Calling at the store which received most of his custom, I introduced myself to the proprietor, made a confidant of him to some extent, and learned that the very next day after that on which the aforesaid letter was mailed, its author offered him in payment for a barrel of flour, a hundred-dollar note on the bank from which a bill of the like denomination had been obtained, as before-mentioned, in exchange for the "small trash." The merchant could not then change it, but sent the flour, and changed a bill which he supposed to be the same, a few days afterward. Armed with these irresistible facts, I proceeded to call on the adventurous deceiver of the clergy, who had attempted to make one member of that body second his intention to cheat another. "Insatiate archer! Could not one suffice?" "Mr. T----," said I, after some preliminary conversation, "it's of no use to mince matters. The fact is, you did not send the money in that New Haven letter. You offered it the day after you pretended to mail it, at Mr. C.'s store. You see I've found out all about it, so I hope you will not deny the truth in the matter." I then gave him his choice, to send the hundred dollars promptly to his New Haven correspondent, or allow me to prove in a public manner, the facts in my possession. Being thus hard pressed, and finding himself cornered, he confessed that he had prepared the letter which was received in New Haven--postscript, double wafers and all--before he left home, and that while crossing the street from the bank to the post-office, he substituted this for the one he wrote in the clergyman's study! He promised to send the money, and pretended to have suffered severely in his feelings, on account of this dishonest act. There is no United States law providing for the punishment of such an offence, but public opinion and private conscience make nicer distinctions than the law can do, and often mete out a well deserved penalty to those who elude the less subtle ministers of justice. In the present instance, the foregoing story was made public by direction of the Post Master General; and the author of the trick, unable to sustain the indignation and contempt of the community in which he lived, was compelled to make a hasty retreat from that part of the country. CHAPTER XIII. Young Offenders--Thirty Years ago--A large Haul--A Ray of Light. The facts of the following case were furnished me by a gentleman connected with the New York post-office. I will introduce him as the relator of his own story, taking some liberty, however, with the phraseology.