And the strange old man, who could not ride a few squares in the omnibus without attracting the attention of every body and exciting public curiosity to such a degree, was the millionaire, the Croesus of the South, the largest land-owner in the United States. He had reached the advanced age of seventy, and his remarkable vigor and health had never given way under the pressure of the severest and most incessant labor. Generation upon generation had lapsed into the grave under his eye. A few, a very few shriveled old men were known to him as cotemporaries. Suddenly, while pursuing so eagerly his imaginary goal, he was seized with faintness on the street. Other men would have taken a cab, and ridden home, or at least to a physician's; but when did John McDonogh turn aside from business to relieve any weakness or want? He had an important document to file in court. It must be done that day. He is too weak to walk. There is the omnibus; the fare is only a dime; but that dime is so much taken from the poor, for John McDonogh is only an agent for the poor, so appointed and called of God. Such were the reflections that passed through his mind before he could be induced to perpetrate this serious violation of the settled rules of a life, this single blot and stain on a career of unbroken self-abnegation. With a sigh, he took his seat in the omnibus. It was his last ride. In a cold, desolate, dreary, brick building, constituting almost the only visible sign of the existence of the town of McDonoghville, situate on the right bank of the Mississippi, opposite to the centre of New-Orleans, and in a large room, the furniture of which was old-fashioned, worn, and time-stained, there lay on a small hard mattress the gaunt figure of the millionaire, tortured with pain and fast sinking under the ravages of that terrible disease, the Asiatic cholera. The only beings near were negroes; no white persons were ever allowed to spend the night under that roof. Those negroes were the rich man's slaves in law, but companions and friends in fact. His immense business, his vast estates were administered through them. Even his documents were copied by them. They were true to him in his moment of distress and sickness. All that their limited knowledge of medicine could suggest was done for his relief. At last, in disregard of his command, a physician was brought from the city, who pronounced his condition a very critical one. The doctor's first demand was for brandy. 'Massa, there an't bin no brandy in this house for twenty years,' was the reply of an old, gray-headed domestic. A servant was dispatched to the nearest grocery; but it proved to be too late. The dying man perceived his condition, and requested that his lawyer should be sent for. In an hour that gentleman arrived. He was just in time.