That very evening, however, he was waited on by the same old gentleman in brown coat and gray hairs, who was seen speaking to her at the lottery. He came with a rueful face, requesting him to visit immediately Madame ----, giving the Countess her right name, which it is now too late in our story to introduce. Whatever may have been the case at some previous time, the wheel of Fortune had that day bitterly disappointed her hopes. She had been carried home insensible. The Doctor hastened to her. It was too late. She had been again attacked by a congestion of the brain, which this time had proved fatal. There appeared no hopes of a complete solution of the enigma. "Ah!" said the same old gentleman, as he stood moralising by his side, "the same luck never comes _twice_--she should have tried other numbers." The Doctor saw immediately that the old gentleman had been in the confidence of the deceased. He questioned him. There was a look of significance, which betrayed plainly that _he knew all_. He was in fact one of those who earn their subsistence by writing letters for those who are deficient in the skill of penmanship or epistolary composition. He had written _the very letter itself_; to his pen was owing that sort of _copy-book_ phrase, "May the gifts of Fortune conduct to the Temple of Happiness!" The Doctor had in truth, as he often said when alluding to the subject, made his fortune in the lottery. We wish we could leave the story here, and let the reader suppose that gratitude alone had induced the old woman to act so generous a part. But the whole truth should be honestly told. There was a mixture of superstition in the case. It was _his number_ that had won the prize, and she considered it, as expressed in the letter which accompanied the notes, in the light of his property. In all countries where a lottery has been long established, the strangest superstitions grow up concerning what are called lucky numbers. In Italy, where this manner of increasing the public revenue is still resorted to, not only is any number which has presented itself under peculiar circumstances sure to be propitious, but there is a well-known book, of acknowledged authority we believe, containing a list of words, with a special number attached to each word, by the aid of which you can convert into a lucky number any extraordinary event which has occurred to you. Let any thing happen of public or private interest--let any thing have been dreamt, or even talked of that was at all surprising, you have only to look in this dictionary for the word which may be supposed to contain the essence of the matter; as, for instance, fire, death, birth--and the number that is opposite that word will assuredly win your fortune. When the Countess first saw the prescription of the young Doctor, she was going to throw it angrily on the floor; but her eye was suddenly riveted by the _numbers_ in it--the numbers of the grains and