are the 
 largest buildings we have, we entertain the Prince of 
 Wales and Jenny Lind alike, by showing them crazy 
 people and paupers. Easy enough to laugh at is the 
 display ; but if, dear Public, it happen that by such a 
 habit you ventilate your Bridewell or your Bedlam, is 
 not the ventilation, perhaps, a compensation for the ab- 
 surdity ? I do not know if Lafayette was any the better 
 for his seeing the Deering Street Asylum ; but I do know 
 I was. 
 
 This is IKO history of my life. It is only an illustra- 
 tion of one of its principles. I have no anecdotes of 
 wilderness life to tell, and no sketch of the lovely rugged 
 traits of Jo\m and Betsy Myers, my real father and
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 137 
 
 mother. I have no quest for the pretended parents, who 
 threw me away in my babyhood, to record. They closed 
 accounts with me when they left me on the asylum steps, 
 and I with them. I grew up with such schooling as the 
 public gave, ten weeks in winter always, and ten in 
 summer, till I was big enough to work on the farm, 
 better periods of schools, I hold, than on the modern 
 systems. Mr. Ogden I never saw. Regularly he allowed 
 for me the hundred a year till I was nine years old, and 
 then suddenly he died, as the reader perhaps knows. 
 But John Myers kept me as his son, none the less. I 
 knew no change until, when I was fourteen, he thought 
 it time for me to see the world, and sent me to what, in 
 those days, was called a " Manual-Labor School." 
 
 There was a theory coming up in those days, wholly 
 . unfounded hi physiology, that if a man worked five hours 
 with his hands, he could study better in the next five. It is 
 all nonsense. Exhaustion is exhaustion ; and if you ex- 
 haust a vessel by one stopcock, nothing is gained or saved 
 by closing that and opening another. The old up-country 
 theory is the true one. Study ten weeks and chop wood 
 fifteen; study ten more and harvest fifteen. But the 
 " Manual-Labor School " offered itself for really no pay, 
 only John Myers and I carried over, I remember, a dozen 
 barrels of potatoes when I went there with my books. 
 The school was kept at Roscius, and if I would work in 
 the carpenter's shop and on the school farm five hours, 
 why they would feed me and teach me all they knew in 
 what I had of the day beside. 
 
 " Felix," said John, as he left me, " I do not suppose 
 this is the best school in the world, unless you make it
 
 138 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 so. But I do suppose you can make it so. If you and 
 I went whining about, looking for the best school in the 
 world, and for somebody to pay your way through it, I 
 should die, and you would lose your voice with whining, 
 and we should not find one after all. This is what the 
 public happens to provide for you and me. We won't 
 look a gift-horse in the mouth. Get on his back, Felix ; 
 groom him well as you can when you stop, feed him when 
 you can, and at all events water him well and take care 
 of him well. My last advice to you, Felix, is to take 
 what is offered you, and never complain because nobody 
 offers more." 
 
 Those words are to be cut on my seal-ring, if I ever 
 have one, and if Dr. Anthon or Professor Webster will 
 put them into short enough Latin for me. That is the 
 motto of the " Children of the Public." 
 
 John Myers died before that term was out. And my 
 more than mother, Betsy, went back to her friends in 
 Maine. After the funeral I never saw them more. How 
 I lived from that moment to what Fausta and I call the 
 Crisis is nobody's concern. I worked in the shop at the 
 school, or on the farm. Afterwards I taught school in 
 neighboring districts. I never bought a ticket in a lot- 
 tery or a raffle. But whenever there was a chance to do 
 an honest stroke of work, I did it. I have walked fif- 
 teen miles at night to carry an election return to the 
 " Tribune's " agent at Gouverneur. I have turned out in 
 the snow to break open the road when the supervisor 
 could not find another man in the township. 
 
 When Sartain started his magazine, I wrote an essay 
 in competition for his premiums, and the essay earned
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 139 
 
 its hundred dollars. When the managers of the " Or- 
 phan Home," in Baltimore, offered their prizes for papers 
 on bad boys, I wrote for one of them, and that helped 
 me on four hard months. There was no luck in those 
 things. I needed the money, and I put my hook into 
 the pork-barrel, that is, I trusted the Public. I 
 never had but one stroke of luck in my life. I wanted 
 a new pair of boots badly. I was going to walk to 
 Albany, to work in the State library on the history of 
 the Six Nations, which had an interest for me. I did 
 not have a dollar. Just then there passed Congress the 
 bill dividing the surplus revenue. The State of New 
 York received two or three millions, and divided it among 
 the counties. The county of St. Lawrence divided it 
 among the townships, and the township of Roscius di- 
 vided it among the voters. Two dollars and sixty cents 
 of Uncle Sam's money came to me, and with that money 
 on my feet I walked to Albany. That I call luck ! How 
 many fools had to assent in an absurdity before I could 
 study the history of the Six Nations ! 
 
 But one instance told in detail is better than a thou- 
 sand told in general, for the illustration of a principle. 
 So I will detain you no longer from the history of what 
 Fausta and I call The Crisis. 
 
 II. 
 
 THE CRISIS. 
 
 I WAS at work as a veneerer in a piano-forte factory at 
 Attica, when some tariff or other was passed or repealed ; 
 there came a great financial explosion, and our boss,
 
 140 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 among the rest, failed. He owed us all six months' 
 wages, and we were all very poor and very blue. Jona- 
 than Whittemore a real good fellow, who used to cover 
 the hammers with leather came to me the day the 
 shop was closed, and told me he was going to take the 
 chance to go to Europe. He was going to the Musical 
 Conservatory at Leipsic, if he could. He would work 
 his passage out as a stoker. He would wash himself for 
 three or four days at Bremen, and then get work, if he 
 could, with Voightlander or Von Hammer till he could 
 enter the Conservatory. By way of preparation for this 
 he wanted me to sell him my Adler's German Dictionary. 
 
 " I 've nothing to give you for it, Felix, but this fool- 
 ish thing, it is one of Burrham's tickets, which I 
 bought in a frolic the night of our sleigh-ride. I '11 
 transfer it to you." 
 
 I told Jonathan he might have the dictionary and 
 welcome. He was doing a sensible thing, and he would 
 use it twenty times as much as I should. As for the 
 ticket, he had better keep it. I did not want it. But I 
 saw he would feel better if I took it, so he indorsed it 
 to me. 
 
 Now the reader must know that this Burrham was a 
 man who had got hold of one corner of the idea of what the 
 Public could do for its children. He had found out that 
 there were a thousand people who would be glad to make 
 the tour of the mountains and the lakes every summer if 
 they could do it for half price. He found out that the 
 railroad companies were glad enough to put the price 
 down if they could be sure of the thousand people. He 
 mediated between the two, and so " cheap excursions "
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 141 
 
 came into being. They are one of the gifts the Public 
 gives its children. Rising from step to step, Burrham 
 had, just before the great financial crisis, conceived the 
 idea of a great cheap combination, in which everybody 
 was to receive a magazine for a year and a cyclopaedia, 
 both at half price ; and not only so, but the money that 
 was gained in the combination was to be given by lot to 
 two ticket-holders, one a man and one a woman, for their 
 dowry in marriage. I dare say the reader remembers 
 the prospectus. It savors too much of the modern 
 "Gift Enterprise" to be reprinted in full; but it had 
 this honest element, that everybody got more than he 
 could get for his money in retail. I have my magazine, 
 the old " Boston Miscellany," to this day, and I just now 
 looked out Levasseur's name in my cyclopaedia ; and, as 
 -you will see, I have reason to know that all the other 
 subscribers got theirs. 
 
 One of the tickets for these books, for which Whitte- 
 more had given five good dollars, was what he gave to 
 me for my dictionary. And so we parted. I loitered at 
 Attica, hoping for a place where I could put in my oar. 
 But my hand was out at teaching, and in a time when 
 all the world's veneers of different kinds were ripping off, 
 nobody wanted me to put on more of my kind, so that 
 my cash ran low. I would not go in debt, that is a 
 thing I never did. More honest, I say, to go to the 
 poorhouse, and make the Public care for its child there, 
 than to borrow what you cannot pay. But I did not 
 come quite to that, as you shall see. 
 
 I was counting up my money one night, and it was 
 easily done, when I observed that the date on this
 
 142 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 Burrkam order was the 15th of October, and it occurred 
 to me that it was riot quite a fortnight before those books 
 were to be delivered. They were to be delivered at 
 Castle Garden, at New York; and the thought struck 
 me that I might go to New York, try my chance there 
 for work, and at least see the city, which I had never 
 seen, and get my cyclopaedia and magazine. It was the 
 least oifer the Public ever made to me ; but just then the 
 Public was in a collapse, and the least was better than 
 nothing. The plan of so long a journey was Quixotic 
 enough, and I hesitated about it a good deal. Finally I 
 came to this resolve : I would start in the morning to 
 walk to the lock-station at Brockport on the canal. If a 
 boat passed that night where they would give me my 
 fare for any work I could do for them, I would go to 
 Albany. If not, I would walk back to Lockport the 
 next day, and try my fortune there. This gave me, for 
 my first day's enterprise, a foot journey of about twenty- 
 five miles. It was out of the question, with my finances, 
 for me to think of compassing the train. 
 
 Every point of life is a pivot on which turns the whole 
 action of our after-lives ; and so, indeed, of the after- 
 lives of the whole world. But we are so purblind that 
 we only see this of certain special enterprises and en- 
 deavors, which we therefore call critical. I am sure I 
 see it of that twenty-five miles of fresh autumnal walking. 
 I was in tip-top spirits. I found the air all oxygen, and 
 everything " all right." I did not loiter, and I did not 
 hurry. I swung along with the feeling that every nerve 
 and muscle drew, as in the trades a sailor feels of every 
 rope and sail. And so I was not tired, not thirsty, till
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 143 
 
 the brook appeared where I was to drink ; nor hungry 
 till twelve o'clock came, when I was to dine. I called 
 myself, as I walked, "The Child of Good Fortune," be- 
 cause the sun was on my right quarter, as the sun should 
 be when you walk, because the rain of yesterday had laid 
 the dust for me, and the frost of yesterday had painted 
 the hills for me, and the northwest wind cooled the air 
 for me. I came to Wilkie's Cross-Roads just in time to 
 meet the Claremont baker and buy my dinner loaf of 
 him. And when my walk was nearly done, I came out 
 on the low bridge at Sewell's, which is a drawbridge, 
 just before they raised it for a passing boat, instead of 
 the moment after. Because I was all right I felt myself 
 and called myself "The Child of Good Fortune." Dear 
 reader, in a world made by a loving Father, we are 
 all of us children of good fortune, if we only have wit 
 enough to find it out, as we stroll along. 
 
 The last stroke of good fortune which that day had for 
 me was the solution of my question whether or no I 
 would go to Babylon. I was to go if any good-natured 
 boatman would take me. This is a question, Mr. Mil- 
 lionnaire, more doubtful to those who have not drawn 
 their dividends than to those who have. As I came 
 down the village street at Brockport, I could see the 
 horses of a boat bound eastward, led along from level to 
 level at the last lock ; and, in spite of my determination 
 not to hurry, I put myself on the long, loping trot which 
 the St. Regis Indians taught me, that I might overhaul 
 this boat before she got under way at her new speed. I 
 came out on the upper gate of the last lock just as she 
 passed out from the lower gate. The horses were just
 
 144 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 put on, and a reckless boy gave them their first blow 
 after two hours of rest and corn. As the heavy boat 
 started off under the new motion, I saw, and her skipper 
 saw at the same instant, that a long new tow-rope of his, 
 which had lain coiled on deck, was suddenly flying out 
 to its full length. The outer end of it had been carried 
 upon the lock-side by some chance or blunder, and there 
 some idle loafer had thrown the looped bight of it over a 
 hawser-post. The loafers on the lock saw, as I did, that 
 the rope was running out, and at the call of the skipper 
 one of them condescended to throw the loop overboard, 
 but he did it so carelessly that the lazy rope rolled over 
 into the lock, and the loop caught on one of the valve- 
 irons of the upper gate. The whole was the business of 
 an instant, of course. But the poor skipper saw, what 
 we did not, that the coil of the rope on deck was foul, 
 and so entangled round his long tiller, that ten seconds 
 would do one of three things, they would snap his 
 new rope in two, which was a trifle, or they would 
 wrench his tiller-head off the rudder, which would cost 
 him an hour to mend, or they would upset those two 
 horses, at this instant on a trot, and put into the canal 
 the rowdy youngster who had started them. It was this 
 complex certainty which gave fire to the double cries 
 which he addressed aft to us on the lock, and forward to 
 the magnet boy, whose indifferent intelligence at that 
 moment drew him along. 
 
 I was stepping upon the gate-head to walk across it. 
 It took but an instant, not nearly all the ten seconds, to 
 swing down by my arms into the lock, keeping myself 
 hanging by my hands, to catch with my right foot the
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 145 
 
 bight of the rope and lift it off the treacherous iron, to 
 kick the whole into the water, and then to scramble up 
 the wet lock-side again. I got a little wet, but that was 
 nothing. I ran down the tow-path, beckoned to the 
 skipper, who sheered his boat up to the shore, and I 
 jumped on board. 
 
 At that moment, reader, Fausta was sitting in a yel- 
 low chair on the deck of that musty old boat, crocheting 
 from a pattern in " Godey's Lady's Book. I remember 
 it as I remember my breakfast of this morning. Not that 
 I fell in love with her, nor did I fall in love with my 
 breakfast ; but I knew she was there. And that was 
 the first time I ever saw her. It is many years since, 
 and I have seen her every day from that evening to this 
 evening. But I had then no business with her. My 
 affair was with him whom I have called the skipper, by 
 way of adapting this fresh-water narrative to ears accus- 
 tomed to Marry at and Tom Cringle. I told him that 
 I had to go to New York ; that I had not time to 
 walk, and had not money to pay; that I should like 
 to work my passage to Troy, if there were any way in 
 which I could; and to ask him this I had come on 
 board. 
 
 "Waal," said the skipper, "'t ain't much that is to 
 be done, and Zekiel and I calc'late to do most of that ; 
 and there 's that blamed boy beside " 
 
 This adjective "blamed" is the virtuous oath by 
 which simple people, who are improving their habits, 
 cure themselves of a stronger epithet, as men take to 
 flag-root who are abandoning tobacco. 
 
 " He ain't good for nothin', as you see," continued 
 
 VOL. XII. 7 J
 
 146 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 the skipper meditatively, " and you air, anybody can see 
 that," he added. " Ef you 've mind to come to Albany, 
 you can have your vittles, poor enough they are too ; 
 and ef you are willing to ride sometimes, you can ride. 
 I guess where there's room for three in the bunks 
 there 's room for four. 'T ain't everybody would have 
 cast off that blamed hawser-rope as neat as you did." 
 
 From which last remark I inferred, what I learned as 
 a certainty as we travelled farther, that but for the 
 timely assistance I had rendered him I should have plead 
 for my passage in vain. 
 
 This was my introduction to Fausta. That is to say, 
 she heard the whole of the conversation. The formal 
 introduction, which is omitted in no circle of American 
 life to which I have ever been admitted, took place at 
 tea half an hour after, when Mrs. Grills, who always 
 voyaged with her husband, brought in the flapjacks from 
 the kitchen. " Miss Jones," said Grills, as I came into 
 the meal, leaving Zekiel at the tiller, " Miss Jones, 
 this is a young man who is going to Albany. I don't 
 rightly know how to call your name, sir." I said my 
 name was Carter. Then he said, " Mr. Carter, this is 
 Miss Jones. Mrs. Grills, Mr. Carter. Mr. Carter, Mrs. 
 Grills. She is my wife." And so our partie carree was 
 established for the voyage. 
 
 In these days there are few people who know that a 
 journey on a canal is the pleasantest journey in the 
 world. A canal has to go through fine scenery. It can- 
 not exist unless it follow through the valley of a stream. 
 The movement is so easy that, with your eyes shut, you 
 do not know you move. The route is so direct, that
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 147 
 
 when you are once shielded from the sun, you are safe 
 for hours. You draw, you read, you write, or you sew, 
 crochet, or knit. You play on your flute or your guitar, 
 without one hint of inconvenience. At a " low bridge " 
 you duck your head lest you lose your hat, and that 
 reminder teaches you that you are human. You are glad 
 to know this, and you laugh at the memento. For the 
 rest of the time you journey, if you are " all right " 
 within, in Elysium. 
 
 I rode one of those horses perhaps two or three hours 
 a day. At locks I made myself generally useful. At 
 night I walked the deck till one o'clock, with my pipe or 
 without it, to keep guard against the lock-thieves. The 
 skipper asked me sometimes, after he found I could " ci- 
 pher," to disentangle some of the knots in his bills of 
 lading for him. But all this made but a little inroad in 
 those lovely autumn days, and for the eight days that we 
 glided along, there is one blessed level which is sev- 
 enty miles long, I spent most of my time with Fausta. 
 We walked together on the tow-path to get our appetites 
 for dinner and for supper. At sunrise I always made a 
 cruise inland, and collected the gentians and black alder- 
 berries and colored leaves, with which she dressed Mrs. 
 Grill's table. She took an interest in my wretched 
 sketch-book ; and though she did not and does not draw 
 well, she did show me how to spread an even tint, which 
 I never knew before. I was working up my French. 
 She knew about as much and as little as I did, and we 
 read Mad Reybaud's Clementine together, guessing at 
 the hard words, because we had no dictionary. 
 
 Dear old Grill offered to talk French at table, and we
 
 148 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 tried it for a few days. But it proved he picked up his 
 pronunciation at St. Catherine's, among the boatmen 
 there, and he would say shwo for " horses," where the 
 book said chevaux. Our talk, on the other hand, was 
 not Parisian, but it was not Catherinian, and we 
 subsided into English again. 
 
 So sped along these blessed eight days. I told Fausta 
 thus much of my story, that I was going to seek my for- 
 tune in New York. She, of course, knew nothing of me 
 but what she saw, and she told me nothing of her story. 
 
 But I was very sorry when we came into the basin at 
 Troy, for I knew then that in all reason I must take the 
 steamboat down. And I was very glad I have sel- 
 dom in my life been so glad when I found that she 
 also was going to New York immediately. She accepted, 
 very pleasantly, my offer to carry her trunk to the 
 Isaac Newton for her, and to act as her escort to the 
 city. Tor me, my trunk, 
 
 " in danger tried," 
 Swung in my hand, " nor left my side." 
 
 My earthly possessions were few anywhere. I had 
 left at Attica most of what they were. Through the 
 voyage I had been man enough to heep on a working- 
 gear fit for a workman's duty. And old Grills had not 
 yet grace enough to keep his boat still on Sunday. How 
 one remembers little things ! I can remember each 
 touch of the toilet, as, in that corner of a dark cuddy 
 where I had shared " Zekiel's " bunk with him, I dressed 
 myself with one of my two white shirts, and with the 
 Change of raiment which had been tight squeezed in my
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 149 
 
 portmanteau. The old overcoat was the best part of it, 
 as in a finite world it often is. I sold my felt hat to 
 Zekiel, and appeared with a light travelling-cap. I do 
 not know how Fausta liked my metamorphosis. I only 
 know that, like butterflies, for a day or two after they 
 go through theirs, I felt decidedly cold. 
 
 As Carter, the canal man, I had carried Fausta's 
 trunk on board. As Mr. Carter, I gave her my arm, 
 led her to the gangway of the Newton, took her passage 
 and mine, and afterwards walked and sat through the 
 splendid moonlight of the first four hours down the river. 
 
 Miss Joues determined that evening to breakfast on 
 the boat. Be it observed that I did not then know her 
 by any other name. She was to go to an aunt's house, 
 and she knew that if she left the boat on its early arri- 
 val in New York, she would disturb that lady by a 
 premature ringing at her bell. I had no reason for 
 haste, as the reader knows. The distribution of the cy- 
 clopaedias was not to take place till the next day, and 
 that absurd trifle was the only distinct excuse I had to 
 myself for being in New York at all. I asked Miss 
 Jones, therefore, if I might not be her escort still to her 
 aunt's house. I had said it would be hard to break off 
 our pleasant journey before I had seen where she lived, 
 and I thought she seemed relieved to know that she 
 should not be wholly a stranger on her arrival. It was 
 clear enough that her aunt would send no one to meet 
 her. 
 
 These preliminaries adjusted, we parted to our respec- 
 tive cabins. And when, the next morning, at that un- 
 earthly hour demanded by Philadelphia trains and other
 
 150 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 exigencies, the Newton made her dock, I rejoiced that 
 breakfast was not till seven o'clock, that I had two 
 hours more of the berth, which was luxury compared 
 to Zekiel's bunk, I turned upon my other side and 
 slept on. 
 
 Sorry enough for that morning nap was I for the next 
 thirty-six hours. Tor when I went on deck, and sent 
 in the stewardess to tell Miss Jones that I was waiting 
 for her, and then took from her the check for her trunk, 
 I woke to the misery of finding that, in that treacherous 
 two hours, some pirate from the pier had stepped on 
 board, had seized the waiting trunk, left almost alone, 
 while the baggage-master's back was turned, and that, to 
 a certainty, it was lost. I did not return to Fausta with 
 this story till the breakfast-bell had long passed and the 
 breakfast was very cold. I did not then tell it to her 
 till I had seen her eat her breakfast with an appetite 
 much better than mine. I had already offered up stairs 
 the largest reward to anybody who would bring it back 
 which my scanty purse would pay. I had spoken to the 
 clerk, who had sent for a policeman. I could do nothing 
 more, and I did not choose to ruin her chop and coffee 
 by ill-timed news. The officer came before breakfast was 
 over, and called me from table. 
 
 On the whole, his business-like way encouraged me. 
 He had some clews which I had not thought possible. 
 It was not unlikely that they should pounce on the trunk 
 before it was broken open. I gave him a written de- 
 scription of its marks ; and when he civilly asked if " my 
 lady " would give some description of any books or other 
 articles within, I readily promised that I would call with
 
 THE CHILDREN OP THE PUBLIC. 151 
 
 such a description at the police station. Somewhat en- 
 couraged, I returned to Miss Jones, and, when I led her 
 from the breakfast-table, told her of her misfortune. I 
 took all shame to myself for my own carelessness, to 
 which I attributed the loss. But I told her all that the 
 officer had said to me, and that I hoped to bring her the 
 trunk at her aunt's before the day was over. 
 
 Fausta took my news, however, with a start which 
 frightened me. All her money, but a shilling or two, 
 was in the trunk. To place money in trunks is a weak- 
 ness of the female mind which I have nowhere seen 
 accounted for. Worse than this, though, as appeared 
 after a moment's examination of her travelling-sa^, her 
 portfolio in the trunk contained the letter of the aunt 
 whom she came to visit, giving her her address in the 
 city. To this address she had no other clew but that 
 her aunt was Mrs. Mary Mason, had married a few years 
 before a merchant named Mason, whom Miss Jones had 
 never seen, and of whose name and business this was all 
 she knew. They lived in a numbered street, but whether 
 it was Fourth Street, or Fifty -fourth, or One Hundred 
 and Twenty-fourth, or whether it was something be- 
 tween, the poor child had no idea. She had put up the 
 letter carefully, but had never thought of the importance 
 of the address. Besides this aunt, she knew no human 
 being in New York. 
 
 " Child of the Public," I said to myself, " what do you 
 do now P " I had appealed to my great patron in sending 
 for the officer, and on the whole I felt that my sovereign 
 had been gracious to me, if not yet hopeful But now I 
 must rub my lamp again, and ask the genie where the
 
 152 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 unknown Mason lived. The genie of course suggested 
 the Directory, and I ran for it to the clerk's office. But 
 as we were toiling down the pages of "Masons," and 
 had written off thirteen or fourteen who lived in num- 
 bered streets, Fausta started, looked back at the preface 
 and its date, flung down her pencil in the only abandon- 
 ment of dismay in which I ever saw her, and cried " First 
 of May ! They were abroad until May. They have been 
 abroad since the day they were married ! " So that 
 genie had to put his glories into his pocket, and carry his 
 Directory back to the office again. 
 
 The natural thing to propose was, that I should find 
 for Miss Jones a respectable boarding-house, and that 
 she should remain there until her trunk was found, or 
 till she could write to friends who had this fatal address, 
 and receive an answer. But here she hesitated. She 
 hardly liked to explain why, did not explain wholly. 
 But she did not say that she had no friends who knew 
 this address. She had but .few relations in the world, 
 and her aunt had communicated with her alone since she 
 came from Europe. As for the boarding-house, " I had 
 rather look for work," she said bravely. " I have never 
 promised to pay money when I did not know how to ob- 
 tain it ; and that " and here she took out fifty or sixty 
 cents from her purse " and that is all now. In re- 
 spectable boarding-houses, when people come without lug- 
 gage, they are apt to ask for an advance. Or, at least," 
 she added, with some pride, " I am apt to offer it." 
 
 I hastened to ask her to take all my little store ; but I 
 had to own that I had not two dollars. I was sure, 
 however, that my overcoat and the dress-suit I wore
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 153 
 
 would avail me something, if I thrust them boldly up 
 some spout. I was sure that I should be at work within, 
 a day or two. At all events, I was certain of the cyclo- 
 paedia the next day. That should go to old Gowan's, 
 in Pulton Street it was then, " the moral centre of 
 the intellectual world," in the hour I got it. And at 
 this moment, for the first time, the thought crossed me, 
 "If mine could only be the name drawn, so that that 
 foolish $5,000 should fall to me. In that case I felt 
 that Fausta might live in " a respectable boarding-house " 
 till she died. Of this, of course, I said nothing, only 
 that she was welcome to my poor dollar and a half, and 
 that I should receive the next day some more money that 
 was due me. 
 
 " You forget, Mr. Carter," replied Fausta, as proudly 
 as before, " you forget that I cannot borrow of you any 
 more than of a boarding-house-keeper. I never borrow. 
 Please God, I never will. It must be," she added, 
 " that in a Christian city like this there is some respect- 
 able and fit arrangement made for travellers who find 
 themselves where I am. What that provision is I do 
 not know : but I will find out what it is before this sun 
 goes down." 
 
 I paused a moment before I replied. If I had been 
 fascinated by this lovely girl before, I now bowed in 
 respect before her dignity and resolution ; and, with my 
 sympathy, there was a delicious throb of self-respect 
 united, when I heard her lay down so simply, as princi- 
 ples of her life, two principles on which I had always 
 myself tried to live. The half-expressed habits of my 
 boyhood and youth were now uttered for me as axioms 
 7*
 
 154 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 by lips which I knew could speak nothing but right and 
 truth. 
 
 I paused a moment. I stumbled a little as I expressed 
 my regret that she would not let me help her, joined 
 with my certainty that she was in the right in refusing, 
 and then, in the only stiff speech I ever made to her, 
 I said : 
 
 " I am the ' Child of the Public.' If you ever hear 
 my story, you will say so too. At the least, I can claim 
 this, that I have a right to help you in your quest as to 
 the way in which the public will help you. Thus far I 
 am clearly the officer in his suite to whom he has in- 
 trusted you. Are you ready, then, to go on shore ? " 
 
 Fausta looked around on that forlorn ladies' saloon, as 
 if it were the last link holding her to her old safe world. 
 
 " Looked upon skylight, lamp, and chain, 
 As what she ne'er might see again." 
 
 Then she looked right through me ; and if there had 
 been one mean thought in me at that minute, she would 
 have seen the viper. Then she said sadly, 
 
 " I have perfect confidence in you, though people 
 would say we were strangers. Let us go." 
 
 And we left the boat together. We declined the in- 
 vitations of the noisy hackmen, and walked slowly to 
 Broadway. 
 
 We stopped at the station-house for that district, and 
 to the attentive chief Fausta herself described those con- 
 tents of her trunk which she thought would be most 
 easily detected, if offered for sale. Her mother's Bible, 
 at which the chief shook his head ; Bibles, alas ! brought
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 155 
 
 nothing at the shops ; a soldier's medal, such as were 
 given as target prizes by the Montgomery regiment, and 
 a little silver canteen, marked with the device of the 
 same regiment, seemed to him better worthy of note. 
 Her portfolio was wrought with a cipher, and she ex- 
 plained to him that she was most eager that this should 
 be recovered. The pocket-book contained more than one 
 hundred dollars, which she described, but he shook his 
 head here, and gave her but little hope of that, if the 
 trunk were once opened. His chief hope was for this 
 morning. 
 
 " And where shall we send to you then, madam ? " 
 said he. 
 
 I had been proud, as if it were my merit, of the im- 
 pression Fausta had made upon the officer, in her quiet, 
 simple, lady -like dress and manner. For myself, I thought 
 that one slip of pretence in my dress or bearing, a scrap 
 of gold or of pinchbeck, would have ruined both of us 
 in our appeal. But, fortunately, I did not disgrace her, 
 and the man looked at her as if he expected her to say, 
 " Fourteenth Street." What would she say ? 
 
 " That depends upon what the time will be. Mr. Car- 
 ter will call at noon, and will let you know." 
 
 We bowed, and were gone. In an instant more she 
 begged my pardon, almost with tears ; but I told her 
 that if she also had been a " Child of the Public," she 
 could not more fitly have spoken to one of her father's 
 officers. I begged her to use me as her protector, and 
 not to apologize again. Then we laid out the plans 
 which we followed out that day. 
 
 The officer's manner had reassured her, and I sue-
 
 156 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 ceeded in persuading her that it was certain we should 
 have the trunk at noon. How much better to wait, at 
 least so far, before she entered on any of the enterprises 
 of which she talked so coolly, as of offering herself as a 
 nursery-girl, or as a milliner, to whoever would employ 
 her, if only she could thus secure an honest home till 
 money or till aunt were found. Once persuaded that we 
 were safe from this Quixotism, 1 told her that we must 
 go on, as we did on the canal, and first we must take our 
 constitutional walk for two hours. 
 
 " At least," she said, " our good papa, the Public, 
 gives us wonderful sights to see, and good walking to 
 our feet, as a better Father has given us this heavenly 
 sky and this bracing air." 
 
 And with those words the last heaviness of despond- 
 ency left her face for that day. And we plunged into 
 the delicious adventure of exploring a new city, staring 
 into windows as only strangers can, revelling in print- 
 shops as only they do, really seeing the fine buildings as 
 residents always forget to do, and laying up, in short, 
 with those streets, nearly all the associations which to 
 this day we have with them. 
 
 Two hours of this tired us with walking, of course. I 
 do not know what she meant to do next ; but at ten I 
 said, " Time for French, Miss Jones." " Ah oui," said 
 she, " mais ou ? " and I had calculated my distances, and 
 led her at once into Lafayette Place ; and, in a moment, 
 pushed open the door of the Astor Library, led her up 
 the main stairway, and said, " This is what the Public 
 provides for his children when they have to study." 
 
 " This is the Astor," said she, delighted. " And we
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 157 
 
 are all right, as you say, here?" Then she saw that 
 our entrance excited no surprise among the few read- 
 ers, men and women, who were beginning to assem- 
 ble. 
 
 We took our seats at an unoccupied table, and began 
 to revel in the luxuries for which we had only to ask 
 that we might enjoy. I had a little memorandum of 
 books which I had been waiting to see. She needed 
 none ; but looked for one and another, and yet another, 
 and between us we kept the attendant well in motion. 
 A pleasant thing to me to be finding out her thorough- 
 bred tastes and lines of work, and I was happy enough 
 to interest her in some of my pet readings; and, of 
 course, for she was a woman, to get quick hints which 
 had never dawned on me before. A very short hour 
 ,and a half we spent there before I went to the station- 
 house again. I went very quickly, I returned to her 
 very slowly. 
 
 The trunk was not found. But they were now quite 
 sure they were on its track. They felt certain it had 
 been carried from pier to pier and taken back up the 
 river. Nor was it hopeless to follow it. The particular 
 rascal who was supposed to have it would certainly stop 
 either at Piermont or at Newburg. They had tele- 
 graphed to both places, and were in time for both. 
 ' The day boat, sir, will bring your lady's trunk, and 
 will bring me Rowdy Rob, too, I hope," said the officer. 
 But at the same moment, as he rang his bell, he learned 
 hat no despatch had yet been received from either of 
 ^e nlaces named. I did not feel so certain as he did. 
 
 Eut Fausta showed no discomfort as I told my news.
 
 158 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Thus far," said she, " the Public serves me well. I 
 will borrow no trouble by want of faith." And I, as 
 Dante would say, and I, to her, " Will you let me re- 
 mind you, then, that at one we dine ; that Mrs. Grills 
 is now placing the salt-pork upon the cabin table, and 
 Mr. Grills asking the blessing ; and, as this is the only 
 day when I can have the honor of your company, will 
 you let me show you how a Child of the Public dines, 
 when his finances are low?" 
 
 Pausta laughed, and said again, less tragically than 
 before, "I have perfect confidence in you," little 
 thinking how she started my blood with the words ; but 
 this time, as if in token, she let me take her hand upon 
 my arm, as we walked down the street together. 
 
 If we had been snobs, or even if I had been one, I 
 should have taken her to Taylor's, and have spent all the 
 money I had on such a luncheon as neither of us had 
 ever eaten before. Whatever else I am, I am not a snob 
 of that sort. I show my colors. I led her into a little 
 cross-street which I had noticed in our erratic morning 
 pilgrimage. We stopped at a German baker's. I bade 
 her sit down at the neat marble table, and I bought two 
 rolls. She declined lager, which I offered her in fun. 
 We took water instead, and we had dined, and had paid 
 two cents for our meal, and had had a very merry din- 
 ner, too, when the clock struck two. 
 
 " And now, Mr. Carter," said she, " I will steal no 
 more of your day. You did not come to New York to 
 escort lone damsels to the Astor Library or to dinner. 
 Nor did I come only to see the lions or to read Prench. 
 I insist on your going to your affairs, and leaving me to
 
 THE CHILDEEN OF THE PUBLIC. 159 
 
 mine. If you will meet me at the Library half an hour 
 before it closes, I will thank you; till then," with a 
 tragedy shake of the hand, and a merry laugh, " adieu ! " 
 
 I knew very well that no harm could happen to her in 
 two hours of an autumn afternoon. I was not sorry for 
 her conge, for it gave me an opportunity to follow my 
 own plans. I stopped at one or two cabinet-makers, and 
 talked with the "jours" about work, that I might tell 
 her with truth that I had been in search of it; then 
 I sedulously began on calling upon every man I could 
 reach named Mason. O, how often I went through one 
 phase or another of this colloquy : 
 
 " Is Mr. Mason in ? " 
 
 " That 's my name, sir." 
 
 " Can you give me the address of Mr. Mason who 
 returned from Europe last May ? " 
 
 "Know no such person, sir." 
 
 The reader can imagine how many forms this dia- 
 logue could be repeated, in, before, as I wrought my way 
 through a long line of dry-goods cases to a distant 
 counting-room, I heard some one in it say, " No, mad- 
 am, I know no such person as you describe " ; and from 
 the recess Fausta emerged and met me. Her plan for 
 the afternoon had been the same with mine. We laughed 
 as we detected each other ; then I told her she had had 
 quite enough of this, that it was time she should rest, and 
 took her, nolens volens, into the ladies' parlor of the St. 
 Nicholas, and bade her wait there through the twilight, 
 with my copy of Clementine, till I should return from 
 the police-station. If the reader has ever waited in such 
 a place for some one to come and attend to him, he will
 
 160 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 understand that nobody mil be apt to molest him when 
 he has not asked for attention. 
 
 Two hours I left Fausta in the rocking-chair, which 
 there the Public had provided for her. Then I returned, 
 sadly enough. No tidings of Rowdy Rob, none of 
 trunk, Bible, money, letter, medal, or anything. Still 
 was my district sergeant hopeful, and, as always, re. 
 spectful. But I was hopeless this time, and I knew that 
 the next day Fausta would be plunging into the war 
 with intelligence-houses and advertisements. For the 
 night, I was determined that she should spend it in my 
 ideal " respectable boarding-house." On my way down 
 town, I stopped in at one or two shops to make inquiries, 
 and satisfied myself where I would take her. Still I 
 thought it wisest that we should go after tea ; and an- 
 other cross-street baker, and another pair of rolls, and 
 another tap at the Croton, provided that repast for us. 
 Then I told Fausta of the respectable boarding-house, 
 and that she must go there. She did not say no. But 
 she did say she would rather not spend the evening 
 there. " There must be some place open for us," said 
 she. " There ! there is a church-bell ! The church is 
 always home. Let us come there." 
 
 So to " evening meeting " we went, startling the sex- 
 ton by arriving an hour early. If there were any who 
 wondered what was the use of that Wednesday-evening 
 service, we did not. In a dark gallery pew we sat, she 
 at one end, I at the other; and, if the whole truth be 
 told, each of us fell asleep at once, and slept till the 
 heavy organ tones taught us that the service had begun. 
 A hundred or more people had straggled in then, and the
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 161 
 
 preacher, good soul, he took for his text, " Doth not God 
 care for the ravens ? " I cannot describe the ineffable 
 feeling of home that came over me in that dark pew of 
 that old church. I had never been in so large a church 
 before. I had never heard so heavy an organ before. 
 Perhaps I had heard better preaching, but never any 
 that came to my occasions more. But it was none of 
 these things which moved me. It was the fact that we 
 were just where we had a right to be. No impudent 
 waiter could ask us why we were sitting there, nor any 
 petulant policeman propose that we should push on. It 
 was God's house, and, because his, it was his children's. 
 
 All this feeling of repose grew upon me, and, as it 
 proved, upon Fausta also. For when the service was 
 ended, and I ventured to ask her whether she also had 
 this sense of home and rest, she assented so eagerly, that 
 I proposed, though with hesitation, a notion which had 
 crossed me, that I should leave her there. 
 
 " I cannot think," I said, " of any possible harm that 
 could come to you before morning." 
 
 "Do you know, I had thought of that very same 
 thing, but I did not dare tell you," she said. 
 
 Was not I glad that she had considered me her 
 keeper ! But I only said, " At the ' respectable boarding- 
 house ' you might be annoyed by questions." 
 
 "And no one will speak to me here. I know that 
 from Goody Two-Shoes." 
 
 " I will be here," said I, " at sunrise in the morning." 
 And so I bade her good by, insisting on leaving in the 
 pew my own great-coat. I knew she might need it 
 before morning. I walked out as the sexton closed the 
 
 K
 
 162 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 door below on the last of the down-stairs worshippers. 
 He passed along the aisles below, with his long poker 
 which screwed down the gas. I saw at once that he had 
 no intent of exploring the galleries. But I loitered out- 
 side till I saw him lock the doors and depart ; and then, 
 happy in the thought that Miss Jones was in the safest 
 place in New York, as comfortable as she was the 
 night before, and much more comfortable than she had 
 been any night upon the canal, I went in search of my 
 own lodging. 
 
 " To the respectable boarding-house ? " 
 
 Not a bit, reader. I had no shillings for respectable 
 or disrespectable boarding-houses. I asked the first 
 policeman where his district station was. I went into 
 its office, and told the captain that I was green in the 
 city ; had got no work and no money. In truth, I had 
 left my purse in Miss Jones's charge, and a five-cent 
 piece, which I showed the chief, was all I had. He said 
 no word but to bid me go up two flights and turn into 
 the first bunk I found. I did so ; and in five minutes 
 was asleep in a better bed than I had slept in for nine 
 days. 
 
 That was what the Public did for me that night. I, 
 too, was safe ! 
 
 I am making this story too long. But with that night 
 and its anxieties the end has come. At sunrise I rose 
 and made my easy toilet. I bought and ate my roll, 
 varying the brand from yesterday's. I bought another, 
 with a lump of butter, and an orange, for Fausta. I left 
 my portmanteau at the station, while I rushed to the 
 sexton's house, told his wife I had left my gloves in
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 163 
 
 church the night before, as was the truth, and easily 
 obtained from her the keys. In a moment I was in the 
 vestibule, locked in, was in the gallery, and there 
 found Eausta, just awake, as she declared, from a com- 
 fortable night, reading her morning lesson in the Bible, 
 and sure, she said, that I should soon appear. Nor 
 ghost, nor wraith, had visited her. I spread for her a 
 brown paper table-cloth on the table in the vestibule. I 
 laid out her breakfast for her, called her, and wondered 
 at her toilet. How is it that women always make them- 
 selves appear as neat and finished as if there were no 
 conflict, dust, or wrinkle in the world? 
 
 [Here Fausta adds, in this manuscript, a parenthesis, 
 to say that she folded her undersleeves neatly, and her 
 collar, before she slept, and put them between the cush- 
 ions, upon which she slept. In the morning they had 
 been pressed without a sad-iron.] 
 
 She finished her repast. I opened the church-door for 
 five minutes. She passed out when she had enough ex- 
 amined the monuments, and at a respectable distance I 
 followed her. We joined each other, and took our ac- 
 customed morning walk; but then she resolutely said, 
 " Good by," for the day. She would find work before 
 night, work and a home. And I must do the same. 
 Only when I pressed her to let me know of her success, 
 she said she would meet me at the Astor Library just 
 before it closed. No, she would not take my money. 
 Enough, that for twenty-four hours she had been my 
 guest. When she had found her aunt and told her the 
 story, they should insist on repaying this hospitality. 
 Hospitality, dear reader, which I had dispensed at the
 
 164 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 charge of six cents. Have you ever treated Miranda for 
 a day and found the charge so low? When I urged 
 other assistance she said resolutely, " No." In fact, she 
 had already made an appointment at two, she said, and 
 she must not waste the day. 
 
 I also had an appointment at two ; for it was at that 
 hour that Burrham was to distribute the cyclopaedias at 
 Castle Garden. The Emigrant Commission had not yet 
 seized it for their own. I spent the morning in asking 
 vainly for Masons fresh from Europe, and for work in 
 cabinet-shops. I found neither, and so wrought my way 
 to the appointed place, where, instead of such wretched 
 birds in the bush, I was to get one so contemptible in 
 my hand. 
 
 Those who remember Jenny Lind's first triumph night 
 at Castle Garden have some idea of the crowd as it filled 
 gallery and floor of that immense hall when I entered. 
 I had given no thought to the machinery of this folly. 
 I only know that my ticket bade me be there at two 
 p. M. this day. But as I drew near, the throng, the 
 bands of policemen, the long queues of persons entering, 
 reminded me that here was an affair of ten thousand per- 
 sons, and also that Mr. Burrham was not unwilling to 
 make it as showy, perhaps as noisy, an affair as was 
 respectable, by way of advertising future excursions and 
 distributions. I was led to seat No. 3,671 with a good 
 deal of parade, and when I came there I found I was 
 very much of a prisoner. I was late, or rather on the 
 stroke of two. Immediately, almost, Mr. Burrham arose 
 in the front and made a long speech about his liberality, 
 and the public's liberality, and everybody's liberality in
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 165 
 
 general, and the method of the distribution in particular. 
 The mayor and four or five other well-known and re- 
 spectable gentlemen were kind enough to be present to 
 guarantee the fairness of the arrangements. At the sug- 
 gestion of the mayor and the police, the doors would now 
 be closed, that no persons might interrupt the ceremony 
 till it was ended. And the distribution of the cyclopae- 
 dias would at once go forward, in the order in which the 
 lots were drawn, earliest numbers securing the earliest 
 impressions ; which, as Mr. Burrham almost regretted to 
 say, were a little better than the latest. After these had 
 been distributed two figures would be drawn, one 
 green and one red, to indicate the fortunate lady and 
 gentleman who would receive respectively the profits 
 which had arisen from this method of selling the cyclo- 
 paedias, after the expenses of printing and distribution 
 had been covered, and after the magazines had been 
 ordered. 
 
 Great cheering followed this announcement from all 
 but me. Here I had shut myself up in this humbug 
 hall, for Heaven knew how long, on the most important 
 day of my life. I would have given up willingly my 
 cyclopaedia and my chance at the " profits," for the cer- 
 tainty of seeing Fausta at five o'clock. If I did not see 
 her then, what might befall her, and when might I see 
 her again ? An hour before this certainty was my own ; 
 now it was only mine by my liberating myself from this 
 prison. Still I was encouraged by seeing that every- 
 thing was conducted like clock-work. Prom literally a 
 hundred stations they were distributing the books. We 
 formed ourselves into queues as we pleased, drew our
 
 166 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 numbers, and then presented ourselves at the bureaux, 
 ordered our magazines, and took our cyclopaedias. It 
 would be done, at that rate, by half past four. An om- 
 nibus might bring me to the Park, and a Bowery car do 
 the rest in time. After a vain discussion for the right of 
 exit with one or two of the attendants, I abandoned my- 
 self to this hope, and began studying my cyclopaedia. 
 
 It was sufficiently amusing to see ten thousand peo- 
 ple resign themselves to the same task, and affect to be 
 unconcerned about the green and red figures which were 
 to divide the " profits." I tried to make out who were 
 as anxious to get out of that tawdry den as I was. Tour 
 o'clock struck, and the distribution was not done. I 
 began to be very impatient. What if Fausta fell into 
 trouble ? I knew, or hoped I knew, that she would strug- 
 gle to the Astor Library, as to her only place of rescue 
 and refuge, her asylum. What if I failed her there ? 
 I who had pretended to be her protector ! " Protector, 
 indeed ! " she would say, if she knew I was at a theatre 
 witnessing the greatest folly of the age. And if I did 
 not meet her to-day, when should I meet her ? If she 
 found her aunt, how should I find her ? If she did not 
 find her, good God ! that was worse, where might 
 she not be before twelve hours were over? Then the 
 fatal trunk ! I had told the police agent he might send 
 it to the St. Nicholas, because I had to give him some 
 address. But Fausta did not know this, and the St. 
 Nicholas people knew nothing of us. I grew more and 
 more excited, and when at last my next neighbor told me 
 that it was half past four, I rose and insisted on leaving 
 my seat. Two ushers with blue sashes almost held me
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 167 
 
 down ; they showed me the whole assembly sinking into 
 quiet. In fact, at that moment Mr. Burrham was beg- 
 ging every one to be seated. I would not be seated. I 
 would go to the door. I would go out. " Go, if you 
 please ! " said the usher next it, contemptuously. And 
 I looked, and there was no handle ! Yet this was not a 
 dream. It is the way they arrange the doors in halls 
 where they choose to keep people in their places. I 
 could have collared that grinning blue sash. I did tell 
 him I would wring his precious neck for him, if he did 
 not let me out. I said I would sue him for false impris- 
 onment ; I would have a writ of habeas corpus. 
 
 " Habeas corpus be d d ! " said the officer, with an 
 irreverent disrespect to the palladium. " If you are not 
 more civil, sir, I will call the police, of whom we have 
 plenty. You say you want to go out ; you are keeping 
 everybody in." 
 
 And, in fact, at that moment the clear voice of the 
 mayor was announcing that they would not go on until 
 there was perfect quiet ; and I felt that I was imprison- 
 ing all these people, not they me. 
 
 " Child of the Public," said my mourning genius, 
 "are you better than other men?" So I sneaked back 
 to seat No. 3,671, amid the contemptuous and reproach- 
 ful looks and sneers of my more respectable neighbors, 
 who had sat where they were told to do. We must be 
 through in a moment, and perhaps Fausta would be late 
 also. If only the Astor would keep open after sunset ! 
 How often have I wished that since, and for less rea- 
 Bons ! 
 
 Silence thus restored, Mr. A , the mayor, led for-
 
 168 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 ward his little daughter, blindfolded her, and bade her 
 put her hand into a green box, from which she drew out 
 a green ticket. He took it from her, and read, in his 
 clear voice again, "No. 2,973 !" By this time we all 
 knew where the " two thousands " sat. Then " nine 
 hundreds " were not far from the front, so that it was 
 not far that that frightened girl, dressed all in black, and 
 heavily veiled, had to walk, who answered to this call. 
 
 Mr. A met her, helped her up the stair upon the 
 
 stage, took from her her ticket, and read, " Jerusha 
 Stillingfleet, of Yellow Springs, who, at her death, as it 
 seems, transferred this right to the bearer." 
 
 The disappointed nine thousand nine hundred and 
 ninety-nine joined in a rapturous cheer, each man and 
 woman, to show that he or she was not disappointed. 
 The bearer spoke with Mr. Burrham, in answer to his 
 questions, and, with a good deal of ostentation, he 
 opened a check-book, filled a check and passed it to her, 
 she signing a receipt as she took it, and transferring to 
 him her ticket. So far, in dumb show, all was well. 
 What was more to my purpose, it was rapid, for we 
 should have been done in five minutes more, but that 
 some devil tempted some loafer in a gallery to cry, 
 " Face ! face ! " Miss Stillingfleet's legatee was still 
 heavily veiled. 
 
 In one horrid minute that whole amphitheatre, which 
 seemed to me then more cruel than the Coliseum ever 
 was, rang out with a cry of " Face, face ! " I tried the 
 counter-cry of " Shame ! shame ! " but I was in dis- 
 grace among my neighbors, and a counter-cry neve? 
 takes as its prototype does, either. At first, on the
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 169 
 
 stage, they affected not to hear or understand; then 
 there was a courtly whisper between Mr. Burrhara and 
 the lady ; but Mr. A , the mayor, and the respecta- 
 ble gentlemen, instantly interfered. It was evident that 
 she would not unveil, and that they were prepared to in- 
 dorse her refusal. In a moment more she courtesied to 
 the assembly ; the mayor gave her his arm, and led her 
 out through a side door. 
 
 O, the yell that rose up then ! The whole assembly 
 stood up, and, as if they had lost some vested right, 
 hooted and shrieked, "Back! back! Face! face!" 
 
 Mr. A returned, made as if he would speak, came 
 
 forward to the very front, and got a moment's silence. 
 
 " It is not in the bond, gentlemen," said he. " The 
 young lady is unwilling to unveil, and we must not com- 
 pel her." 
 
 " Face ! face ! " was the only answer, and oranges 
 from up stairs flew about his head and struck upon the 
 table, an omen only fearful from what it prophesied. 
 Then there was such a row for five minutes as I hope I 
 may never see or hear again. People kept their places, 
 fortunately, under a vague impression that they should 
 forfeit some magic rights if they left those numbered 
 seats. But when, for a moment, a file of policemen ap- 
 peared in the orchestra, a whole volley of cyclopedias 
 fell like rain upon their chief, with a renewed cry of 
 "Face! face!" 
 
 At this juncture, with a good deal of knowledge of 
 
 popular feeling, Mr. A led forward his child again. 
 
 Frightened to death the poor thing was, and crying ; he 
 tied his handkerchief round her eyes hastily, and took 
 
 VOL. XII. 8
 
 170 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 her to the red box. Eor a minute the house was hushed. 
 A cry of " Down ! down ! " and every one took his 
 place as the child gave the red ticket to her father. He 
 read it as before, "No. 3,671 !" I heard the words as 
 if he did not speak them. All excited by the delay and 
 the row, by the injustice to the stranger and the per- 
 sonal injustice of everybody to me, I did not know, for 
 a dozen seconds, that every one was looking towards our 
 side of the house, nor was it till my next neighbor with 
 the watch said, " Go, you fool," that I was aware that 
 3,671 was I ! Even then, as I stepped down the pas- 
 sage and up the steps, my only feeling was, that I should 
 get out of this horrid trap, and possibly find Miss Jones 
 lingering near the Astor, not by any means that I was 
 invited to take a check for $ 5,000. 
 
 There was not much cheering. Women never mean 
 to cheer, of course. The men had cheered the green 
 ticket, but they were mad with the red one. I gave up 
 my ticket, signed my receipt, and took my check, shook 
 
 hands with Mr. A and Mr. Burrham, and turned 
 
 to bow to the mob, for mob I must call it now. But 
 the cheers died away. A few people tried to go out, per- 
 haps, but there was nothing now to retain any in their 
 seats as before, and the generality rose, pressed down 
 the passages, and howled, " Face ! face ! " I thought for 
 a moment that I ought to say something, but they would 
 not hear me, and, after a moment's pause, my passion 
 to depart overwhelmed me. I muttered some apology 
 to the gentlemen, and left the stage by the stage-door. 
 
 I had forgotten that to Castle Garden there can be no 
 back entrance. I came to door after door, which were
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 171 
 
 all locked. It was growing dark. Evidently the sun 
 was set, and I knew the library-door would be shut at 
 sunset. The passages were very obscure. All around 
 me rang this horrid yell of the mob, in which all that I 
 could discern was the cry, " Face, face ! " At last, as I 
 groped round, I came to a practicable door. I entered 
 a room where the western sunset glare dazzled me. I 
 was not alone. The veiled lady in black was there. 
 But the instant she saw me she sprang towards me, flung 
 herself into my arms, and cried : 
 
 " Felix, is it you ? you are indeed my protector ! " 
 
 It was Miss Jones ! It was Fausta ! She was the 
 legatee of Miss Stillingfleet. My first thought was, " 0, 
 if that beggarly usher had let me go ! Will I ever, ever 
 think I have better rights than the Public again ? " 
 
 I took her in my arms. I carried her to the sofa. I 
 could hardly speak for excitement. Then I did say that 
 I had been wild with terror ; that I had feared I had lost 
 her, and lost her forever ; that to have lost that inter- 
 view would have been worse to me than death; for 
 unless she knew that I loved her better than man ever 
 loved woman, I could not face a lonely night, and 
 another lonely day. 
 
 " My dear, dear child," I said, " you may think me 
 wild ; but I must say this, it has been pent up too 
 long." 
 
 " Say what you will," she said after a moment, in 
 which still I held her in my arms ; she was trembling so 
 that she could not have sat upright alone, " say what 
 you will, if only you do not tell me to spend another day 
 alone."
 
 172 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 And I kissed her, and I kissed her, and I kissed her, 
 and I said, " Never, darling, God helping me, till I die ! " 
 
 How long we sat there I do not know. Neither of us 
 spoke again. For one, I looked out on the sunset and 
 the bay. We had but just time to rearrange ourselves 
 
 in positions more independent, when Mr. A came 
 
 in, this time in alarm, to say : 
 
 " Miss Jones, we must get you out of this place, or 
 we must hide you somewhere. I believe, before God, 
 they will storm this passage, and pull the house about 
 our ears." 
 
 He said this, not conscious, as he began, that I was 
 there. At that moment, however, I felt as if I could 
 have met a million men. I started forward and passed 
 him, saying, " Let me speak to them." I rushed upon 
 the stage, fairly pushing back two or three bullies who 
 were already upon it. I sprang upon the table, kicking 
 down the red box as I did so, so that the red tickets 
 fell on the floor and on the people below. One stuck in 
 an old man's spectacles in a way which made the people 
 in the galleries laugh. A laugh is a great blessing at 
 such a moment. Curiosity is another. Three loud words 
 spoken like thunder do a good deal more. And after 
 three words the house was hushed to hear me. I 
 said: 
 
 " Be fair to the girl. She has no father nor mother. 
 She has no brother nor sister. She is alone in the world, 
 with nobody to help her but the public and me ! " 
 
 The audacity of the speech brought out a cheer, and 
 we should have come off in triumph, when some rowdy 
 the original " face " man, I suppose said,
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 173 
 
 " And who are you ? " 
 
 If the laugh went against me now I was lost, of 
 course. Fortunately I had no time to think. I said 
 without thinking, 
 
 "I am the Child of the Public, and her betrothed 
 husband ! " 
 
 heavens ! what a yell of laughter, of hurrahings, of 
 satisfaction with a denouement, rang through the house, 
 and showed that all was well. Burrham caught the 
 moment, and started his band, this time successfully, 
 I believe with " See the Conquering Hero." The doors, 
 of course, had been open long before. Well-disposed 
 people saw they need stay no longer ; ill-disposed people 
 dared not stay ; the blue-coated men with buttons saun- 
 tered on the stage in groups, and I suppose the worst 
 rowdies disappeared as they saw them. I had made my 
 single speech, and for the moment I was a hero. 
 
 1 believe the mayor would have liked to kiss me. 
 Burrham almost did. They overwhelmed me with thanks 
 and congratulations. All these I received as well as I 
 could, somehow I did not feel at all surprised, 
 everything was as it should be. I scarcely thought of 
 leaving the stage myself, till, to my surprise, the mayor 
 asked me to go home with him to dinner. 
 
 Then I remembered that we were not to spend the 
 rest of our lives in Castle Garden. I blundered out 
 something about Miss Jones, that she had no escort 
 except me, and pressed into her room to find her. A 
 group of gentlemen was around her. Her veil was back 
 now. She was very pale, but very lovely. Have I said 
 that she was beautiful as heaven ? She was the queen of
 
 174 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 the room, modestly and pleasantly receiving their felicita* 
 tions that the danger was over, and owning that she had 
 been very much frightened. " Until," she said, " my 
 friend, Mr. Carter, was fortunate enough to guess that I 
 was here. How he did it," she said, turning to me, " is 
 yet an utter mystery to me." 
 
 She did not know till then that it was I who had 
 shared with her the profits of the cyclopaedias. 
 
 As soon as we could excuse ourselves, I asked some 
 one to order a carriage. I sent to the ticket-office for 
 my valise, and we rode to the St. Nicholas. I fairly 
 laughed as I gave the hackman at the hotel-door what 
 would have been my last dollar and a half only two hours 
 before. I entered Miss Jones's name and my own. 
 The clerk looked, and said inquiringly, 
 
 "Is it Miss Jones's trunk which came this after- 
 noon ? " 
 
 I followed his finger to see the trunk on the marble 
 floor. Rowdy Rob had deserted it, having seen, per- 
 haps, a detective when he reached Piermont. The trunk 
 had gone to Albany, had found no owner, and had re- 
 turned by the day boat of that day. 
 
 Pausta went to her room, and I sent her supper after 
 her. One kiss and " Good night " was all that I got 
 from her then. 
 
 " In the morning," said she, " you shall explain." 
 
 It was not yet seven. I went to my own room and 
 dressed, and tendered myself at the mayor's just before 
 his gay party sat down to dine. I met, for the first time 
 in my life, men whose books I had read, and whose 
 speeches I had by heart, and women whom I have since
 
 THE CHILDREN OP THE PUBLIC. 175 
 
 known to honor ; and, in the midst of this brilliant group, 
 
 so excited had Mr. A been in telling the strange 
 
 story of the day, I was, for the hour, the lion. 
 
 I led Mrs. A to the table ; I made her laugh very 
 
 heartily by telling her of the usher's threats to me, and 
 mine to him, and of the disgrace into which I fell among 
 the three thousand six hundreds. I had never been at 
 any such party before. But I found it was only rather 
 simpler and more quiet than most parties I had seen, 
 that its good breeding was exactly that of dear Betsy 
 Myers. 
 
 As the party broke up, Mrs. A said to me, 
 
 "Mr. Carter, I am sure you are tired, with all this 
 excitement. You say you are a stranger here. Let me 
 send round for your trunk to the St. Nicholas, and you 
 sliall spend the night here. I know I can make you a 
 better bed than they." 
 
 I thought as much myself, and assented. In half an 
 hour more I was in bed in Mrs. A 's " best room." 
 
 " I shall not sleep better," said I to myself, " than I 
 did last night." 
 
 That was what the Public did for me that night. I 
 was safe again ! 
 
 in. 
 
 FATJSTA'S STOBY. 
 
 FATJSTA slept late, poor child. I called for her before 
 breakfast. I waited for her after. About ten she ap- 
 peared, so radiant, so beautiful, and so kind! The 
 trunk had revealed a dress I never saw before, and the
 
 176 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 sense of rest, and eternal security, and unbroken love 
 had revealed a charm which was never there to see 
 before. She was dressed for walking, and, as she met 
 me, said, 
 
 " Time for constitutional, Mr. Millionnaire." 
 
 So we walked again, quite up town, almost to the 
 region of pig-pens and cabbage-gardens which is now 
 the Central Park. And after just the first gush of my 
 enthusiasm, Fausta said, very seriously : 
 
 " I must teach you to be grave. You do not know 
 whom you are asking to be your wife. Excepting Mrs. 
 Mason, No. 27 Thirty -fourth Street, sir, there is no one 
 in the world who is of kin to me, and she does not care 
 for me one straw, Felix," she said, almost sadly now. 
 "You call yourself 'Child of the Public.' I started 
 when you first said so, for that is just what I am. 
 
 " I am twenty-two years old. My father died before 
 I was born. My mother, a poor woman, disliked by his 
 relatives and avoided by them, went to live in Hoboken 
 over there, with me. How she lived, God knows ! but 
 it happened that of a strange death she died, I in her 
 arms." 
 
 After a pause, the poor girl went on : 
 
 " There was a great military review, an encampment. 
 She was tempted out to see it. Of a sudden, by some 
 mistake, a ramrod was fired from a careless soldier's gun, 
 and it pierced her through the heart. I tell you, Felix, 
 it pinned my baby frock into the wound, so that they 
 could not part me from her till it was cut away. 
 
 " Of course every one was filled with horror. No- 
 body claimed poor me, the baby. But the battalion the
 
 THE CHILDREN OF THE PUBLIC. 177 
 
 Montgomery Battalion, it was, which had, by mischance, 
 killed my mother adopted me as their child. I was 
 voted ' Fille du Regiment.' They paid an assessment 
 annually, which the colonel expended for me. A kind 
 old woman nursed me." 
 
 " She was your Betsy Myers," interrupted I. 
 
 " And when I was old enough I was sent into Con- 
 necticut, to the best of schools. This lasted till I was 
 sixteen. Fortunately for me, perhaps, the Montgom- 
 ery Battalion then dissolved. I was finding it hard to 
 answer the colonel's annual letters. I had my living 
 to earn, it was best I should earn it. I declined a 
 proposal to go out as a missionary. I had no call. I 
 answered one of Miss Beecher's appeals for Western 
 teachers. Most of my life since has been a school- 
 ma'am's. It has had ups and downs. But I have al- 
 ways been proud that the Public was my godfather ; 
 and, as you know," she said, " I have trusted the Public 
 well. I have never been lonely, wherever I went. I 
 tried to make myself of use. Where I was of use I 
 found society. The ministers have been kind to me. 
 I always offered my services in the Sunday schools and 
 sewing-rooms. The school committees have been kind 
 to me. They are the Public's high chamberlains for 
 poor girls. I have written for the journals. I won one 
 of Sartain's hundred-dollar prizes " 
 
 " And I another," interrupted I. 
 
 " When I was very poor, I won the first prize for an 
 essay on bad boys." 
 
 " And I the second," answered I. 
 
 " I think I know one bad boy better than he knows 
 8* L
 
 178 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 himself," said she. But she went on. " I watched with 
 this poor Miss Stilliugfleet the night she died. This 
 absurd ' distribution ' had got hold of her, and she would 
 not be satisfied till she had transferred that strange 
 ticket, No. 2,973, to me, writing the indorsement which 
 you have heard. I had had a longing to visit New 
 York and Hoboken again. This ticket seemed to me to 
 beckon me. I had money enough to come, if I would 
 come cheaply. I wrote to my father's business partner, 
 and enclosed a note to his only sister. She is Mrs. 
 Mason. She asked me, coldly enough, to her house. 
 Old Mr. Grills always liked me, he offered me escort 
 and passage as far as Troy or Albany. I accepted his 
 proposal, and you know the rest." 
 
 When I told Fausta my story, she declared I made 
 it up as I went along. When she believed it, as she 
 does believe it now, she agreed with me in declaring 
 that it was not fit that two people thus joined should 
 ever be parted. Nor have we been, ever! 
 
 She made a hurried visit at Mrs. Mason's. She pre- 
 pared there for her wedding. On the 1st of November 
 we went into that same church which was our first home 
 in New York; and that dear old raven-man made us 
 one.
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 
 
 BY JOHN BAOTM. 
 
 j|R. WASHINGTON IRVING has already given 
 to the public a version of an American legend, 
 which, in a principal feature, bears some like- 
 ness to the following transcript of a popular Irish one. 
 It may, however, be interesting to show this very coin- 
 cidence between the descendants of a Dutch transatlantic 
 colony and the native peasantry of Ireland, in the super- 
 stitions annals of both. Our tale, moreover, will be 
 found original in all its circumstances, that alluded to 
 only excepted. 
 
 Shamus Dempsey returned a silent, plodding, sorrowful 
 man, though a young one, to his poor home, after seeing 
 laid in the grave his aged, decrepit father. The last rays 
 of the setting sun were glorious, shooting through the 
 folds of their pavilion of" scarlet clouds ; the last song of 
 the thrush, chanted from the bough nearest to his nest, 
 was gladdening ; the abundant though but half-matured 
 crops around breathed of hope for the future. But 
 Shamus's bosom was covered with the darkness that 
 inward sunshine alone can illumine. The chord that
 
 180 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 should respond to song and melody had snapped in it ; 
 for him the softly undulating fields of light-green wheat, 
 or the silken surfaced patches of barley, made a promise 
 in vain. He was poor, penniless, friendless, and yet 
 groaning under responsibilities : worn out by past and 
 present suffering, and without a consoling prospect. 
 His father's corpse had been just buried by a subscrip- 
 tion among his neighbors, collected in an old glove, a 
 penny or a half-penny from each, by the most active of 
 the humble community to whom his sad state was a 
 subject of pity. In the wretched shed which he called 
 " home," a young wife lay on a truss of straw, listening 
 to the hungry cries of two little children, and awaiting 
 her hour to become the weeping mother of a third. 
 And the recollection that but for an act of domestic 
 treachery experienced by his father and himself, both 
 would have been comfortabre and respectable in the 
 world, aggravated the bitterness of the feeling in which 
 Shamus contemplated this lot. He could himself faintly 
 call to mind a time of early childhood, when he lived 
 with his parents in a roomy house, eating and sleeping 
 and dressing well, and surrounded by servants and work- 
 men ; he further remembered that a day of great afflic- 
 tion came, upon which strange and rude persons forced 
 their way into the house ; and, for some cause his infant 
 observation did not reach, father, servants, and workmen 
 (his mother had just died) were all turned out upon the 
 road, and doomed to seek the shelter of a mean roof. 
 But his father's discourse, since he gamed the years of 
 manhood, supplied Shamus with an explanation of all 
 these circumstance, as follows :
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 181 
 
 Old Dempsey had been the youngest son of a large 
 farmer, who divided his lands between two elder children, 
 and destined Shamus's father to the Church, sending him 
 abroad for education, and, during its course, supplying 
 him with liberal allowances. Upon the eve of ordina- 
 tion the young student returned home to visit his friends ; 
 was much noticed by neighboring small gentry of each 
 religion ; at the house of one of the opposite persuasion 
 from his met a sister of the proprietor, who had a for- 
 tune in her own right ; abandoned his clerical views for 
 her smiles ; eloped with her ; married her privately ; in- 
 curred thereby the irremovable hostility of his own fam- 
 ily ; but, after a short time, was received, along with his 
 wife, by his generous brother-in-law, under whose guid- 
 ance both became reputably settled in the house to which 
 'Shamus's early recollections pointed, and where, till he 
 was about six years old, he passed indeed a happy child- 
 hood. 
 
 But, a little previous to this time, his mother's good 
 brother died unmarried, and was succeeded by another of 
 her brothers, who had unsuccessfully spent half his life 
 as a lawyer in Dublin, and who, inheriting little of his 
 predecessor's amiable character, soon showed himself a 
 foe to her and her husband, professedly on account of 
 her marriage with a Roman Catholic. He did not appear 
 to their visit, shortly after his arrival in their neighbor- 
 hood, and he never condescended to return it. The afflic- 
 tion experienced by his sensitive sister, from his conduct, 
 entailed upon her a premature accouchement, in which, 
 giving birth to a lifeless babe, she unexpectedly died. 
 The event was mattr of triumph rather than of sorrow
 
 182 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to her unnatural brother. For, in the first place, totally 
 unguarded against the sudden result, she had died intes- 
 tate ; in the next place, he discovered that her private 
 marriage had been celebrated by a Roman Catholic priest, 
 consequently could not, according to law, hold good ; and 
 again, could not give to her nominal husband any right 
 to her property, upon which both had hitherto lived, and 
 which was now the sole means of existence to Shamus's 
 father. 
 
 The lawyer speedily set to work upon these points, and 
 with little difficulty succeeded in supplying for Shamus's 
 recollections a day of trouble, already noticed. In fact, 
 his father and he, now without a shilling, took refuge in 
 a distant cabin, where, by the sweat of his parent's brow, 
 as a laborer in the fields, the ill-fated hero of this story 
 was scantily fed and clothed, until maturer years enabled 
 him to relieve the old man's hand of the spade and sickle, 
 and in turn labor for their common wants. 
 
 Shamus, becoming a little prosperous in the world, 
 rented a few acres adjacent to his cabin and married. 
 The increase of his fields did not quite keep pace with 
 the increase of his cares, in the persons of new-comers, 
 for whose well-being he was bound to provide. His ray 
 of success in life soon became overclouded, by the calls 
 of the landlord and the tithe-proctor. In truth, three 
 years after his marriage, he received a notice which it 
 were vain to oppose, to quit both his farm and his cabin, 
 and leave his few articles of furniture behind. 
 
 At this juncture his father was bedridden, and his wife 
 advanced in her third pregnancy. He put on his hat, 
 walked to ths door, fixed bis eyes upon the ruins of an
 
 THE RIVAL DBEAMEB.S. 183 
 
 old abbey which stood on the slope of an opposite hill, 
 and formed his plan for present measures. By the next 
 evening he had constructed a wattled shed, covered with 
 rushes and leaves, against a gable in the interior of the 
 ruin. Clearing away the nettles and other rank weeds 
 enclosed by his new house, he discovered a long slab on 
 which was carved a cross and letters illegible to his eye ; 
 this he made his hearthstone. To furnish the abode, he 
 fetched two large stones, as seats for his wife and himself, 
 shook straw in either corner, and laid in a bundle of 
 twigs. Then he went to the cabin that was no longer 
 his, sent on his wife and two children to the abbey, fol- 
 lowed with his father on his back, and laid him upon one 
 of the straw couches. Two days afterwards the old man 
 was a corpse. From his pauper funeral we now see Sha- 
 mus returning, and to such a home does he bend his heavy 
 steps. 
 
 If to know that the enemy of his father and mother 
 did not thrive on the spoils of his oppression could have 
 yielded Shamus any consolation in his lot, he had long 
 ago become aware of circumstances calculated to give this 
 negative comfort. His maternal uncle enjoyed, indeed, 
 his newly acquired property only a few years after it came 
 into his possession. Partly on account of his cruelty to 
 his relations, partly from a meanness and vulgarity of 
 character, which soon displayed itself in his novel situa- 
 tion, and which, it was believed, had previously kept him 
 in the lowest walks of his profession as a Dublin attorney, 
 he found himself neglected and shunned by the gentry 
 of his neighborhood. To grow richer than any one who 
 thus insulted him, to blazon abroad reports of his wealth.
 
 184 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 and to watch opportunities of using it to their iujury, 
 became the means of revenge adopted by the parvenu. 
 His legitimate income not promising a rapid accomplish- 
 ment of this plan, he ventured, using precautions that 
 seemingly set suspicion at defiance, to engage in smug- 
 gling adventures on a large scale, for which his proximity 
 to the coast afforded a local opportunity. Notwithstand- 
 ing all his pettifogging cleverness, the ex-attorney was 
 detected, however, in his illegal traffic, and fined to an 
 amount which swept away half his real property. Driven 
 to desperation by the publicity of his failure, as well as 
 by the failure itself, he tried another grand effort to re- 
 trieve his fortune ; was again surprised by the revenue 
 officers ; in a personal struggle with them, at the head of 
 his band, killed one of their body ; immediately absconded 
 from Ireland; for the last twenty years had not been 
 authentically heard of; but, it was believed, lived under 
 an assumed name in London, deriving an obscure exist- 
 ence from some mean pursuit, of which the very nature 
 enabled him to gratify propensities to drunkenness and 
 other vices, learned during his first career in life. 
 
 All this Shamus knew, though only from report, inas- 
 much as his uncle had exiled himself while he was yet a 
 child, and without previously having become known to 
 the eyes of the nephew he had so much injured. But if 
 eJhamus occasionally drew a bitter and almost savage 
 gratification from the downfall of his inhuman persecutor, 
 AO recurrence to the past could alleviate the misery of his 
 present situation. He passed under one of the capacious 
 open arches of the old abbey, and then entered his squalid 
 shed reared against its wall, his heart as shattered and as
 
 THE EIVAL DREAMERS. 185 
 
 trodden down as the ruins around him. No words of 
 greeting ensued between him and his equally hopeless 
 wife, as she sat on the straw of her bed, rocking to sleep, 
 with feeble and mournful cries, her youngest infant. He 
 silently lighted a fire of withered twigs on his ready -fur- 
 nished hearthstone ; put to roast among their embers a 
 few potatoes which he had begged during the day ; di- 
 vided them between her and her crying children ; and as 
 the moon, rising high in the heavens, warned him that 
 night asserted her full empire over the departed day, Sha- 
 mus sank down upon the couch from which his father's 
 mortal remains had lately been borne, supperless himself, 
 and dinnerless, too, but not hungry ; at least not con- 
 scious or recollecting that he was. 
 
 His wife and little ones soon slept soundly, but Shamus 
 lay for hours inaccessible to nature's claims for sleep as 
 well as for food. From where he lay he could see, through 
 the open front of his shed, out into the ruins abroad. 
 After much abstraction in his own thoughts, the silence, 
 the extent, and the peculiar desolation of the scene, almost 
 spiritualized by the magic effect of alternate moonshine 
 and darkness, of objects and of their parts, at last di- 
 verted his mind, though not to relieve it. He remembered 
 distinctly, for the first time, where he was, an intruder 
 among the dwellings of the dead ; he called to mind, too, 
 that the present was their hour for revealing themselves 
 among the remote loneliness and obscurity of their crum- 
 bling and intricate abode. As his eye fixed upon a distant 
 stream of cold light or of blank shadow, either the waver- 
 ing of some feathery herbage from the walls, or the flitting 
 of some night bird over the roofless aisle, made motion
 
 186 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 which went and came during the instant of his alarmed 
 start, or else some disembodied sleeper around had chal- 
 lenged and evaded his vision so rapidly as to baffle even 
 the accompaniment of thought. Shamus would; however, 
 recur, during these entrancing aberrations, to his more 
 real causes for terror ; and he knew not, and to this day 
 cannot distinctly tell, whether he waked or slept, when 
 a new circumstance absorbed his attention. The moon 
 struck fully, under his propped roof, upon the carved slab 
 he had appropriated as a hearthstone, and turning his eye 
 to the spot, he saw the semblance of a man advanced in 
 years, though not very old, standing motionless, and very 
 steadfastly regarding him ; the still face of the figure shone 
 like marble in the nightbeam, without giving any idea of 
 the solidity of that material ; the long and deep shadows 
 thrown by the forehead over the eyes left those unusually 
 expressive features vague and uncertain. Upon the head 
 was a close-fitting black cap, the dress was a loose-sleeved, 
 plaited garment of white, descending to the ground, and 
 faced and otherwise checkered with black, and girded 
 round the loins ; exactly the costume which Shamus had 
 often studied in a little framed and glazed print, hung up 
 in the sacristry of the humble chapel recently built in the 
 neighborhood of the ruin by a few descendants of the 
 great religious fraternity to whom, in its day of pride, the 
 abbey had belonged. As he returned very inquisitively, 
 though, as he avers, not now in alarm, the fixed gaze of 
 his midnight visitor, a voice reached him, and he heard 
 these strange words : 
 
 " Shamus Dempsey, go to London Bridge, and you will 
 be a rich man."
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 187 
 
 " How will that come about, your reverence ? " cried 
 Shamus, jumping up from the straw. 
 
 But the figure was gone ; and stumbling among the 
 black embers on the remarkable place where it had stood, 
 he fell prostrate, experiencing a change of sensation and 
 of observance of objects around, which might be explained 
 by supposing a transition from a sleeping to a waking state 
 of mind. 
 
 The rest of the night he slept little, thinking of the 
 advice he had received, and of the mysterious personage 
 who gave it. But he resolved to say nothing about his 
 vision, particularly to his wife, lest, in her present state 
 of health, the frightful story might distress her ; and, as 
 to his own conduct respecting it, he determined to be 
 guided by the future, in fact, he would wait to see if 
 -his counsellor came again. He did come again, appearing 
 in the same spot at the same hour of the night, and wear- 
 ing the same dress, though not the same expression of 
 feature ; for the shadowy brows now slightly frowned, 
 and a little severity mingled with the former steadfast- 
 ness of look. 
 
 " Shamus Dempsey, why have you not gone to London 
 Bridge, and your wife so near the time when she will 
 want what you are to get by going there ? Remember, 
 this is my second warning." 
 
 " Musha, your reverence, an' what am I to do on 
 Lunnon Bridge ? " 
 
 Again he rose to approach the figure ; again it eluded 
 him. Again a change occurred in the quality of the in- 
 terest with which he regarded the admonition of his vis- 
 itor. Again he passed a day of doubt as to the propriety
 
 188 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 of undertaking what seemed to him little less than a jour, 
 ney to the world's end, without a penny iu his pocket, 
 and upon the eve of his wife's accouchement, merely in 
 obedience to a recommendation which, according to his 
 creed, was not yet sufficiently strongly given, even were 
 it under any circumstances to be adopted. For Shamus 
 had often heard, and firmly believed, that a dream or a 
 vision, instructing one how to procure riches, ought to 
 be experienced three times before it became entitled to 
 attention. 
 
 He lay down, however, half hoping that his vision 
 might thus recommend itself to his notice. It did so. 
 
 " Shamus Dempsey," said the figure, looking more 
 angry than ever, " you have not yet gone to London 
 Bridge, although I hear your wife crying out to bid you 
 go. And, remember, this is my third warning." 
 
 "Why, then, tundher-an-ouns, your reverence, just 
 stop and tell me " 
 
 Ere he could utter another word the holy visitant 
 disappeared, in a real passion at Shamus's qualified 
 curse ; and at the same moment his confused senses 
 recognized the voice of his wife, sending up from her 
 straw pallet the cries that betoken a mother's distant 
 travail. Exchanging a few words with her, he hurried 
 away, professedly to call up, at her cabin window, an 
 old crone who sometimes attended the very poorest 
 women in Nance Dempsey's situation. 
 
 " Hurry to her, Noreen, acuishla, and do the best it 's 
 the will of God to let you do. And tell her from me, 
 Noreen " He stopped, drawing in his lip, and clutch- 
 ing his cudgel hard.
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 189 
 
 " Skamus, what ails you, avick ? " asked old Noreen ; 
 " what ails you, to make the tears run down in the gray 
 ' the morning ? " 
 
 "Tell her from me," continued Shamus, "that it's 
 from the bottom o' the heart I '11 pray, morning and 
 evening, and fresh and fasting, maybe, to give her a 
 good time of it ; and to show her a face on the poor child 
 that 's coming, likelier than the two that God sent afore 
 it. And that I '11 be thinking o' picturing it to my own 
 mind, though I '11 never see it far away." 
 
 " Musha, Shamus, what are you speaking of ? " 
 
 " No matter, Noreen, only God be wid you, and wid 
 her, and wid the weenocks ; and tell her what I bid you. 
 More-be-token, tell her that poor Shamus quits her in 
 her throuble, with more love from the heart out than he 
 had for her the first day we came together ; and I '11 
 come back to her at any rate, sooner or later, richer or 
 poorer, or as bare as I went ; and maybe not so bare 
 either. But God only knows. The top o' the morning 
 to you, Noreen, and don't let her want the mouthful o' 
 praties while I 'm on my thravels. For this," added 
 Shamus, as he bounded off, to the consternation of old 
 Noreen, " this is the very morning and the very 
 minute that, if I mind the dhrame at all at all, I ought 
 to mind it; ay, without ever turning back to get a 
 look from her, that 'ud kill the heart in my body en- 
 tirely." 
 
 Without much previous knowledge of the road he was 
 to take, Shamus walked and begged his way along the 
 coast to the town where he might hope to embark for 
 England. Here, the captain of a merchantman agreed
 
 190 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 to let him work his passage to Bristol, whence he again 
 walked and begged into London. 
 
 Without taking rest or food, Shamus proceeded to 
 London Bridge, often put out of his course by wrong 
 directions, and as often by forgetting and misconceiving 
 true ones. It was with old London Bridge that Shamus 
 had to do (not the old one last pulled down, but its more 
 reverend predecessor), which, at that time, was lined at 
 either side by quaintly fashioned houses, mostly occupied 
 by shop-keepers, so that the space between presented, 
 perhaps, the greatest thoroughfare then known in the 
 Queen of Cities. And at about two o'clock in the after- 
 noon, barefooted, ragged, fevered, and agitated, Shamus 
 mingled with the turbid human stream, that roared and 
 chafed over the, as restless and as evanescent, stream 
 which buffeted the arches of old London Bridge. In a 
 situation so novel to him, so much more extraordinary 
 in the reality than his anticipation could have fancied, 
 the poor and friendless stranger felt overwhelmed. A 
 sense of forlornness, of insignificance, and of terror 
 seized upon his faculties. From the stare, or the sneers, 
 or the jostle of the iron-nerved crowd, he shrank with 
 glances of wild timidity, and with a heart as wildly 
 timid as were his looks. For some time he stood or 
 staggered about, unable to collect his thoughts, or to 
 bring to mind what was his business there. But when 
 Shamus became able to refer to the motive of his pau- 
 per journey, from his native solitudes into the thick of 
 such a scene, it was no wonder that the zeal of super- 
 stition totally subsided amid the astounding truths 
 he witnessed. In fact, the bewildered simpleton now
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 191 
 
 regarded his dream as the merest chimera. Hastily 
 escaping from the thoroughfare, he sought out some 
 wretched place of repose suited to his wretched condi- 
 tion, and there moaned himself asleep, in self-accusations 
 at the thought of poor Nance at home, and in utter 
 despair of all his future prospects. 
 
 At daybreak the next morning he awoke, a little less 
 agitated, but still with no hope. He was able, however, 
 to resolve upon the best course of conduct now left open 
 to him ; and he arranged immediately to retrace his steps 
 to Ireland, as soon as he should have begged sufficient 
 alms to speed him a mile on the road. With this intent 
 he hastily issued forth, preferring to challenge the notice 
 of chance passengers, even at the early hour of dawn, 
 than to venture again, in the middle of the day, among 
 the dreaded crowds of the vast city. Very few, indeed, 
 were the passers-by whom Shamus met during his strag- 
 gling and stealthy walk through the streets, and those 
 of a description little able or willing to afford a half- 
 penny to his humbled, whining suit, and to his spasmed 
 lip and watery eye. In what direction he went Shamus 
 did not know; but at last he found himself entering 
 upon the scene of his yesterday's terror. Now, how- 
 ever, it presented nothing to renew its former impres- 
 sion. The shops at the sides of the bridge were closed, 
 and the occasional stragglers of either sex who came 
 along inspired Shamus, little as he knew of a great city, 
 with aversion rather than with dread. In the quietness 
 and security of his present position, Shamus was both 
 courageous and weak enough again to summon up his 
 dream.
 
 192 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 " Come," he said, " since I am on Lunnon Bridge, 
 I '11 walk over every stone of it, and see what good that 
 will do." 
 
 He valiantly gained the far end. Here one house, of 
 all that stood upon the bridge, began to be opened ; it 
 was a public house, and, by a sidelong glance as he 
 passed, Shamus thought that, in the person of a red- 
 cheeked, red-nosed, sunk-eyed, elderly man, who took 
 down the window-shutters, he recognized the proprietor. 
 This person looked at Shamus, in return, with peculiar 
 scrutiny. The wanderer liked neither his regards nor 
 the expression of his countenance, and quickened his 
 steps onward until he cleared the bridge. 
 
 " But I '11 walk it over at the other side, now," he 
 bethought, after allowing the publican time to finish 
 opening his house, and retire out of view. 
 
 But, repassing the house, the man still appeared, lean- 
 ing against his door-jamb, and as if waiting for Shamus's 
 return, whom, upon this second occasion, he eyed more 
 attentively than before. 
 
 " Sorrow 's in him," thought Shamus, " have I two 
 heads on me, that I 'm such a sight to him ? But who 
 cares about his pair of ferret-eyes ? I '11 thrudge down 
 the middle stone of it, at any rate ! " 
 
 Accordingly he again walked towards the public house, 
 keeping the middle of the bridge. 
 
 " Good morrow, friend," said the publican, as Shamus 
 a third time passed his door. 
 
 " Sarvant kindly, sir," answered Sbamus, respectfully 
 pulling down the brim of his hat, and increasing his 
 pace.
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 193 
 
 " An early hour you choose for a morning walk," con- 
 tinued his new acquaintance. 
 
 " Brave and early, faix, sir," said Shamus, still hurry- 
 ing off. 
 
 " Stop a bit," resumed the publican. Shamus stood 
 still. " I see you 're a countryman of mine, an Irish- 
 man ; I 'd know one of you at a look, though I 'm a 
 long time out of the country. And you 're not very well 
 off on London Bridge this morning, either." 
 
 " No, indeed, sir," replied Shamus, beginning to 
 doubt his skill hi physiognomy, at the stranger's kind 
 address ; " but as badly off as a body 'ud wish to be." 
 
 " Come over to look for the work ? " 
 
 " Nien, sir ; but come out this morning to beg a ha'- 
 penny, to send me a bit of the road home." 
 
 " Well, here 's a silver sixpence without asking. And 
 you 'd better sit on the bench by the door here, and eat 
 a crust and a cut of cheese, and drink a drop of good 
 ale, to break your fast." 
 
 With profuse thanks, Shamus accepted this kind invi- 
 tation, blaming himself at heart for having allowed his 
 opinion of the charitable publican to be guided by the 
 expression of the man's features. " Handsome is that 
 handsome does," was Shamus's self-correcting reflec- 
 tion. 
 
 While eating his bread and cheese, and drinking his 
 strong ale, they conversed freely together, and Shamus's 
 heart opened more and more to his benefactor. The 
 publican repeatedly asked him what had brought him to 
 London ; and though half out of prudence, and half out 
 of shame, the dreamer at first evaded the question, he 
 
 VOL. XII. 9 M
 
 194 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 felt it at last impossible to refuse a candid answer to hi 
 generous friend. 
 
 " Why, then, sir, only I am such a big fool for telling 
 it to you, it 's what brought me to Lunnon Bridge was a 
 quare dhrame I had at home in Ireland, that tould me 
 just to come here, and I 'd find a pot of goold." For 
 such was the interpretation given by Shamus to the 
 vague admonition of his visionary counsellor. 
 
 His companion burst into a loud laugh, saying, after 
 it, 
 
 " Pho, pho, man, don't be so silly as to put faith in 
 nonsensical dreams of that kind. Many a one like it I 
 have had, if I would bother my head with them. Why, 
 within the last ten days, while you were dreaming of 
 finding a pot of gold on London Bridge, I was dreaming 
 of finding a pot of gold in Ireland." 
 
 " Ullaloo, and were you, sir ? " asked Shamus, laying 
 down his empty pint. 
 
 " Ay, indeed : night after night, an old friar with a 
 pale face, and dressed all in white and black, and a 
 black skull-cap on his head, came to me in a dream, and 
 bid me go to Ireland, to a certain spot in a certain 
 county that I know very well, and under the slab of his 
 tomb, that has a cross and some old Homish letters on 
 it, in an old abbey I often saw before now, I 'd find a 
 treasure that would make me a rich man all the days of 
 my life." 
 
 " Musha, sir," asked Shamus, scarce able prudently to 
 control his agitation, " and did he tell you that the treas- 
 ure lay buried there ever so long under the open sky and 
 the ould walls ? "
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 195 
 
 " No ; but he told me I was to find the slab covered 
 in by a shed, that a poor man had lately built inside the 
 abbey for himself and his family." 
 
 " Whoo, by the powers ! " shouted Shamus, at last 
 thrown off his guard by the surpassing joy derived from 
 this intelligence, as well as by the effects of the ale ; and, 
 at the same time, he jumped up, cutting a caper with hi* 
 legs, and flourishing his shillelagh. 
 
 "Why, what's the matter with you?" asked his 
 friend, glancing at him a frowning and misgiving look. 
 
 " We ax pardon, sir." Shamus rallied his prudence. 
 "An' sure sorrow a thing is the matter wid me, only 
 the dhrop, I believe, made me do it, as it ever and al- 
 ways does, good luck to it for the same. An' is n't what 
 we were spaking about the biggest raumaush* undher 
 the sun, sir ? Only it 's the laste bit in the world quare 
 to me how you 'd have the dhrame about your own 
 country, that you did n't see for so many years, sir, 
 for twenty long years, I think you said, sir ? " Sha- 
 mus had now a new object in putting his sly ques- 
 tion. 
 
 " If I said so, I forgot," answered the publican, his 
 suspicions of Shamus at an end. "But it is about 
 twenty years, indeed, since I left Ireland." 
 
 " And by your speech, sir, and your dacency, I '11 en- 
 gage you were in a good way in the poor place, afore 
 you left it?" 
 
 "You guess correctly, friend." (The publican gave 
 way to vanity.) " Before misfortunes came over me, I 
 
 * Nonsense.
 
 196 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 possessed, along with a good hundred acres besides, the 
 very ground that the old ruin I saw in the foolish dream 
 I told you stands upon." 
 
 "An' so did my curse-o'-God's uncle," thought Sha- 
 mus, his heart's blood beginning to boil, though, with a 
 great effort he kept himself seemingly cool. " And this 
 is the man foment me, if he answers another word I '11 
 ax him. Paix, sir, and sure that makes your dhrame 
 quarer than ever ; and the ground the ould abbey is on, 
 sir, and the good acres round it, did you say they lay 
 somewhere in the poor county myself came from ? " 
 
 " What county is that, friend ? " demanded the publi- 
 can, again with a studious frown. 
 
 " The ould County Monaghan, sure, sir," replied Sha- 
 mus, very deliberately. 
 
 " No, but the county of Clare," answered his com- 
 panion. 
 
 " Was it ? " screamed Shamus, again springing up. 
 The cherished hatred of twenty years imprudently burst- 
 ing out, his uncle lay stretched at his feet, after a re- 
 newed flourish of his cudgel. " And do you know who 
 you are telling it to this morning ? Did you ever hear 
 that the sisther you kilt left a bit of a gorsoon behind 
 her, that one day or other might overhear you ? Ay," 
 he continued, keeping down the struggling man, " it is 
 poor Shamus Dempsey that 's kneeling by you ; ay, and 
 that has more to tell you. The shed built over the old 
 friar's tombstone was built by the hands you feel on 
 your throttle, and that tombstone is his hearthstone ; 
 and," continued Shamus, beginning to bind the pros- 
 trate man with a rope, snatched from a bench near them,
 
 THE RIVAL DEEAHEES. 197 
 
 " while you lie here awhile, an' no one to help you, in 
 the cool of the morning, I '11 just take a start of you on 
 the road home, to lift the flag and get the threasure; 
 and follow me if you dare ! You know there 's good 
 money bid for your head in Ireland, so here goes. 
 Yes, faith and wid this this to help me on the way ! " 
 He snatched up a heavy purse which had fallen from 
 his uncle's pocket in the struggle. " And sure, there 's 
 neither hurt nor harm in getting back a little of a 
 body's own from you. A bright good-morning, uncle 
 dear ! " 
 
 Shamus dragged his manacled relative into the shop, 
 quickly shut to and locked the door, flung the key over 
 the house into the Thames, and the next instant was 
 running at headlong speed. 
 
 He was not so deficient in the calculations of common- 
 sense as to think himself yet out of his uncle's power. 
 It appeared, indeed, pretty certain, that neither for the 
 violence done to his person, nor for the purse appropri- 
 ated by his nephew, the outlawed murderer would raise 
 a hue and cry after one who, aware of his identity, 
 could deliver him up to the laws of his country. But 
 Shamus felt certain that it would be a race between him 
 and his uncle for the treasure that lay under the friar's 
 tombstone. His simple nature supplied no stronger mo- 
 tive for a pursuit on the part of a man whose life now 
 lay in the breath of his mouth. Full of his conviction, 
 however, Shamus saw he had not a moment to lose until 
 the roof of his shed in the old abbey again sheltered him. 
 So, freely making use of his uncle's guineas, he pur- 
 chased a strong horse in the outskirts of London, and to
 
 198 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 the surprise, if not under heavy suspicions of the vender, 
 set off at a gallop upon the road by which he had the 
 day before gained the great metropolis. 
 
 A ship was ready to sail at Bristol for Ireland ; but, to 
 Shamus's discomfiture, she waited for a wind. He got 
 aboard, however, and in the darksome and squalid hold 
 often knelt down and, with clasped hands and panting 
 breast, petitioned Heaven for a favorable breeze. But 
 from morning until evening the wind remained as he had 
 found it, and Shamus despaired. His uncle, meantime, 
 might have reached some other port, and embarked for 
 their country. In the depth of his anguish he heard a 
 brisk bustle upon deck, clambered up to investigate its 
 cause, and found the ship's sails already half unfurled to 
 a wind that promised to bear him to his native shores 
 by the next morning. The last light of day yet lin- 
 gered in the heavens : he glanced, now under way, to 
 the quay of Bristol. A group who had been watching 
 the departure of the vessel turned round to note the 
 approach to them of a man who ran furiously towards 
 the place where they stood, pointing after her, and evi- 
 dently speaking with vehemence, although no words 
 reached Shamus's ear. Neither was his eye sure of this 
 person's features ; but his heart read them distinctly. A 
 boat shot from the quay ; the man stood up in it, and 
 its rowers made a signal. 
 
 Shamus stepped to the gangway, as if preparing to hurl 
 his pursuer into the sea. The captain took a speaking- 
 trumpet, and informing the boat that he could not stop 
 an instant, advised her to wait for another merchantman, 
 which would sail in an hour. And during and after his
 
 THE EIVAL DREAMERS. 199 
 
 speech his vessel ploughed cheerily on, making as much 
 way as she was adapted to accomplish. 
 
 Shamus's bosom felt lightened of its immediate terror, 
 but not freed of apprehension for the future. The ship 
 that was to sail in an hour haunted his thoughts : he did 
 not leave the deck, and, although the night proved very 
 dark, his anxious eyes were never turned from the Eng- 
 lish coast. Unusual fatigue and want of sleep now and 
 then overpowered him, and his senses swam in a wild 
 and snatching slumber; but from this he would start, 
 crying out and clinging to the cordage, as the feverish 
 dream of an instant presented him with the swelling can- 
 vas of a fast-sailing ship, which came, suddenly bursting 
 through the gloom of midnight, alongside of his own. 
 Morning dawned, really to unveil to him the object of 
 his fears following almost in the wake of her rival. He 
 glanced in the opposite direction, and beheld the shores 
 of Ireland ; in another hour he jumped upon them ; but 
 his enemy's face watched him from the deck of the com- 
 panion vessel, now not more than a few ropes' lengths 
 distant. 
 
 Shamus mounted a second good horse, and spurred 
 towards home. Often did he look back, but without 
 seeing any cause for increased alarm. As yet, however, 
 the road had been level and winding, and therefore could 
 not allow him to span much of it at a glance. After 
 noon it ascended a high and lengthened hill, surrounded 
 by wastes of bog. As he gamed the summit of this hill, 
 and again looked back, a horseman appeared, sweeping to 
 its foot. Shamus galloped at full speed down the now 
 quickly falling road; then along its level continuation
 
 200 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 for about a mile ; and then up another eminence, more 
 lengthened, though not so steep as the former ; and from 
 it still he looked back, and caught the figure of the 
 horseman breaking over the line of the hill he had 
 passed. Tor hours such was the character of the chase ; 
 until the road narrowed and began to wind amid an un- 
 cultivated and uninhabited mountain wilderness. Here 
 Shamus's horse tripped and fell; the rider, little injured, 
 assisted him to his legs, and, with lash and spur, re-urged 
 him to pursue his course. The animal went forward in a 
 last effort, and, for still another span of time, well be- 
 friended his rider. A rocky valley, through which both 
 had been galloping, now opened at its farther end, pre- 
 senting to Shamus's eye, in the distance, the sloping 
 ground, and the ruin which, with its mouldering walls, en- 
 circled his poor home ; and the setting sun streamed golden 
 rays through the windows and rents of the old abbey. 
 
 The fugitive gave a weak cry of joy, and lashed his 
 beast again. The cry seemed to be answered by a shout ; 
 and a second time, after a wild plunge, the horse fell, 
 now throwing Shamus off with a force that left him 
 stunned. And yet he heard the hoofs of another horse 
 come thundering down the rocky way ; and, while he 
 made a faint eifort to rise on his hands and look at his 
 pursuer, the horse and horseman were very near, and. the 
 voice of his uncle cried, " Stand ! " at the same time that 
 the speaker fired a pistol, of which the ball struck a stone 
 at Shamus's foot. The next moment his uncle, having 
 left his saddle, stood over him, presenting a second pistol, 
 and he spoke in a low but distinct voice. 
 
 " Spawn of a beggar ! This is not merely for the
 
 THE EIVAL DEEAMEES. 201 
 
 chance of riches given by our dreams, though it seems, 
 in the teeth of all I ever thought, that the devil tells 
 truth at last. No, nor it is not quite for the blow ; but 
 it is to close the lips that, with a single word, can kill 
 me. You die, to let me live ! " 
 
 " Help ! " aspirated Shamus's heart, turning itself to 
 Heaven; "help me but now, not for the sake of the 
 goold either, but for the sake of them that will be left 
 on the wild world without me ; for them help me, great 
 God ! " 
 
 Hitherto his weakness and confusion had left him pas- 
 sive. Before his uncle spoke the last words, his silent 
 prayer was offered, and Shamus had jumped upon his 
 assailant. They struggled, and dragged each other down. 
 Shamus felt the muzzle of the pistol at his breast ; heard 
 it snap, but only snap ; he seized and mastered it, and 
 once more the uncle was at the mercy of his nephew. 
 Shamus's hand was raised to deal a good blow ; but he 
 checked himself, and addressed the almost senseless ears 
 of his captive. 
 
 " No ; you 're my mother's blood, and a son of hers 
 will never draw it from your heart ; but I can make sure 
 of you again, stop a bit." 
 
 He ran to his own prostrate horse, took off its bridle 
 and its saddle-girth, and with both secured his uncle's 
 limbs, beyond all possibility of the straggler being able 
 to escape from their control. 
 
 "There," resumed Shamus, "lie there till we have 
 
 time to send an ould friend to see you, that, I '11 go bail, 
 
 will take good care of your four bones. And do you 
 
 know where I 'm going now ? You tould me, on Lun- 
 
 9*
 
 202 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 non Bridge, that you knew that, at least," pointing to 
 the abbey, " ay, and the quare ould hearthstone that 's 
 to be found in it. And so, look at this, uncle, honey," 
 he vaulted upon his relative's horse, "I'm just 
 goin' to lift it off o' the barrel-pot full of good ould 
 goold, and you have only to cry halves, and you '11 get it, 
 as sure as that the big divvle is in the town you came 
 from." 
 
 Nance Dempsey was nursing her new-born babe, sit- 
 ting up in her straw, and doing very well after her late 
 illness, when old Noreen tottered in from the front of 
 the ruin, to tell her that " the body they were just speak- 
 ing about was driving up the hill mad, like as if 't was 
 his own sperit in great throuble." And the listener had 
 not recovered from her surprise, when Shamus ran into 
 the shed, flung himself kneeling by her side, caught her 
 in his arms, then seized her infant, covered it with kisses, 
 and then, roughly throwing it in her lap, turned to the 
 fireplace, raised one of the rocky seats lying near it, poised 
 the ponderous mass over the hearthstone, and shivered 
 into pieces, with one crash, that solid barrier between 
 him and his visionary world of wealth. 
 
 " It 's cracked he is, out an' out, of a certainty," said 
 Nance, looking terrified at her husband. 
 
 " Nothing else am I," shouted Shamus, after groping 
 under the broken slab ; " an', for a token, get along with 
 yourself out of this, owld gran ! " 
 
 He started up and seized her by the shoulder. Noreen 
 remonstrated. He stooped for a stone; she ran; he 
 pursued her to the arches of the ruin. She stopped half- 
 way down the descent. He pelted her with clods to the
 
 THE RIVAL DREAMERS. 203 
 
 bottom, and along a good piece of her road homewards ; 
 and then danced back into his wife's presence. 
 
 " Now, Nance," he cried, " now that we 're by our- 
 selves, what noise is this like ! " 
 
 " And he took out han'fuls after han'fuls of the ould 
 goold, afore her face, my dear," added the original nar- 
 rator of this story. 
 
 "An' after the gangers and their crony, Ould Nick, 
 ran off wid the uncle of him, Nance and he, and the 
 childer, lived together in their father's and mother's 
 house ; and if they did n't live and die happy, I wish 
 that you and I may."
 
 THE THREEFOLD DESTINY. 
 
 BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 JN the twilight of a summer eve, a tall, dark 
 figure, over which long and remote travel had 
 thrown an outlandish aspect, was entering a 
 village, not in " Fairy Londe," but within our own 
 familiar boundaries. The staff on which this traveller 
 leaned had been his companion from the spot where it 
 grew, in the jungles of Hindostan ; the hat, that over- 
 shadowed his sombre brow, had shielded him from the 
 suns of Spain, but his cheek had been blackened by the 
 red-hot wind of an Arabian desert, and had felt the frozen 
 breath of an Arctic region. Long sojourning amid wild 
 and dangerous men, he still wore beneath his vest the 
 ataghan which he had once struck into the throat of a 
 Turkish robber. In every foreign clime he had lost 
 something of his New England characteristics ; and, per- 
 haps, from every people he had unconsciously borrowed 
 a new peculiarity ; so that when the world-wanderer 
 again trod the street of his native village, it is no wonder 
 that he passed unrecognized, though exciting the gaze 
 and curiosity of all. Yet, as his arm casually touched
 
 THE THREEFOLD DESTINY. 205 
 
 that of a young woman, who was wending her way to an 
 evening lecture, she started, and almost uttered a cry. 
 
 " Ralph Cranfield ! " was the name that she half artic- 
 ulated. 
 
 "Can that be my old playmate, Faith Egerton?" 
 thought the traveller, looking round at her figure, but 
 without pausing. 
 
 Ralph Cranfield, from his youth upward, had felt him- 
 self marked out for a high destiny. He had imbibed the 
 idea, we say not whether it were revealed to him by 
 witchcraft, or in a dream of prophecy, or that his brood- 
 ing fancy had palmed its own dictates upon him as the 
 oracles of a Sibyl, but he had imbibed the idea, and 
 held it firmest among his articles of faith, that three 
 marvellous events of his life were to be confirmed to him 
 by three signs. 
 
 The first of these three fatalities, and perhaps the one 
 on which his youthful imagination had dwelt most fondly, 
 was the discovery of the maid, who alone, of all the 
 maids on earth, could make him happy by her love. He 
 was to roam around the world till he should meet a 
 beautiful woman, wearing on her bosom a jewel in the 
 shape of a heart ; whether of pearl, or ruby, or emerald, 
 or carbuncle, or a changeful opal, or perhaps a priceless 
 diamond, Ralph Cranfield little cared, so long as it were 
 a heart of one peculiar shape. On encountering this 
 lovely stranger, he was bound to address her thus : 
 "Maiden, I have brought you a heavy heart. May I 
 rest its weight on you ? " And if she were his fated 
 bride, if their kindred souls were destined to form a 
 union here below, which all eternity should only bind
 
 206 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 more closely, she would reply, with her finger on the 
 heart-shaped jewel, " This token, which I have worn 
 so long, is the assurance that you may ! " 
 
 And, secondly, Ralph Cranfield had a firm belief that 
 there was a mighty treasure hidden somewhere in the 
 earth, of which the burial-place would be revealed to 
 none but him. When his feet should press upon the 
 mysterious spot, there would be a hand before him, 
 pointing downward, whether carved of marble, or hewn 
 in gigantic dimensions on the side of a rocky precipice, 
 or perchance a hand of flame in empty air, he could not 
 tell; but, at least, he would discern a hand, the fore- 
 finger pointing downward, and beneath it the Latin word 
 EFFODE, Dig ! And digging thereabouts, the gold in 
 coin or ingots, the precious stones, or of whatever else 
 the treasure might consist, would be certain to reward 
 his toil. 
 
 The third and last of the miraculous events in the life 
 of this high-destined man was to be the attainment of 
 extensive influence and sway over his fellow-creatures. 
 Whether he were to be a king, and founder of an hered- 
 itary throne, or the victorious leader of a people con- 
 tending for their freedom, or the apostle of a purified 
 and regenerated faith, was left for futurity to show. As 
 messengers of the sign, by which Ralph Cranfield might 
 recognize the summons, three venerable men were to 
 claim audience of him. The chief among them, a digni- 
 fied and majestic person, arrayed, it may be supposed, in 
 the flowing garments of an ancient sage, would be the 
 bearer of a wand, or prophet's rod. With this wand, or 
 rod, or staff, the venerable sage would trace a certain
 
 THE THEEEFOLD DESTINY. 207 
 
 figure in the air, and then proceed to make known his 
 heaven-instructed message ; which, if obeyed, must lead 
 to glorious results. 
 
 With this proud fate before him, in the flush of his 
 imaginative youth, Ralph Cranfield had set forth to seek 
 the maid, the treasure, and the venerable sage with his 
 gift of extended empire. And had he found them? 
 Alas ! it was not with the aspect of a triumphant man, 
 who had achieved a nobler destiny than all his fellows, 
 but rather with the gloom of one struggling against 
 peculiar and continual adversity, that he now passed 
 homeward to his mother's cottage. He had come back, 
 but only for a time, to lay aside the pilgrim's staff, trust- 
 ing that his weary manhood would regain somewhat of 
 the elasticity of youth, in the spot where his threefold 
 fate had been foreshown him. There had been few 
 changes in the village; for it was not one of those 
 thriving places where a year's prosperity makes more ' 
 than the havoc of a century's decay ; but k'ke a gray hair 
 in a young man's head, an antiquated little town, full of 
 old maids, and aged elms, and moss-grown dwellings. 
 Few seemed to be the changes here. The drooping 
 elms, indeed, had a more majestic spread ; the weather- 
 blackened houses were adorned with a denser thatch of 
 verdant moss; and doubtless there were a few more 
 gravestones in the burial-ground, inscribed with names 
 that had once been familiar in the village street. Yet, 
 summing up all the mischief that ten years had wrought, 
 it seemed scarcely more than if Ralph Cranfield had gone 
 forth that very morning, and dreamed a daydream till the 
 twilight, and then turned back again. But bis heart
 
 208 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 grew cold, because the village did not remember him as 
 he remembered the village. 
 
 " Here is the change ! " sighed he, striking his hand 
 upon his breast. "Who is this man of thought and care, 
 weary with world wandering, and heavy with disappointed 
 hopes ? The youth returns not, who went forth so joy- 
 ously ! " 
 
 And now Ralph Cranfield was at his mother's gate, in 
 front of the small house where the old lady, with slender 
 but sufficient means, had kept herself comfortable during 
 her son's long absence. Admitting himself within the 
 enclosure, he leaned against a great old tree, trifling 
 with his own impatience, as people often do in those 
 intervals when years are summed into a moment. He 
 took a minute survey of the dwelling, its windows, 
 brightened with the sky gleam, its doorway, with the 
 half of a millstone for a step, and the faintly traced path 
 waving thence to the gate. He made friends again with 
 his childhood's friend, the old tree against which he 
 leaned; and glancing his eye adown its trunk, beheld 
 something that excited a melancholy smile. It was a 
 half-obliterated inscription, the Latin word EFFODE, 
 which he remembered to have carved in the bark of the 
 tree, with a whole day's toil, when he had first begun to 
 muse about his exalted destiny. It might be accounted 
 a rather singular coincidence, that the bark, just above 
 the inscription, had put forth an excrescence, shaped not 
 unlike a hand, with the forefinger pointing obliquely at 
 the word of fate. Such, at least, was its appearance in 
 the dusky light. 
 
 " Now a credulous man," said Ralph Cranfield care-
 
 THE THREEFOLD DESTINY. 209 
 
 lessly to himself, " might suppose that the treasure which 
 I have sought round the world lies buried, after all, at 
 the very door of my mother's dwelling. That would be 
 a jest indeed ! " 
 
 More he thought not about the matter ; for now the 
 door was opened, and an elderly woman appeared on the 
 threshold, peering into the dusk to discover who it might 
 be that had intruded on her premises, and was standing 
 in the shadow of her tree. It was Ralph Cranfield's 
 mother. Pass we over their greeting, and leave the one to 
 her joy and the other to his rest, if quiet rest be found. 
 
 But when morning broke, he arose with a troubled 
 brow ; for his sleep and his wakefulness had alike been 
 full of dreams. All the fervor was rekindled with which 
 he had burned of yore to unravel the threefold mystery 
 of his fate. The crowd of his early visions seemed to 
 have awaited him beneath his mother's roof, and thronged 
 riotously around to welcome his return. In the well- 
 remembered chamber on the pillow where his infancy 
 had slumbered he had passed a wilder night than ever 
 in an Arab tent, or when he had reposed his head in the 
 ghastly shades of a haunted forest. A shadowy maid 
 had stolen to his bedside, and laid her finger on the scin- 
 tillating heart ; a hand of flame had glowed amid the 
 darkness, pointing downward to a mystery within the 
 earth ; a hoary sage had waved his prophetic wand, and 
 beckoned the dreamer onward to a chair of state. The 
 same phantoms, though fainter in the daylight, still 
 flitted about the cottage, and mingled among the crowd 
 of familiar faces that were drawn thither by the news of 
 Ralph Cranfield's return, to bid him welcome for his
 
 210 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 mother's sake. There they found him, a tall, dark, 
 stately man, of foreign aspect, courteous in demeanor 
 and mild of speech, yet with an abstracted eye, which 
 seemed often to snatch a glance at the invisible. 
 
 Meantime the widow Cranfield went bustling about 
 the house, full of joy that she again had somebody to 
 love, and be careful of, and for whom she might vex and 
 tease herself with the petty troubles of daily life. It was 
 nearly noon, when she looked forth from the door, and 
 descried three personages of note coming along the 
 street, through the hot sunshine and the masses of elm- 
 tree shade. At length they reached her gate, and undid 
 the latch. 
 
 " See, Ralph ! " exclaimed she, with maternal pride, 
 " here is Squire Hawkwood and the two other selectmen, 
 coming on purpose to see you ! Now do tell them a good 
 long story about what you have seen in foreign parts." 
 
 The foremost of the three visitors, Squire Hawkwood, 
 was a very pompous, but excellent old gentleman, the 
 head and prime mover in all the affairs of the village, 
 and universally acknowledged to be one of the sagest 
 men on earth. He wore, according to a fashion even 
 then becoming antiquated, a three-cornered hat, and car- 
 ried a silver-headed cane, the use of which seemed to be 
 rather for flourishing in the air than for assisting the 
 progress of his legs. His two companions were elderly 
 and respectable yeomen, who, retaining an ante-revolu- 
 tionary reverence for rank and hereditary wealth, kept a 
 little in the Squire's rear. As they approached along 
 the pathway, Ralph Cranfield sat in an oaken elbow- 
 chair, half unconsciously gazing at the three visitors, and
 
 THE THEEEFOLD DESTINY. 211 
 
 enveloping their homely figures in the misty romance 
 that pervaded his mental world. 
 
 "Here," thought he, smiling at the conceit, "here 
 come three elderly personages, and the first of the three 
 is a venerable sage with a staff. What if this embassy 
 should bring me the message of my fate ! " 
 
 While Squire Hawkwood and his colleagues entered, 
 Ralph rose from his seat, and advanced a few steps to 
 receive them; and his stately figure and dark counte- 
 nance, as he bent courteously towards his guests, had a 
 natural dignity ; contrasting well with the bustling im- 
 portance of the Squire. The old gentleman, according 
 to invariable custom, gave an ekborate preliminary flour- 
 ish with his cane in the air, then removed his three- 
 cornered hat in order to wipe his brow, and finally 
 proceeded to make known his errand. 
 
 " My colleagues and myself," began the Squire, " are 
 burdened with momentous duties, being jointly select- 
 men of this village. Our minds, for the space of three 
 days past, have been laboriously bent on the selection of 
 a suitable person to fill a most important office, and take 
 upon himself a charge and rule, which, wisely considered, 
 may be ranked no lower than those of kings and poten- 
 tates. And whereas you, our native townsman, are of 
 good natural intellect, and well cultivated by foreign 
 travel, and that certain vagaries and fantasies of your 
 youth are doubtless long ago corrected, taking all these 
 matters, I say, into due consideration, we are of opinion 
 that Providence hath sent you hither, at this juncture, 
 for our very purpose." 
 
 During this harangue, Cranfield gazed fixedly at tht
 
 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 speaker, as if he beheld something mysterious and un- 
 earthly in his pompous little figure, and as if the Squire 
 had worn the flowing robes of an ancient sage, instead 
 of a square-skirted coat, flapped waistcoat, velvet breeches, 
 and silk stockings. Nor was his wonder without sufficient 
 cause ; for the flourish of the Squire's staff, marvellous 
 to relate, had described precisely the signal in the air 
 which was to ratify the message of the prophetic Sage, 
 whom Cranfield had sought around the world. 
 
 " And what," inquired Ralph Cranfield, with a tremor 
 in his voice, " what may this office be, which is to equal 
 me with kings and potentates ? " 
 
 " No less than instructor of our village school," an- 
 swered Squire Hawkwood ; " the office being now vacant 
 by the death of the venerable Master Whitaker, after a 
 fifty years' incumbency." 
 
 " I will consider of your proposal," replied Ralph 
 Cranfield, hurriedly, " and will make known my decision 
 within three days." 
 
 After a few more words, the village dignitary and his 
 companions took their leave. But to Cranfield's fancy 
 their images were still present, and became more and 
 more invested with the dim awfulness of figures which 
 had first appeared to him in a dream, and afterwards had 
 shown themselves in his waking moments, assuming 
 homely aspects among familiar things. His mind dwelt 
 upon the features of the Squire, till they grew confused 
 with those of the visionary Sage, and one appeared but 
 the shadow of the other. The same visage, he now 
 thought, had looked forth upon him from the Pyramid 
 of Cheops ; the same form had beckoned to him among
 
 THE THBEEFOLD DESTINY. 213 
 
 the colonnades of the Alhambra; the same figure had 
 mistily revealed itself through the ascending steam of 
 the Great Geyser. At every effort of his memory he 
 recognized some trait of the dreamy Messenger of Des- 
 tiny, in this pompous, hustling, self-important, little 
 great man of the village. Amid such musings, Ralph 
 Cranfield sat all day in the cottage, scarcely hearing and 
 vaguely answering his mother's thousand questions about 
 his travels and adventures. At sunset he roused him- 
 self to take a stroll, and, passing the aged elm-tree, his 
 eye was again caught by the semblance of a hand, point- 
 ing downward at the half-obliterated inscription. 
 
 As Cranfield walked down the street of the village, 
 the level sunbeams threw his shadow far before him ; 
 and he fancied that, as his shadow walked among dis- 
 tant objects, so had there been a presentiment stalking 
 in advance of him throughout his life. And when he 
 drew near each object, over which his tall shadow had 
 preceded him, still it proved to be one of the familiak 
 recollections of his infancy and youth. Every crook in 
 the pathway was remembered. Even the more transi- 
 tory characteristics of the scene were the same as in by- 
 gone days. A company of cows were grazing on the 
 grassy roadside, and refreshed him with their fragrant 
 breath. "It is sweeter," thought he, "than the per- 
 fume which was wafted to our ship from the Spice Isl- 
 ands. The round little figure of a child rolled from a 
 doorway, and lay laughing almost beneath Cranfield's 
 feet. The dark and stately man stooped down, and, 
 lifting the infant, restored him to his mother's arms. 
 "The children," said he to himself, and sighed, and
 
 214 LITTLE CLASSICS. 
 
 smiled, " the children are to be my charge ! " And 
 while a flow of natural feeling gushed like a wellspring 
 in his heart, he came to a dwelling which he could no- 
 wise forbear to enter. A sweet voice, which seemed to 
 come from a deep and tender soul, was warbling a 
 plaintive little air, within. 
 
 He bent his head, and passed through the lowly door. 
 As his foot sounded upon the threshold, a young woman 
 advanced from the dusky interior of the house, at first 
 hastily, and then with a more uncertain step, till they 
 met face to face. There was a singular contrast in their 
 two figures ; he dark and picturesque, one who had bat- 
 tled with the world, whom all suns had shone upon, and 
 whom all winds had blown on a varied course ; she neat, 
 comely, and quiet, quiet even in her agitation, as if 
 all her emotions had been subdued to the peaceful tenor 
 of her life. Yet their faces, all unlike as they were, had 
 aa expression that seemed not so alien, a glow of kin- 
 dred feeling, flashing upward anew from half-extinguished 
 embers. 
 
 "You are welcome home ! " said Paith Egerton. 
 
 But Cranfield did not immediately answer ; for his eye 
 had been caught by an ornament in the shape of a Heart, 
 which Faith wore as a brooch upon her bosom. The ma- 
 terial was the ordinary white quartz ; and he recollected 
 having himself shaped it out of one of those Indian arrow- 
 heads, which are so often found in the ancient haunts of 
 the red men. It was precisely on the pattern of that worn 
 by the visionary Maid. When Cranfield departed on his 
 shadowy search he had bestowed this brooch, in a gold 
 setting, as a parting gift to Faith Egerton.
 
 THE THREEFOLD DESTINY. 215 
 
 " So, Faith, you have kept the Heart ! " said he, at 
 length. 
 
 " Yes," said she, blushing deeply ; then, more gayly, 
 " and what else have you brought me from beyond the 
 sea ? " 
 
 " Faith ! " reph'ed Kalph Cranfield, uttering the fated 
 words by an uncontrollable impulse, " I have brought you 
 nothing but a heavy heart ! May I rest its weight oa 
 you?" 
 
 " This token, which I have worn so long," said Faith, 
 laying her tremulous finger on the Heart, " is the assur- 
 ance that you may ! " 
 
 " Faith ! Faith ! " cried Cranfield, clasping her in his 
 arms, " you have interpreted my wild and weary dream ! " 
 
 Yes, the wild dreamer was awake at last. To find the 
 mysterious treasure, he was to till the earth around his 
 mother's dwelling, and reap its products! Instead of 
 warlike command, or regal or religious sway, he was to 
 rule over the village children ! And now the visionary 
 Maid had faded from his fancy, and in her place he saw 
 the playmate of his childhood ! Would all, who cher- 
 ish such wild wishes, but look around them, they would 
 oftenest find their sphere of duty, of prosperity, and 
 happiness, within those precincts, and in that station, 
 where Providence itself has cast their lot. Happy they 
 who read the riddle, without a weary world-search, or a 
 lifetime spent in vain I
 
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