“For a time, I remained with a heap of rubbish, where I found myself with a parcel of old rags, each of which could have told a tale, perhaps, as curious as my own. There was an old shirt, which had belonged to a man who had died of the plague; a pocket handkerchief, spun by the silk-worms of India, and manufactured by Hindoo artizans, and after being borne to Europe, had ministered to the conveniences of at least three different persons; an old frill which had flourished upon the bosom of a beau, and sundry other fragments equally curious. After a long space, we were bundled together, taken to the city of Cadiz, packed in an enormous bale, and shipped to Boston. “Thus, I made my fourth voyage across the Atlantic, and found myself restored to the country of my birth. I had passed through various adventures, but alas, what was my present condition! How sadly did it contrast with the brighter days of my existence. Once the favorite of a duchess; once the ornament of the holy Virgin, and fit to be decorated with a priceless gem; now an old rag tumbled in, cheek by jowl, with a thousand vulgar fragments of shirts, sheets, and nose-wipers. “I did not remain in this condition long. I was soon purchased by Messrs. Tileston & Hollingsworth, and transported to their mill at Dorchester; and here I am awaiting my fate. And what is that to be? Am I to be manufactured into a pure sheet, upon which Mr. Longfellow shall write one of his beautiful sonnets; or make an immortal leaf in a new edition of Prescott’s Cortez; or shall I go gilt-edged, to some fair lady, and receive her confession to her lover; or shall I be impressed with the magic figures of a bank, and bear a value a hundred times my weight in gold; or shall I go to the office of a penny paper, and be cried about the streets by the boys,――‘Here’s the second edition of the Mail, Bee, and Times, with a full account of the last horrible murder!’” Thus I read, or seemed to read, from the scroll, which the haggish old rag in the bin had put into my hands. As I finished the last sentence recorded above, the paper shrunk from my grasp. At the same instant, I saw the grisly image rise again from the rag-bin, but with a look so portentous, that I trembled in every limb. In the agony of the moment, I uttered a shriek, which awoke me, and behold, “The Reminiscences of a Rag” were but a dream! [Illustration (Persians on horses)] Persia.