seventy-five feet high, were built at the extremities. From this the line was extended northwards to the district known as the Doab, where the impediments to observation seem to have been increased. The inhabitants,' according to Lieutenant-Colonel Everest, 'in common with those of other parts of India, are congregated in villages and towns which vary in extent and character according to the wealth and traffic of the owners, from the veriest hovel composed of straw, to the costly fourstoreyed edifice of masonry; but instances of isolated dwellings are rare, and hardly ever met with, except in the case of indigo planters, or now and then a temple or mosque, the bare walls of which offer no temptation to the plunderer. The villages, however, lie so thickly scattered over the surface, that it is difficult to trace a line in any direction so as to pass free of all habitations, and quite impossible to calculate on seeing between the breaks which occasionally appear in the dense belt of foliage; for, in the very few instances where such do exist, they stand altogether at random. In fact, generally speaking, the trees form to all appearance a continuous dense belt of foliage, at the distance of four or five miles from the eye of the observer; and if an interstitial space is anywhere found, it as often as not leads to low marshy or other land totally ineligible as a principal station.

The smoke from the daily and nightly fires which, particularly in the cold season, envelopes the villages, and clings to the groves surrounding them; that arising from brick and lime-kilns, and conflagration of weeds; the clouds of dust raised by herdsmen and their cattle in going out to graze in the morning, and returning in the evening; by travellers and processions of men, carriages, and cattle, proceeding along the divers roads for business or pleasure; and by the force of the wind, the slightest action of which suffices in this arid, parched-up soil to obscure the view-form an assemblage of obstacles which it is only possible in very favourable contingencies to surmount."

Northwards from the Doab lie the Sewalik Hills, and the beautiful valley of the Dehra Dun; in the hilly country higher observing stations became necessary, and as these were to be permanent structures of solid masonry, the determination of the best locality for them was of much importance. This was accomplished by means of tall bamboo masts, sufficiently strong to bear a scaffolding, with a tent, signal-lights, and observers; at the top of this a smaller bamboo was attached, which afforded the means of exhibiting a blue light at a height of ninety feet above the surface of the ground. Thirteen such stations were required; and as large bamboos are not to be found in Upper India, orders were sent to all the commissariat officers in the neighbourhood to procure supplies from the country boats on the rivers, and forward them to Agra as a temporary depôt; at the same time the other materials required were accumulated. The blue lights were burned at intervals of ten minutes; and as they were seldom visible to the naked eye, an observer was constantly on the watch with the telescope to mark the first moment of ignition-a work of no small labour, when it is considered that from each station six others were observed. The towers which replaced the temporary erections are massive structures of solid masonry, fifty feet high, with a railed platform at the top, from which observations are taken.

Of Betal, a civil and military station in the Mahadeo mountain range, we read that, in 1824, it was so notoriously unhealthy, as to have appropriated to itself par excellence the appalling title of the Valley of Death. That valley has since become highly cultivated and flourishing, and is considered one of the healthiest places in the tropical parts of India. This is not, however, the case with the mountain range in general, which continues to be about as deadly a tract in 1840 as it was in 1824. It is a long and weary journey through this unhealthy range; the inhabitants are scanty, the water and provisions are scarce, and it is only at certain sea

sons of the year that travelling through them can be attempted with any reasonable prospect of impunity.' Notwithstanding all precautions, the party suffered severely from sickness while traversing the region of the Mahadeo mountains.

Recent improvements have tended greatly to diminish the chances of sickness in out-of-door operations in tropical countries. The atmosphere being best for the perception of distant objects when it is charged with humidity, there was a standing order for the surveying party to wait till the first heavy fall of rain, and then take the field. It is easy to conceive,' writes Colonel Everest, what a reckless waste of life and health was caused by this exposure to the pitiless pelting of the tropical rains, in forest tracts teeming with miasma: no constitution, European or Asiatic, could bear up for any length of time against such a complication of hardships as thence arose eternal watchings by day, to the prevention of all regular exercise; tents decomposing into their original elements; servants, cattle, baggage, clothes, bedding, la cuisine, all daily dripping with rain; every comfort which the indwellers of cities and leaders of regular lives deem essential to happiness, and even to existence, remorselessly sacrificed; and yet, strange to say, except when under the actual influence of a jungle fever, which sometimes swept like a destroying angel over us, and prostrated the whole camp in one night, we hardly ever knew what it was to have a sorry hour. Surely the great trigonometrical survey of India in those days was the proper school to teach men how to laugh at the calamities and nothingness of life. The introduction of lamps and heliotropes has totally changed the face of things; and by rendering the rainy season the least fitting period for observing luminous objects, especially those dependent on cloudless skies, has afforded an opportunity, of which I eagerly availed myself, to spare the health of my valuable subordinates, by ordering them to desist from field operations at the very period which, in the early part of my career, and my four years' heavy apprenticeship, used to be chosen par excellence for their commencement.'

Lieutenant-Colonel Everest looks forward to the period when the meridian arc, commencing at Cape Comorin, will be extended northwards to the extremity of the Russian dominions, near Nova Zembla. The trace contemplated,' he observes, would extend our geographical knowledge over a part of the globe highly interesting and but little known; and though, in truth, there is a belt to be passed through of several hundred miles in extent, over which the Chinese government have a control nominal or real, yet as that belt is bounded by the territory of Russia on the north, and the British possessions on the south, the jealousy to be apprehended from that source would no doubt be mainly counteracted by the influence of two such potent neighbours, could they be persuaded to act combinedly.'

THE LATE PROPRIETOR OF THE TIMES.'

A REMARKABLY interesting memoir of Mr Walter appeared in the 'Times' of September 16th, from which it appears that he was the son of a bookseller and publisher of London, was taught printing as a trade in early life, afterwards spent some time in study at Oxforddevoted himself, in the year 1803, to the management being then designed for the church-but ultimately of the Times,' then a languishing paper in the hands of his father. His career during the forty-four subsequent years appears to have been a remarkable example of unobtrusive diligence and skill directed to a specific end. It also forms a valuable illustration of the rise and progress of the newspaper power in England-to which no man contributed more than he.

he instantly remodelled its establishment, and worked On obtaining the sole charge and property of the Times," the scanty supplies of capital at his command with what

other nations call the felicitous temerity of English enterprise. His genius was essentially creative; and while his extraordinary foresight enabled him to anticipate the demands of the public, his untiring energy pointed out to him the way to execute them. Like some great military commanders, Mr Walter seems to have been gifted with an intuitive perception of character, and he soon organised a corps of agents whose zeal and intelligence were almost equal to his own. The difficulties which he encountered at the very outset of his career, would have daunted any ordinary mind; to say nothing of the opposition he met with out of doors, the paternal auspices were anything but encouraging. His persevering, and, for a long time, fruitless efforts to introduce greater expedition in printing, were treated as a piece of juvenile folly and extravagance, and excited his father's serious displeasure. Indeed it is not a little remarkable that the two earliest acts of Mr Walter's life which bespoke the enterprise and highmindedness of his character-namely, his efforts just referred to, and his abolition of the system of theatrical puffs, which, up to his time, were a source of considerable revenue to the daily press--became the subjects of painful comment in his father's will.

'The attributes of a newspaper forty years ago bore that general resemblance to those of the present day that the child does to the man. There were leading articles, criticisms, foreign intelligence, reporting, and miscellaneous news. The first difficulties of reporting had been surmounted; its second epoch had not yet arrived. When Mr Walter entered the world of journalism, he found a very small but well-organised corps of reporters connected with each of the morning papers; in that department, therefore, he had too much prudence to attempt originality of design, but he wisely aimed at its extension and practical improvement. In criticism he pursued a course somewhat similar, but differing in this respect-that he sought to elevate its moral character, and to render it dignified by insisting that it should be impartial. His honourable labours for the purification of diurnal criticism were commenced early, and continued late. With unceasing vigilance he endeavoured to protect the drama, the fine arts, and the literature of the age from the evil influence of venal panegyric on the one hand, or unscrupulous malignity on the other. Few amongst the labours of his long life have been crowned with more real and less apparent success; for not many undertakings are more difficult than any attempt to disabuse the public mind of a persuasion that a friendly or a hostile bias must necessarily govern the tone of every critical lucubration; but as Mr Walter despised temporary advantages, and considered not the probable condition of affairs to-morrow or next day, but how they would work in "the long-run," so he relied upon ultimately securing the grand desideratum of impartial and independent criticism, by following out in that department pretty nearly the same rules that he applied to all other concerns. He began by setting an example of independence in the more important affair of the political department of his journal. He was too proud for a partisan, and the force of sympathy attracted to his side men of his own stamp in moral feeling, though with mental accomplishments of a character wholly dissimilar. From amongst these his profound knowledge of human nature enabled him to select a succession of writers as incapable of yielding to personal pique or private favour as any class of men that have ever yet contributed to a public journal; but in this important branch of journalism the reputation of Mr Walter was of slow growth, and some twelve or fifteen years elapsed before the world fully acknowledged his inaccessible independence.

"The progress that he made in the department of foreign intelligence was, however, more rapid. Forty years ago, all Europe was one vast theatre of war; and it was no light achievement for the voice of the press to make itself heard amidst the roar of Napoleon's artillery. But in mercantile affairs apparent difficulties become instruments of victory when courage and conduct happen to be united with wisdom and capital. All Mr Walter's rivals supported or opposed the ministers of that day. In supporting a vigorous prosecution of the war, without supporting either the party of the minister or that of the opposition, he lost the political assistance of the one, and the foreign information of the other; but he won the hearts of the people of England. The monied and the commercial class supplied the sinews of war. Early intelligence has long been the vital principle of British commerce. Mr Walter's mind became fired

with the noble ambition of being its first and greatest purveyor. Those very difficulties which inferior spirits viewed with dismay, protected him from rivalry, and so became ancillary to conquest. Wherever important events were in progress-no matter on what part of the continent some emissary of his was in the midst; not perhaps such a complete and varied agency as is now established, but one sufficient for the exigency; and before the close of the war, Mr Walter's broad-sheet had become to the British merchant a necessity of his existence. Under various disguises, and by means of sundry pretexts, his employés on the continent ascertained facts, and conveyed them to London-often at imminent risk, always at prodigious expense. But he was amply rewarded; for he outstripped the government couriers, and half the trade of London proceeded on the faith of the intelligence that he published.'

'His

Allusion is next made to the intensely English character of Mr Walter, and his remarkable Napoleonic power of surrounding himself with energetic coadjutors. great discrimination and munificence collected around him the ablest writers of the age, and that formed the second source of early success. A third was that extreme self-reliance which unfitted him for party purposes, and protected him from the necessity of labouring for party interests. A fourth was his extraordinary boldness and resolution. That spirit, though it often brought him into difficulties, operated most favourably in its ultimate results. Of this truth a striking exemplification occurred in 1810. Towards the latter end of May in that year, the pressmen-not those who arrange the types, but those who impress their forms on the paper-insisted upon increased wages. The men then employed in working the day newspaper came to the "Times" office in Printing-House Square, and called upon their brethren to join them in a combination which was illegal under the circumstances, and must at any time have been regarded as unjustifiable. They insisted upon uniform rates of wages throughout all the printing-offices, overlooking the fact, that the men of the "Times" enjoyed indulgences, as well as opportunities of extra labour and reward, which in other quarters were denied. At first Mr Walter was disposed to make concessions; but a boy employed at the "Times" office informed him that a conspiracy had been organised not only amongst the pressmen, but amongst the compositors also, to abandon his employment under circumstances that would stop the publication of the paper, and therefore destroy the most valuable property that he then possessed. The complaints of the compositors not only had reference to wages, but to a particular description of type then getting into use the effect of which type, it was alleged, would materially diminish the remuneration for piece-work. These unfortunate men bound themselves by a solemn oath, that unless the proprietors of the "Times" acceded to the previously unheard-of terms which the general body of the London compositors and pressmen then thought proper to dictate, the combination into which they had entered should be carried out into its fullest effect.

"The "strike" took place on a Saturday morning. Mr Walter had only a few hours' notice of this formidable design, and, beset as he was, most men would have submitted to any conditions; but as he despised mediocrity, so he hated compromise. Having collected a few apprentices from half-a-dozen different quarters, and a few inferior workmen anxious to obtain employment on any terms, he determined to set a memorable example of what one man's energy can accomplish. For six-and-thirty hours he himself worked incessantly at case and at press; and on Monday morning, the conspirators, who had assembled to triumph over his defeat, saw, to their inexpressible astonishment and dismay, the "Times" issue from the hands of the publisher with the same regularity as ever. A few months passed on, and Mr Walter brought out his journal every day without the aid of his quondam workmen; but the printers whom he did employ lived in a state of the utmost peril. Two of them were accused by the conspirators of being deserters from the royal navy, and this charge was supported by the testimony of perjured witnesses, but eventually fell to the ground. Those, however, who thus conspired against his men, were not permitted to go unscathed. He had been for some time cautiously but unceasingly engaged in the discovery of evidence sufficient in a court of law to bring home the charge not only of illegal combination, but of the still higher offence that had been

committed the crime of conspiracy. His legal advisers at length informed him that he might prefer a bill of indictment against twenty-one of the men who attacked workmen whom he had recently employed. On the 8th of November 1810, the persons thus accused were placed at the bar of the Old Bailey. The trial lasted eight hours. Mr Walter, with several other witnesses, underwent long examinations, and the offence charged in the indictment was brought home to nineteen of the prisoners. The chiefs of the conspiracy, two in number, were sentenced to two years' imprisonment; three others to imprisonment for eighteen months; three for twelve months; and eleven for nine months. Thenceforward everything like combination ceased in Printing-House Square. It is believed that by that operation Mr Walter never expected to effect any diminution of wages; on the contrary, the incomes of the men were gradually improved; they were relieved from the expenses of combination societies, and the intemperance which their meetings-always held in public-houses-frequently occasioned; a fund was created to provide for sickness as well as old age; and from the year 1810 to the present hour, the "Times" office has been by far the most advantageous place in which a competent printer can obtain employment. It is a fact worthy of being recorded, that a very considerable number of the younger compositors of the "Times" are men whose fathers have been in Mr Walter's employment. Although the conviction of the conspirators had led to no direct pecuniary saving, nor had ever been intended to produce that effect, yet Mr Walter had secured future protection for his men, protection for his property, peace in his office, and the full command of his establishment; he could now do as he pleased with his own, and an admirable use he made in after-years of the resources which his perseverance, talent, and courage had enabled him to command.

We cannot quit this part of our history without recording another highly characteristic anecdote which a friend and eye-witness has kindly communicated to us. We give it in the words of our informant :

"In the spring of the year 1833, an express arrived from Paris, bringing the speech of the king of the French on opening the French chambers. The express reached the "Times' office at ten A. M. There was no editor on the spot -no printers; but Mr Walter was in Printing-House Square. He sent for **** **** **** **** Not one of them was to be found. I, too, was sent for, but was out. It was a 'Mail' day. I came to the office about twelve o'clock, and found Mr Walter, then M. P. for Berks, working in his shirt sleeves at case. He had himself translated the principal parts of the speech, and was setting up his own translation with his own hand, assisted, I think, by one compositor. He gave me a proof of what he had set up, and desired me to read over the speech, and see whether he had omitted anything material. I found only two very short sentences of any importance omitted. I translated them, and Mr Walter set them up. The second edition, with the speech, was in the city by one o'clock.

"Had not Mr Walter turned to in the way he did, the whole expense of the express must have been lost; for I

am sure that there was not one man in the whole establishment who could have performed the double part which he executed that day with his own hands."

It is not surprising of one so self-devoted as Mr Walter, to learn that he took little ease, and scarcely ever entered society. One of his greatest feats was his introduction of steam printing-for he it practically was who gave the world this invention. The first printing machine employed in England was erected in his office in 1814. It was an invention absolutely essential to a large newspaper circulation, seeing that, by common presses, only a comparatively small number of copies can be thrown off within that space of time which makes all news lose its savour. By and by the circulation of his journal became so extensive, that even at the rate of 1100 per hour, it took six or seven hours each day, with the machinery and the steam-engine at full speed, to satisfy the public demand. Once more he exercised his own ingenuity, while summoning to its aid the ablest men of the period, and by means of further improvements, increased speed was attained; but the additional supply seemed to inflame instead of satiating the public appetite, and 5000 copies per hour do not now suffice to meet the still growing and apparently indefinite demand. From Mr Walter's mind the improvement of printing machinery seemed scarcely ever to have been absent; and in the latest year of his invaluable life, his atten

tion was given to a new engine of power tenfold greater than that which Köenig originally suggested. To describe the machinery now in work at Printing-House Square would require a goodly volume, and no small amount of complex diagrams and elaborate drawings; but the material fact in Mr Walter's biography is this, that whereas before his time 5000 copies of important intelligence could be circulated in the course of a day, ten times that number can now be issued without any duplicate composition of the types. As many as 54,000 copies of one number of the "Times" have been worked off by the present machinery fully in time for the despatch of the mails.' Some personal traits of the 'potentate of Printing-House Square,' as he has often been called, are curious. It is asserted that he combined, what are so rarely seen together, the wisdom and circumspection which accom panies age, with the strong passions, vivacity, and cheeriness of early youth. No one moved about more than he did, but he was not impelled to the indulgence of locomotive habits by any childish impatience of restraint. His intense activity did not result from any series of temporary impulses, but from a sense of duty which his position and his previous life had imposed. Within certain limitations, it might be said that he preferred an interview to a letter. In his intercourse with total, or even comparative strangers, he-being a cautious man of the world-liked to communicate through third parties-through the agency of the half-dozen professional gentlemen who were respectively at the heads of the several departments which he himself governed in chief. But with those whom he admitted to his acquaintance, he generally conversed rather than corresponded; he therefore largely patronised every mode of conveyance that served to bring him into contact with those whom he desired to see, or to escape from the bores who desired to see him. Men incapable of understanding his character would exclaim, "Strange man that he is! no sooner settled steadily at his business in the City, than he is off to the West End, no one knows about what; then back in the middle of the night for an hour or two, and the next morning at sunrise away to Bearwood!" At one moment tempted from home by the stirring calls of business, the next invited to return by the recollection of past happiness, and the hope of future enjoyment. An almost consuming zeal for the improvement of the "Times" newspaper alternated with his passion for planting and pruning, creating artificial lakes and undulating lawns. At night, seated in the editorial chair, directing the pens that made the popular voice of England heard in every court of the continent, spending his strength in the foul atmosphere of the City, and the exhausting labours of a newspaper office; in a few hours afterwards, however, the carol of the lark and "incense-breathing morn" restored his jaded faculties, and the same hand now wielded a woodman's axe which, a short time previously, had been guiding the greatest political engine in Europe.'

The memoir makes strong claims for Mr Walter, on the score of his political sagacity and liberality, and for the vast power which he exercised in public affairs. We dispute not the power, but we fear that the whole political life will not bear strict scrutiny with advantage. The changes of tone and sentiment in the 'Times' throughout the last fourteen years alone have been so marked, as to impress indelibly on the general mind its want of any fixed principle. This cannot be altogether a popular delusion. ¦ We were once much struck by hearing a remark on that journal from one of the most philosophical writers of our age-one unconnected with journals-So great and powerful, without a high and unimpeachable morality, what would this paper be if it were otherwise!' We are reluctant, however, to do more than indicate the one subtraction which most persons will make when they read the history of this extraordinary, and in many respects admirable man. Let the unequivocal good that was in him have the last word. It was,' says the memoir, by a rare combination of qualities that Mr Walter was enabled to achieve the great work which has immortalised his name. From the first dawn of life, he had set his mind on purifying and strengthening public opinion, by the creation of an organ which, as a necessary means to its end, should beat in perfect unison with the heart of his country. No one can suppose for a moment that this was an easy task, yet none but Mr Walter's most intimate friends can have any conception of the difficulties and trials he encountered in the progress of his work. The mere physical labour which it imposed upon him required a constitution of uncommon

vigour and buoyancy. For many years, he never enjoyed a single unbroken night's rest, while his days were consumed with restless anxiety, either in counteracting the increasing attempts that were made to thwart his undertaking, or in devising new means to promote it. The success that crowned his exertions brought perils in its turn of a still more subtle and deadly character. The opposition of enemies might be overcome by energy and perseverance: the treacherous favours of the great might insinuate themselves when open hostility had failed. Against both, however, Mr Walter was proof. No dangers or difficulties could daunt him; no proffered advantages conciliate him. So careful was he to avoid even the very appearance of evil, where his honour and independence were concerned, that he shrank from accepting the slightest compliment that could be construed by the bitterest enemy into an attempt to bias his judgment or flatter his self-esteem. Bearing always in mind the saying of the wise man, that "a gift

perverteth the understanding of the wise," he steadily refused even those apparently harmless acknowledgments which undoubtedly sprang from the purest gratitude, and which were offered to him in common with some of the most illustrious men of his day. Among other instances, it may not be generally known that at the close of the war he received through the Spanish ambassador a splendid tea-service of gold plate, as a memorial of the vigour and constancy with which he had kept up the spirit of this country during the manifold vicissitudes of the Peninsular war. Mr Walter instinctively shrank from a supposed interchange of personal favours with a Ferdinand, or any set of advisers who might happen to be ascendant in Spain. No sooner had the glittering bauble tantalised the eyes of the feminine spectators, than it was returned to its case, and sent back as it came.' This noble self-denial-a proof of watchful integrity-alone covers the name of Mr Walter with undying honours.

THE COUNT DE DIJON.

exclaimed the wagoner, throwing a contemptuous look at the well-worn brown surtout of his companion. You will give them to me-you will steal them then, I suppose? Come, say no more about it, but lend a hand at unharnessing the poor beast. Marianne, poor Marianne! what will she say!'

The count readily did as he was desired, and gave all the assistance in his power; but this accident having caused considerable delay, they did not arrive until late at the Red Cross Inn.

'Can you give me a room and a bed?' said the count to the landlord.

and without either a cloak or an umbrella, haughtily reThe latter seeing a foot traveller, covered with snow, plied, 'There is no room for you here; you must go elsewhere.'

not be very pleasant in frost and snow: let me have any 'But I should have to go a league further, which would place;

am not particular.'

'I should think not, indeed,' replied the hostess; but our inn is not for every one that comes the way. I admit none but respectable people—all wagoners; I will admit your companion, but not you.'

'Allow me at least, madame, to share the supper and room of my companion.'

'As to that, it is no concern of mine; you must settle it with him.'

Well, be it so.

The count then turning to the wagoner, repeated his request. Come then, good woman, supper for two, and a comfortable room.' retired to their apartment; the count then made some inWhen supper was over, they paid their reckoning, and quiries respecting the people of the house.

'I know,' replied Penot, that they have well feathered their nest; this is the only inn in the district, and during the nine years they have kept it, they must have laid by a pretty good sum. Oh if my poor Marianne and I had

One morning during the last winter, being at his country residence, he recollected that the lease of an inn called the Red Cross, about three leagues distant, had expired. The landlord was soliciting a renewal; but wishing to judge of the state of the premises, he set out on foot, although the weather was intensely cold, and the snow falling.

At some distance from his château he overtook a wagoner walking along by the side of his cart. Between pedestrians acquaintance is soon made; and it was not long before the count discovered that the man's name was Penot, his wife's name Marianne; that he had five children, and as many horses; and that all he had to depend on for the support of his family and cattle was his errandcart.

But all at once, while they were walking on in earnest conversation, the leading horse made a false step, fell down, and broke his leg. At this sight the wagoner cried out in despair, and began to use epithets which are not to be found in any vocabulary of polite conversation.

'You do wrong to utter such language, my friend,' said his companion; your conduct in this small misfortune is really sinful. How can you tell what may be the intentions of Providence towards you?'

I

Will you hold your peace?' replied the wagoner. wish you were in my place, and that you were losing that fine horse instead of me. Do you know that he cost me twenty-five louis? Do you know how much twenty-five louis are? I am afraid not. What will my poor Marianne say? No, if God were just, He would never have permitted the horse of a poor man like me, with a large family, to have broken his leg.'

'And I tell you again, my friend, that it is wrong to doubt the goodness of God, and for twenty-five miserable louis.'

'You talk very much at your ease about twenty-five louis, as if you knew anything at all about them. Did such a sum ever find its way into your pocket, I wonder? Oh my poor horse! Twenty-five louis are not to be found upon the highways.'

Well, I will give you the twenty-five louis; so compose yourself,' said the count.

'Oh, you are making game of me into the bargain!'

'Well, if this house suits you, you shall have it.' 'Why, how bravely you talk! First you say you will give me twenty-five louis, and then you say you will give me an inn. I cannot help laughing at the idea. However, take care; I tell you I wont be played upon.'

'No play in the case. I tell you that if you like this house, I will give it to you,' replied his companion. 'And I tell you again, that if you say another word, I will turn you out of the room,' said the wagoner.

He seemed a likely person to do so, therefore the count said no more.

The next morning the count rose early, and repaired to his solicitor in the next town. After some conversation between him and the solicitor, the latter set off for the Red Cross.

On reaching the inn, he told the landlord that the count had arrived.

Mercy on us!' exclaimed the landlady,' where is he? Why would he not honour us by putting up here?' 'He came here, but you refused to admit him,' replied the attorney.

'That is not true; he never came here.' 'Yes,' said the attorney, he came here last night in company with a wagoner. Where is this wagoner?' There he is,' replied the landlady, pointing to a stoutlooking man, who was eating his breakfast near the fire. 'My friend,' said the attorney, addressing himself to the wagoner, the person with whom you shared your room last night is the Count de Dijon. In the first place, here are the twenty-five louis he promised to give you for the loss of your horse that broke his leg; and in the next, here is a lease, which puts you in possession of this inn for nine years, on the same terms as your predecessor: but in order to repay you for your hospitality last night to a poor pedestrian, the count gives it to you rent free for the first three years. Will that suit you?'

'Oh my poor Marianne-my five children! Oh my good sir!' exclaimed the wagoner, letting the knife drop from his hands; and I who said such rude things to that kind gentleman! Where is he, that I may go and throw myself at his feet?'