CHARLES LEGATE--A FORGER--STUDYING HIM UP--FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS, HIS "PRIZE"--DESCRIPTION OF LEGATE--NO TWO PERSONS EVER AGREE IN DESCRIBING ANOTHER--A MARK HIT UPON--START FOR ST. LOUIS--MUSINGS--CURIOUS INCIDENTS OF MY JOURNEY--A GENEALOGICAL "DODGE"--ON LEGATE'S TRACK AT LAST--ST. LOUIS REACHED--OF MY STAY THERE--LEAVE FOR NEW ORLEANS PER STEAMER--A GENIAL CROWD OF MEN AND WOMEN ON BOARD--CHARACTERISTICS OF A MISSISSIPPI "VOYAGE"--NAPOLEON, ARKANSAS--SOME "CHARACTERS" COME ON BOARD THERE--A GAMBLING SCENE ON BOARD--ONE JACOBS TAKES A PART--A PRIVATE CONFERENCE WITH JACOB'S NEGRO SERVANT--A TERRIFIC FIGHT ON BOARD AMONG THE GAMBLERS--JACOBS SET UPON, AND MAKES A BRAVE DEFENCE--HOW I DISCOVERED "JACOBS" TO BE PROBABLY LEGATE, IN THE MELEE--HE IS BADLY BRUISED--HIS LIFE DESPAIRED OF--WE ARRIVE IN NEW ORLEANS--JACOBS' IDENTIFICATION AS LEGATE--LEGATE PROVES TO BE VERY RICH--A CURIOUS VISIT TO AN ITALIAN ARTIST'S STUDIO--A NOVEL MEDICINE ADMINISTERED TO SIGNORE CANCEMI, THE SICK ARTIST--HE GETS WELL AT ONCE. Early in my detective life, when I was more ready than now to accept business which might lead me far from home, I was commissioned by a New York mercantile house to go to St. Louis first, and "anywhere else thereafter on the two continents" (as the senior member of the house _fervently_ defined my latitude) where my thread might lead, to work up a subtle case of forgery to the amount of about fifty thousand dollars, out of which the house had been defrauded by one Charles Legate, a Canadian by birth, but combining in himself all the craft of an Italian, with the address of the politest Frenchman, and the bold perseverance and self-complacency of a London "speculator." The task before me was a difficult one, and at that time more than now I craved "desperate jobs," entering into them with an enthusiasm proportioned to the trials and dangers they involved.