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"She whispered a oui that was quite faint, faint and small. But her poor father fell in convulsions at her feet.

tell me all. It was as I had surmised. | lovely child a pang, I said to her Goby de Mouchy, my wretched, be- calmly, Blanche de Béchamel, did sotted, miserable secretary, in his Goby de Mouchy tell you secret visits to the château of the old Mar- NUMBER THREE? quis de Béchamel, who was one of our society, had seen Blanche. I suppose it was because she had been warned that he was worthless and poor, artful, and a coward, she loved him. She wormed out of the besotted wretch the secrets of our Order. Did he tell you the NUMBER ONE?' I asked. "She said, 'Yes.'

"Did he,' I further inquired, 'tell you the '

"Oh, don't ask me, don't ask me!' she said, writhing on the sofa, where she lay in the presence of the Marquis de Béchamel, her most unhappy father. Poor Béchamel, poor Béchamel! How pale he looked as I spoke! Did he tell you.' I repeated with a dreadful calm, the NUMBER TWO?' She said, 'Yes.'

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"The poor old marquis rose up, and clasping his hands, fell on his knees before Count Cagl- Bah! I went by a different name then. Vat's in a name? Dat vich ve call a Rosicrucian by any other name vil smell ⚫as sveet. 'Monsieur,' he said, 'I am old - I am rich. I have five hundred thousand livres of rentes in Picardy. I have half as much in Artois. I have two hundred and eighty thousand on the Grand Livre. I am promised by my Sovereign a dukedom and his orders with a reversion to my heir. I am a grandee of Spain of the First Class, and Duke of Volovento. Take my titles, my ready money, my life, my honor, every thing I have in the world, but don't ask the THIRD QUESTION.'

"Godefroid de Bouillon, Comte de Béchamel, Grandee of Spain and Prince of Volovento, in our Assembly what was the oath you swore? The old man writhed as he remembered its terrific purport.

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Though my heart was racked with agony, and I would have died, ay, cheerfully" (died, indeed, as if that were a penalty!) "to spare yonder

"She died suddenly that night. Did I not tell you those I love come to no good? When General Bonaparte crossed the Saint Bernard, he saw in the convent an old monk with a white beard, wandering about the corridors, cheerful and rather stout, but mad-mad as a March hare. General,' I said to him, 'did you ever see that face before?' He had not. He had not mingled much with the higher classes of our society before the Revolution. I knew the poor old man well enough; he was the last of a noble race, and I loved his child."

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"And did she die by?".

"Man! did I say so? Do I whisper the secrets of the Vchmgericht? I say she died that night; and hehe, the heartless, the villain, the betrayer, you saw him seated in yonder curiosity shop, by yonder guillotine, with his scoundrelly head in his lap.

"You saw how slight that instrument was? It was one of the first which Guillotin made, and which he showed to private friends in a hangar in the Rue Picpus, where he lived. The invention created some little conversation amongst scientific men at the time, though I remember a machine in Edinburgh of a very similar construction, two hundred . well, many, many years ago - and at a breakfast which Guillotin gave, he showed us the instrument, and much talk arose amongst us as to whether people suffered under it.

"And now I must tell you what befell the traitor who had caused all this suffering. Did he know that the poor child's death was a SENTENCE ? He felt a cowardly satisfaction that with her was gone the secret of his

treason. Then he began to doubt. | lie the ancient dead. And he came to the wicket, which Brother Jerome was opening just at the dawning. And the crowd was already waiting with their cans and bowls to receive the alms of the good brethren.

I had MEANS to penetrate all his thoughts, as well as to know his acts. Then he became a slave to a horrible fear. He fled in abject terror to a convent. They still existed in Paris; and behind the walls of Jacobins the wretch thought himself secure. Poor fool! I had but to set one of my somnambulists to sleep. Her spirit went forth and spied the shuddering wretch in his cell. She described the street, the gate, the convent, the very dress which he wore, and which you saw to-day.

"And now this is what happened. In his chamber in the Rue St. Honoré, at Paris, sat a man alone -a man who has been maligned, a man who has been called a knave and charlatan, a man who has been persecuted even to the death, it is said, in Roman Inquisitions, forsooth, and elsewhere. Ha ha! A man who has a mighty will.

"And looking towards the Jacobins convent (of which, from his chamber, he could see the spires and trees), this man wILLED. And it was not yet dawn. And he willed; and one who was lying in his cell in the convent of Jacobins, awake and shuddering with terror for a crime which he had committed, fell asleep.

"But though he was asleep, his eyes were open.

"And after tossing and writhing, and clinging to the pallet, and saying, 'No, I will not go,' he rose up and donned his clothes -a gray coat, a vest of white piqué, black satin small-clothes, ribbed silk stockings, and a white stock with a steel buckle; and he arranged his hair, and he tied his cue, all the while being in that strange somnolence which walks, which moves, which FLIES Sometimes, which sees, which is indifferent to pain, which OBEYS. And he put on his hat, and he went forth from his cell; and though the dawn was not yet, he trod the corridors as seeing them. And he passed into the cloister, and then into the garden where

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more correctly, two statues. "A strange legend has got abroad was recumbent,— a man. Over him, that after the deed was done, the figsabre in hand, stood a woman. ure rose, took the head from the bas"The man was Olofernes. The ket, walked forth through the garden, woman was Judith. From the head, and by the screaming porters at the from the trunk, the water gushed. It gate, and went and laid itself down at was the taste of the doctor;- - was it the Morgue. But for this I will not not a droll of taste? vouch. Only of this be sure. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy.' More and more the light peeps through the chinks. Soon, amidst music ravishing, the curtain will rise, and the glorious scene be displayed. Adieu! Remember me. Ha! 'tis dawn," Pinto said. And he was gone.

"At the end of the garden was the doctor's cabinet of study. My faith, a singular cabinet, and singular pic

tures!

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"Decapitation of Charles Premier at Vitehall.

"Decapitation of Montrose at Edimbourg.

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Decapitation of Cinq Mars. When I tell you that he was a man of taste, charming!

"Through this garden, by these statues, up these stairs, went the pale figure of him who, the porter said, knew the way of the house. He did. Turning neither right nor left, he seemed to walk through the statues, the obstacles, the flower-beds, the stairs, the door, the tables, the chairs. "In the corner of the room was THAT INSTRUMENT which Guillotin had just invented and perfected. One day he was to lay his own head under his own axe. Peace be to his name! With him I deal not!

"In a frame of mahogany, neatly worked, was a board with a half-circle in it, over which another board fitted. Above was a heavy axe, which fell - you know how. It was held up by a rope, and when this rope was untied, or cut, the steel fell.

"To the story which I now have to relate you may give credence, or not, as you will. The sleeping man went up to that instrument.

"He laid his head in it, asleep." Asleep!"

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"He then took a little penknife out of the pocket of his white dimity waistcoat.

"He cut the rope asleep.

"The axe descended on the head of the traitor and villain. The notch in it was made by the steel buckle of his stock, which was cut through.

I am ashamed to say that my first movement was to clutch the check which he had left with me, and which I was determined to present the very moment the bank opened. I know the importance of these things, and that men change their mind sometimes. I sprang through the streets to the great banking house of Manasseh in Duke Street. It seemed to me as if I actually flew as I walked. As the clock struck ten I was at the counter and laid down my check.

The gentleman who received it, who was one of the Hebrew persuasion, as were the other two hundred clerks of the establishment, having looked at the draft with terror in his countenance, then looked at me, then called to himself two of his fellowclerks, and queer it was to see all their aquiline beaks over the paper.

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Come, come?" said I, "don't keep me here all day. Hand me over the money, short, if you please! I was, you see, a little alarmed, and so determined to assume some extra bluster.

"Will you have the kindness to step into the parlor to the partners?" the clerk said, and I followed him.

"What, again?" shrieked a baldheaded, red-whiskered gentleman, whom I knew to be Mr. Manasseh. "Mr. Salathiel, this is too bad! Leave me with this gentleman, S." And the clerk disappeared.

"Sir," ," he said, "I know how you Came by this; the Count de Pinto gave it you. It is too bad! I honor my parents; I honor their parents; I honor their bills! But this one of grandma's is too bad it is upon my word, now. She've been dead these five and thirty years. And this last four months she has left her burial-place and took to drawing on our 'ouse! It's too bad, grandma; it is too bad!" and he appealed to me, and tears actually trickled down his nose.

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Is it the Countess Sidonia's check or not?" I asked haughtily. "But, I tell you, she's dead! It's a shame! - it's a shame! it is, grandmamma!" and he cried, and

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now a thousand more! The 'ouse can't stand it; it won't stand it, I say! What? Oh! mercy, mercy!"

As he uttered these words, A HAND fluttered over the table in the air! It was a female hand: that which I had seen the night before. That female hand took a pen from the green baize table, dipped it in a silver inkstand, and wrote on a quarter of a sheet of foolscap on the blotting-book, "How about the diamond robbery? If you do not pay, I will tell him where they are."

What diamonds? what robbery? what was this mystery? That will never be ascertained, for the wretched man's demeanor instantly changed. wiped his great nose in his yellow" Certainly, sir; - oh, certainly," he pocket-handkerchief. "Look year. said, forcing a grin. "How will you will you take pounds instead of guineas? She's dead, I tell you! It's no go! Take the pounds - one tausend pound!ten nice, neat, crisp hundred-pound notes, and go away vid you, do!"

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I will have my bond, sir, or nothing," I said; and I put on an attitude of resolution which I confess surprised even myself.

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Wery vell," he shrieked, with many oaths, "then you shall have noting-ha, ha, ha!- noting but a policeman! Mr. Abednego, call a policeman! Take that, you humbug and impostor!" and here with an abundance of frightful language, which I dare not repeat, the wealthy banker abused and defied me.

Au bout du compte, what was I to do, if a banker did not choose to honor a check_drawn by his dead grandmother? I began to wish I had my snuff-box back. I began to think I was a fool for changing that little oldfashioned gold for this slip of strange

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have the money, sir? All right, Mr. Abednego. This way out."

"I hope I shall often see you again," I said; on which I own poor Manasseh gave a dreadful grin, and shot back into his parlor.

I ran home, clutching the ten delicious, crisp hundred pounds, and the dear little fifty which made up the account. I flew through the streets again. I got to my chambers. I bolted the outer doors. I sank back in my great chair, and slept.

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My first thing on waking was to feel for my money. Perdition! Where was I? Ha! -on the table before me was my grandmother's snuff-box, and by its side one of those awful those admirable - sensation novels, which I had been reading, and which are full of delicious wonder.

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But that the guillotine is still to be seen at Mr. Gale's, No. 47, High Holborn, I give you MY HONOR. suppose I was dreaming about it. I don't know. What is dreaming? What is life? Why shouldn't I sleep on the ceiling? and am I sitting on it now, or on the floor? I am puzzled. But enough. If the fashion for sensation novels goes on, I tell you I will write one in fifty volumes. For the present, DIXI. But between

ourselves, this Pinto, who fought at | the Colosseum, who was nearly being roasted by the Inquisition, and sang duets at Holyrood, I am rather sorry to lose him after three little bits of Roundabout Papers. Et vous ?

DE FINIBUS.

WHEN Swift was in love with Stella, and despatching her a letter from London thrice a month by the Irish packet, you may remember how he would begin letter No. XXIII., we will say, on the very day when XXII. had been sent away, stealing out of the coffee-house or the assembly so as to be able to prattle with his dear; "never letting go her kind hand, as it were," as some commentator or other has said in speaking of the Dean and his amour. When Mr. Johnson, walking to Dodsley's, and touching the posts in Pall Mall as he walked, forgot to pat the head of one of them, he went back and imposed his hands on it,-impelled I know not by what superstition. I have this I hope not dangerous mania too. As soon as a piece of work is out of hand, and before going to sleep, I like to begin another: it may be to write only half a dozen lines: but that is something towards Number the Next. The printer's boy has not yet reached Green Arbor Court with the copy. Those people who were alive half an hour since, Pendennis, Clive Newcome, and (what do you call him? what was the name of the last hero? I remember now!) Philip Firmin, have hardly drunk their glass of wine, and the mammas have only this minute got the children's cloaks on, and have been bowed out of my premises and here I come back to the study again: tamen usque recurro. How lonely. it looks now all these people are gone! My dear good friends, some folks are utterly tired of you, and say, "What a poverty of

friends the man has? He is always asking us to meet those Pendennises, Newcomes, and so forth. Why does he not introduce us to some new characters? Why is he not thrilling like Twostars, learned and profound like Threestars, exquisitely humorous and human like Fourstars? Why, finally, is he not somebody else?" My good people, it is not only impossible to please you all, but it is absurd to try. The dish which one man devours, another dislikes. Is the dinner of to-day not to your taste? Let us hope to-morrow's entertainment will be more agreeable.

I resume my original subject. What an odd, pleasant, humorous, melancholy feeling it is to sit in the study, alone and quiet, now all these people are gone who have been boarding and lodging with me for twenty months! They have interrupted my rest: they have plagued me at all sorts of minutes: they have thrust themselves upon me when I was ill, or wished to be idle, and I have growled out a "Be hanged to you, can't you leave me alone now? Once or twice they have prevented my going out to dinner. Many and many a time they have prevented my coming home, because I knew they were there waiting in the study, and a plague take them! and I have left home and family, and gone to dine at the Club, and told nobody where I went. They have bored me, those people. They have plagued me at all sorts of uncomfortable hours. They have made such a disturbance in my mind and house, that sometimes I have hardly known what was going on in my family, and scarcely have heard what my neighbor said to me. They are gone at last; and you would expect me to be at ease? Far from it. I should almost be glad if Woolcomb would walk in and talk to me; or Twysden reappear, take his place in that chair opposite me, and begin one of his tremendous stories.

Madmen, you know, see visions, hold conversations with, even draw

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