About this time, in consequence of the favorable notices that appeared in our Portland papers, the Philadelphia Ledger, the Saturday Courier, and some other journals of that city, opened upon him in full cry, followed by the American press generally; the Courier declaring that he had taken _leg bail_ and escaped from Canada,--that he had run away from Rochester, after obtaining five hundred dollars from Henry McIlvaine, Esq., of the Philadelphia bar, in the shape of fees for constituting that gentleman "Consul-General of Greece"! By others he was charged with being a tin-pedler, a horse-thief, and a leech-doctor, who had assumed the title of Count long after his arrival in this country. Among many anonymous letters--letters addressed to strangers in Portland--came one from Henry McIlvaine himself, saying: "I see by the Portland papers, that a man calling himself _sometimes_ General Bratish, at others General Eliovich, Count Eliovich, Baron Fratelin and Walbeck, and claiming to have been a general in the Polish, Spanish, Mexican, and other armies, is now in your town; and I should suppose, from the papers _who_ have noticed him, imposing upon respectable people. Having seen something of this person, and been _myself a victim_, I have felt it due to my friends in Portland to put them on their guard. He is the son of a merchant in Trieste, driven from his home and his friends in consequence of his crimes. His pretension to any of the titles he claims is altogether without foundation. After _exhausting Europe_, he has within a few years turned his talents to good account in our country. He made his appearance here about two years ago as Consul-General and Envoy from Greece, in which capacity he was very free with his commissions of vice-consulships in New York and Philadelphia. He was indicted here for forgery,--_convicted_,--obtained a new trial by the false oaths of his associates, some of whom are now in the state prison (one for horse-stealing), and gave bail for his appearance at the next term. The pretence for a new trial was the absence of a witness _who never existed_, but who was expected to prove his innocence. Before the next term, the Consul-General took wing, leaving his bail, a simple Frenchman, to pay the forfeit. It would be impossible for me to give anything like a history of his crimes in a letter. Suffice it to say that he is a notorious swindler, the most unblushing and inexhaustible liar and the most finished rascal I ever saw." If this were true, how happened it that the notorious swindler, the horse-thief, the convicted forger, and the escaped convict was still at large,--and not only at large, but always before the public, and _always without a change of name_? Why was he not surrendered by his bail? Why not followed by a bench warrant, or a requisition from the Governor of Pennsylvania? Of course, the story could not be true, as told by Mr. McIlvaine. It was too absurd on the face of it.