Hogarth's eyes opened in surprise.”_I_ am not a Jew “. “No? I should have said that there was a hint of expression somewhere--But to resume. I retained those seven diamonds, and disposed of them”. “Honest behaviour!” “Perfectly honest! I acquainted the Pope--he sanctioned it! And now, I, single-handed almost, threw myself into that task. I hired, I built, I begged, I borrowed, I formed committees, I haunted Religious Houses, I sweated, I ran, I wept, I visited dens, I smoked opium, I drank gin, I framed memorials, I learned Yiddish, I read the Mishna and Gemara, I interviewed Rabbonim, I wrote tracts: I was busy. In the midst of it, I had to visit Rome ceremoniously, to assist at an interview between the Duke of York and his Holiness--arrived on the Monday, and on the Wednesday, I remember, attended a Court Ball in the suite of his Royal Highness. That night, when I returned to the Vatican, I found all the Piazza di San Pietro crowded. I do not know if you were free at the time when my friend, M. Tissot, startled everybody by predicting the collision of an asteroid with the earth? Tut, the silly being--he should have known from the body's response to the spectroscope that its condition was too friable to resist our atmosphere. But I never yet knew an astronomer not imbued with sensationalism they acquire a certain megalomania from their intercourse with space. But, at all events, the people, dreading the destruction of everything, had crowded toward the Vatican. The Duke of Genoa, I, and some of the College of Cardinals, stood watching from a balcony; and very imposing, I remember, was the moment when a glare appeared--I must stop--” They were at the face of the rock, and the “halt” and “set to work” parted them. But again on the final march back at 5.15 when nightshades were falling fast like snow, and the arm now felt the pick a load, O'Hara began his muttering: “I was telling you about the asteroid”, he said. “Now this body, it was given out, contained diamonds in large evidence, and the mere thought of such a thing bursting in mid-air, and scattering itself about was, I--I confess, a little fascinating to my mind. A man might let his soul gloat upon such a hope till he went lunatic with lust! I--I confess, the thought was alluring to me. Diamond, my son: lucid--But when the body burst, and none of it came my way, I drove it from my mind: in fact, I never heard of a trace of it having been seen--hissed itself into gases in mid-air. Except in one instance--one instance.