“I will be calm, then,” continued the other (who, to avoid the complication of the intermingling circumstances, may be described as the more stranger of the two), and he took of his neckcloth. “I am a merchant in tea, yellow fat, and mixed spices, in a small but hitherto satisfactory way.” Thus revealing himself, he continued to set forth how at an earlier hour he had started on a journey to deposit his wealth (doubtless as a propitiation of outraged deities) upon a certain bank, and how, upon reaching the specified point, he discovered that what he carried had eluded his vigilance. “All gone: notes, gold, and pocket-book--the savings of a lifetime,” concluded the ill-omened one, and at the recollection a sudden and even more highly-sustained frenzy of self-unpopularity involving him, without a pause he addressed himself by seven and twenty insulting expressions, many of which were quite new to my understanding. At the earliest mention of the details affecting the loss, the elbow of the person who had made himself responsible for the financial obligation of the day propelled itself against my middle part, and unseen by the other he indicated to me by means of his features that the entertainment was becoming one of agreeable prepossession. “Now, touching this hyer wallet,” he said presently. “How might you describe it?” “In colour it was red, and within were two compartments, the one containing three score notes each of ten pounds, the other fifty pounds of gold. But what’s the use of describing it? Some lucky demon will pick it up and pocket the lot, and I shall never see a cent of it again.” “Then you’d better consult one who reburnishes the eyes,” declared the magnanimous one with a laugh, and drawing forth the article referred to he cast it towards the merchant in a small way. At this point of the narrative my thoroughly incompetent brush confesses the proportions of the requirement to be beyond its most extended limit, and many very honourable details are necessarily left without expression. “I’ve known men of all sorts, good, bad, and bothwise,” exclaimed the one who had recovered his possessions; “but I never thought to meet a gent as would hand over six hundred and fifty pounds as if it was a toothpick. Sir, it overbalances me; it does, indeed.” “Say no more about it,” urged the first person, and to suggest gracefully that the incident had reached its furthest extremity, he began to set out the melody of an unspoken verse. “I will say no more, then,” he replied; “but you cannot reasonably prevent my doing something to express my gratitude. If you are not too proud you will come and partake of food and wine with me beneath the sign of the Funereal Male Cow, and to show my confidence in you I shall insist upon you carrying my pocket-book.”