young lady, he is looked upon as a fickle-minded miscreant, capable of ruining a whole town. Little children avoid him, and even dogs go round the corner at his approach. Now, if this BLINKSOP chooses to contest this, marriage, I think—mind you, I only think—that with this previous engagement to back his unwillingness to marry you, this marriage will go for nothing."

Having delivered this legal opinion with an air of profound wisdom, and the most acute penetration, he leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, and regarded his empty glass as with the air of a man whose fondest hopes in that direction had been ruthlessly crushed. And ANN was walking the floor thoroughly excited.

"It's just my confounded luck," said she, angrily, "just as I was counting on galling BELINDA, too. I don't believe," she added after a pause, "that BLINKSOP'S got spunk enough to contest it."

"Perhaps not; but if he should——"

"Well, what shall I do?" she interrupted, impatiently.

The lawyer reached deliberately over the table, and drank the few drops of wine that remained in ANN'S glass.

"Do," said he, slowly, "just what you were going to do, in the first place."

"What! Marry JEFFRY MAULBOY?"

The lawyer nodded.

"But it's too late now. He wouldn't come."

"Try it," was the lawyer's answer. "Urge him," he added, significantly.

The woman who hesitates is lost. ANN hesitated, but she wasn't lost. No; she rather thought she was found.

"I'll do it, old boy," she finally said, "if I can find him, high or low. See here, if you don't hear from me, come here day after to-morrow—will you—and bring DIGBY with you?"

The lawyer promised, and took his departure.

ANN immediately wrote a letter, sealed and directed it to JEFFRY MAULBOY, and rung for TEDDY.

"Do you know of a man named JEFFRY MAULBOY?" said she.

TEDDY opened his eyes very wide.

"What, the Prize-Fighter?" said he. "It's a jokin' ye are; fur how could ye ask that same, afther I see him giv' TIM MCGONIGLE sich an illegant knock-down with me own eyes, at the torchlight procession in the fall of the winter? And JIM, with a shlit in his ear as was bewtifool to look at, jumps up, and says he——"

He paused, for tears stood in ANN'S eyes. The reminiscence was too much for her overcharged soul.

"Yes," she murmured. "He was always just such a lovely brick, was JEFF." Then she added, with an effort: "I want you to take this letter to him the first thing in the morning. Go to Mrs. LADLE'S first, and if he ain't there—Do you know where his folks live?"

"I do that. It's a lawyer his father is, and lives at Western Bend. I'll find him, mum, sure."

"Do it," said ANN, "and I'll find you for a month."

TEDDY took the letter and retired to his room.

"To JIFFRY MAULBOY the Prize-Fighter," said he, patting it lovingly. "Well-a-day! Who'd a thought it now? Here's somethin to be proud of. Here's somethin to boast of like, a settin' at the fireside, mebbe, with me little ansisters upon me knees. 'And it's meself, me little ducks,' I'd say, 'as carried a letther, with me own hands, to the great JIFFRY MAULBOY, as wiped out PATSY MCFADDEN in a fair shtand-up fight, and giv' TIM MCGONIGLE a private mark as he carried to his grave.' I wonder what's in it?" he continued, holding it up to the light. "Divil a word now can I see. That's illaygil, and shows there's mischief brewin'. Now what would an unconvarted haythen do as hadn't the moril welfare of the community a layin' close to his heart like? Carry the letther, and ax no questions. But what would an airnest Christian do, who's a bloomin' all over with religion, and looks upon the piety of the public as the apple of his eye? He'd take his pinknife, jist so, and shlip the blade under the saylin'-wax, jist so, and pacify his conscience like by raydin' the letther."

Having convinced himself that the operation, viewed in a purely religious light, was strictly mercantile, TEDDY snuffed the candle with his thumb and forefinger, and spread the letter on the table.

It ran thus:—

"HALF-WAY HOUSE, June 30th—Evening.

"JEFFRY MAULBOY:—You have gone back on your word, and made a desperate woman of me. I'll do all I threatened, and more. I have just written to Mrs. CUPID, and kept back nothing. If you ain't here by day after to-morrow, ready to marry me, as you agreed to, I'll send the letter, and go to her besides. Do as you please. I don't care for my future, if you don't for yours. Trust the bearer.

"ANN BRUMMET."

TEDDY read it twice. Then he held up his hands, lost in admiration.

"Married to one man, and a goin' for another afore the ceremony is cold! What talints! What nupchility! Oh, what an illegant Mormyn is bein' wastid in this very house! If ye could grow a daughter like that, TEDDY me boy, she'd sit ye up for life." He shook his head, sighed heavily, and gazed wistfully at the letter.

"I couldn't look poshterity in the face," he continued, with a self-accusing air, "without a copy of that letther."

He went and got writing materials with evident reluctance, and after three or four trials, succeeded in producing a very good duplicate of ANN'S letter, bearing himself, throughout, like a man who sees his duty plainly before him, and does it without flinching.

He put the duplicate in the envelope, sealed it carefully, put the original in his pocket, and in ten minutes was abed and asleep.

(To be continued.)

PUNCHINELLO'S PLAN FOR THE PREVENTION AND DETECTION OF CRIME.

In view of the amount of crime which the detective police is apparently unable to trace to its authors, and the number of criminals who constantly elude arrest, Mr. PUNCHINELLO begs to submit an entirely new and original plan for the prevention and detection of crime, which he hopes will receive the favorable consideration of the powers that be.

In the first place, he would recommend that all Jail Birds be immediately transported to the Canary Islands.

Second. The entire population of the City of New York should be organized into a Vigilance Committee. This force should be employed night and day in watching the remaining inhabitants and outsiders. Any member found asleep on his (lamp) post should be drawn (by our special artist) and quartered (in a station-house for the night).

Third. All residents should be compelled, on pain of being instantly garroted, to surrender their valuables, and even their invaluables, to the Property Clerk, Comic Headquarters, PUNCHINELLO Office, who should be held strictly irresponsible and be well paid for it.

Fourth. Everybody should be instantly arrested and held to bail, as a precaution against the escape of wrong-doers. It should be made the duty of proprietors of liquor saloons to Bale out their customers when "too full."

Fifth. Any person found with a 'Dog' in his possession should be compelled to give a strict account of himself; the 'Dog' should be Collared, sent to the Pound, closely interrogated, and his evidence carefully Weighed. In cases of 'Barking up the Wrong Tree' the person unjustly arrested should be indemnified.

Sixth. The City Government should immediately offer an immense reward for the invention of a telescope of sufficient power to detect crime whenever and wherever committed within the city limits. This instrument should be placed on the summit of the dome of the New County Court House, and a competent scientific person appointed to be continually on the look-out, and his observations noted down by a Stenographer.

Seventh. There should be frequent balloon ascensions in various parts of the city, under the direction of distinguished aeronauts, for the purpose of watching the behavior of evil disposed persons. In order that these aerial movements may excite no suspicion in the minds of persons under surveillance, the balloons should ascend high enough to be out of sight. They will then be out of mind.

Eighth. A Sub-Committee should be chosen, the members of which shall hang about the various haunts of vice in back slums, and learn as much as possible of the nefarious projects of the desperate characters who frequent such dens. Each member should report daily, and if he is not familiar with the 'flash' dialect in which thieves converse (which is very improbable, if chosen as suggested), should take care to provide himself with a copy of GROSE'S Slang Dictionary or Vocabulary of Gross Language, which will the better enable him to understand it.

Ninth. A strict blockade of the port should be maintained, to prevent the ingress of bad characters from abroad, and especially from the now Radical State of New Jersey, with which ferry-boat communication should be immediately cut off.

Tenth. A Reformatory School in which the Dangerous Classes might (except during recitations) be kept under restraint would be a great public benefit. The study of metaphysics should be prohibited at such an institution. Burglars especially should not be allowed to Open Locke on the Human Understanding.

The Worst Kind of "Paris Green."

It is stated by observant flâneurs that much absinthe is consumed by ladies who frequent fashionable up-town restaurants. One lovely blonde has grown so absinthe-minded from the habit, that she regularly leaves the restaurant without paying for her luncheon.

Quarrelsome in their Cups.

Should the European Powers get into a fight over the Sublime Porte, what a strong argument it would be in favor of temperance!

ABOUT A FOOT.

Mr. Bunyan (whose corns have just been subjected to severe pressure). "YOU OLD BEGGAR, YOU!"

Mr. Lightfoot (who is a little hard of hearing). "NO APOLOGY NECESSARY, I ASSURE YOU, SIR; MATTER OF NO CONSEQUENCE WHATEVER; PRAY DON'T MENTION IT."

MR. BEZZLE'S DREAM.

MR. BEZZLE was the editor and proprietor of a large and influential newspaper that sold two for a cent, and had special correspondents in every corner of the office. By honest industry and a generous disregard of what went into the newspaper, so that it paid, he had raised himself to the highest rung of fortune's ladder, and we all know what tall ringing that is. He used to say that to accept one kind of advertisement and to reject another, was an injustice to the public and an outrage upon society, and that strict integrity required that he should accept, at as much as he could get a line, every advertisement sent for insertion. It would have done you good to have witnessed Mr. BEZZLE'S integrity in this respect, and the noble spirit of self-sacrifice with which he resolved that none of the public should be slighted. He used to laugh to scorn the transcendental notion about the editorial columns not being purchased, "If my opinions are worth anything," he used to exclaim, "they are worth being paid for; and if I unsay to-morrow what I said yesterday, the contradiction is only apparent, and is in accordance with the great spirit of progress and the breaking up of old institutions." The sequel to this magnanimous career may be imagined. The enterprise paid so well that old BEZZLE found it to his interest to employ a man at fifteen dollars a week to do nothing else but write notes from "Old Subscribers," informing BEZZLE that they had taken his "valuable paper" for over twenty years, that no family should be without it, and that they would rather, any morning, go without their breakfast than go without reading the Hifalutin' Harbinger. One day, when BEZZLE had been an editor for forty years, he fell asleep and had a dreadful dream. He thought that he rose early one morning, dressed himself in his best suit of broadcloth, which he had taken for a bad debt, walked up to the ticket office of a theatre where he was well known, and asked for a couple of seats. The gentlemanly treasurer (was there ever a treasurer that wasn't gentlemanly in a newspaper notice?) handed him two of the best seats in the house—end seats, middle aisle, six rows from the stage. Mr. BEZZLE slapped down a five-dollar bill with that air of virtue which had become a second nature to him. (Second nature, by the by, is no more like nature at first hand than second childhood is like real childhood.)

"Why, Mr. BEZZLE!" exclaimed the treasurer, "have you taken leave of your senses, sir? Put that back in your pocket;" and he pointed to the recumbent bank-note. "Who ever heard of an editor paying for two seats at the theatre since the world began? What have we ever done to offend you, Mr. BEZZLE, that you should behave thus?"

"Sir," said Mr. BEZZLE, "I once was young, but now am old. I see the error of my editorial ways, and have resolved to mend 'em. My columns are not to be bought, sir. My dramatic critic is not to be suborned. I am determined to tear down the flaunting lie with which THESPIS has so long concealed her blushless face, and to show the deluded public the cothurnus bespattered, and the sock and buskin draggled in the mire. Perish my theatrical advertising columns when I cease to tell the truth! There is the sum twice told: I pays my money and I takes my choice. Never mind the change." And with these words Mr. BEZZLE stalked off, his face crimson with a rush of aesthetics to the head.

From the theatre Mr. BEZZLE went to the house of a celebrated publisher, who received him with open arms, and conducted him to a counter where all the newest and most expensive books were displayed. "We are just settled in our new quarters," explained the publisher, "and any little thing you might say about us in your valuable paper would be—I don't ask it, you know—but it would be—upon my word it would. See here, Mr. BEZZLE, I want you to pick out from this counter just what you want, and—"

"Sir!" exclaimed Mr. BEZZLE, leaping at the publisher with eyes that fairly blazed with the radiance of rectitude, "who do you take me for?" If Mr. BEZZLE had been less violent he would probably have said, "Whom do you take me for," and so have spared himself the ignominy of sinking to the ungrammatical level of the Common Herd. But the fact is, his proud spirit was chafed and fretted at the spectacle of sordid self-seeking that everywhere met his gaze, and excess of sentiment made him forgetful of syntax. "Mark me, my friend, I am not to be bought," he continued in unconscious blank verse. "I shall take my pick, sir, and you will take this check." And he handed the amazed publisher a check for five hundred dollars. "I sicken, sir," he continued, "of this qualmish air of half-truth that I have breathed so long. I am going to read these books, and say what I think of 'em, and five hundred dollars is dirt cheap for the privilege. I had sooner that every 'New Publications' ad. should die out of my newspaper than that my literary columns should be contaminated with a Lie! Never mind the change, sir. If anything is left over, send it to the proprietor of the new penny paper that is struggling to keep its head above water. Don't say that it came from me. Say that it came from a converted roper-in." And Mr. BEZZLE stalked out of the office in such a tempest of morality that the publisher felt as though a tidal wave of virtue had swept over him.

After this, Mr. BEZZLE'S dream became a trifle confused; but he thought that this noble course of conduct was greatly approved by the public, that its eminent practicability commended it to all classes of people, and that theatres, publishers, and others quadrupled their advertisements. "Ah!" sighed Mr. BEZZLE, rubbing his hands, but still asleep, "what a sweet thing virtue