left with me as a pledge estimated; it is not worth a thousand florins, as you believed; it is a piece of antiquity that has a value to only those who can indulge in a caprice for fancy articles, and such caprices are rare nowadays, the time for such is past.

"I am, M. le Comte, with much respect, your humble and obedient servant,

"MOSES GULDENTHAL."

Abel Larinski turned once more in his chair. He crumpled up between his fingers the letter of M. Moses Guldenthal, saying to himself as he did so, that the Guldenthals are often very clear-sighted folks. "Ay, to be sure," thought he, "this Hebrew is right, I have lost three valuable years. I have had fever, and my eyes have been clouded; but, Heaven be praised! The charm is broken, the illusion fled, I am cured—saved! Farewell, my chimera, I am no longer thy dupe! Many thanks, my dear friend: I return to you your gun; do with it as it seemeth best to you."

His eyes suddenly fell on his own reflection in the mirror above the chimney-piece, and he regarded it fixedly for a few moments.

"The semblance truly of an inventor," he resumed, mournfully smiling. "This pale, emaciated face; these deep-set eyes, with dark circles about them; these hollow, cadaverous cheeks! The three years have indeed left their traces. Bah! a little rest in the Alpine pastures, and Faust will become rejuvenated."

He seized a pen, and wrote the following reply:

"You are truly kind, my dear Guldenthal: you refuse me the miserable florins, but you give me in their stead a little piece of advice that is worth a fortune. Unluckily, I am not capable of following it. Noble souls like ours comprehend each other with half a word, and you are a poet whenever it suits you. When in the course of the day you have transacted a neat little piece of business, after having rubbed your hands until you have almost deprived them of skin, you tune your violin, which you play like an angel, and you draw from it such delightful strains that your ledger and your cash-box fall to weeping with emotion. I, too, am a musician, and my music is the fair sex. But, alas! women never can be for me other than an adorable inutility, a part of the dream of my life. Your dreams yield you a handsome percentage, as I have sorrowfully experienced; my dreams yield me nothing, and therefore it is that they are dear to me.

"I must prohibit—understand me clearly—your disposing of the trinket I left with you; we have the weakness, we Poles, of clinging to our family relics. Set your mind at rest; before the end of the month I shall have returned to Vienna, and will honour the dear little note. One day you will go down on your knees to beg of me to loan you a thousand florins, and I will astonish you with my ingratitude. May the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, have you in his holy keeping, my dear Guldenthal!"

As he finished his letter, he heard the sound of harps and violins. Some itinerant musicians were giving a concert in the hotel-garden, which was lit up as bright as day. Abel opened his window, and leaned on his elbows, looking out. The first object that presented itself to his eyes was Mlle. Moriaz, promenading one of the long garden-walks, leaning on her father's arm. Many eyes were fixed on her—we have already said it was difficult not to gaze upon her—but no one contemplated her with such close attention as Count Larinski. He never once lost sight of her.

"Is she beautiful? Is she even pretty?" he queried within himself. "I cannot quite make up my mind, but I am very sure that she is charming. Like my bracelet, this is a fancy article. She is a little thin, and her shoulders are too vigorously fashioned for her waist, which is slender and supple as a reed; but, such as she is, she has not her equal. Her walk, her carriage, resemble nothing I ever have seen before. I can well imagine that when she appears in the streets of Paris people turn to look after her, but no one would have the audacity to follow her. How old is she? Twenty-four or twenty-five years, I should say. Why is she not married? Who is this withered, pinched-looking fright of a personage who trots at her side like a poodle-dog? Probably some demoiselle de compagnie. And there comes her femme de chambre, a very spruce little lass, bringing her a shawl, which the demoiselle de compagnie hastens to put over her shoulders. She allows it to be done with the air of one who is accustomed to being waited upon. Mlle. Moriaz is an heiress. Why, then, is she not married?"

Count Larinski pursued his soliloquy as long as Mlle. Moriaz promenaded in the garden. As soon as she re-entered the hotel, it appeared to him that the garden had become empty, and that the musicians were playing out of tune. He closed his window. He gave up his plan of starting the next day for Saxon. He had decided that he would set out for Saint Moritz, to pass there at least two or three days. He said to himself, "It seems absurd; but who can tell?"

Thereupon he proceeded to investigate the state of his finances, and he weighed and re-weighed his purse, which was very light. Formerly Count Larinski had possessed a very pretty collection of jewellery. He had looked upon this as a reserve fund, to which he would have recourse only in cases of extreme distress. Alas! there remained to him now only two articles of his once considerable store—the bracelet that was in the hands of M. Guldenthal, and a diamond ring that he wore on his finger. He decided that, before quitting Chur, he would borrow money on this ring, or that he would try to sell it.

He remained some time seated at the foot of his bed, dangling his legs to and fro, his eyes closed. He had closed them, in order to better call up a vision of Mlle. Moriaz, and he repeated the words: "It seems absurd; but who can tell? The fact is, we can know nothing of a surety, and anything may happen." Then he recalled one of Goethe's poems, entitled "Vanitas! vanitatum vanitas!" and he recited several time in German these two lines:

"Nun hab' ich mein' Sach' auf nichts gestellt, Und mein gehort die ganze Welt!"

This literally signifies, "Now that I no longer count on anything, the whole world is mine." Abel Larinski recited these lines with a purity of accent that would have astonished M. Moses Guldenthal.

M. Moriaz, after wishing his daughter good-night, and imprinting a kiss upon her brow, as was his custom, had retired to his chamber. He was preparing for bed, when there came a knock at his door. Opening this, he saw before him a fair-haired youth, who rushed eagerly towards him, seized both his hands, and pressed them with effusion. M. Moriaz disengaged his hands, and regarded the intruder with a bewildered air.

"How?" cried the latter. "You do not know me? So sure as you are one of the most illustrious chemists of the day, I am Camille Langis, son of your best friend, a young man of great expectations, who admires you truly, who has followed you here, and who is now ready to begin all over again. There, my dear master, do you recognise me?"

"Ay, to be sure I recognise you, my boy," replied M. Moriaz, "although, to tell the truth, you have greatly changed. When you left us you were a mere youth."

"And now?"

"And now you have the air of a young man; but, I beg of you, where have you come from? I thought you were in the heart of Transylvania."

"It is possible to return from there, as you see. Three days ago I arrived in Paris and flew to Maisons-Lafitte. Mme. De Lorcy, who bears the double insignia of honour of being my aunt and the godmother of Antoinette—I beg your pardon, I mean Mlle. Antoinette Moriaz—informed me that you were in ill-health, and that your physician had sent you to Switzerland, to Saint Moritz, to recruit. I hastened after you; this morning I missed you by one hour at Zurich; but I have you now, and you will listen to me."

"I warn you, my dear child, that I am at this moment a most detestable auditor. We have done to-day one hotel de ville, one episcopal