But who can paint his dismay, when no tale or tidings of the leather case could be had! The master, the mistress, the boy, the maid of the public house, all protested they were innocent. His suspicions soon fell on the strollers with whom he had passed the night; and he now found out for the first time, that a merry evening did not always produce a happy morning. He obtained a warrant, and proper officers were sent in pursuit of the strollers. No one, however, believed he had really lost any thing; and as he had not a shilling left to defray the expensive treat he had given, the master of the inn agreed with the other landlord in thinking this story was a trick to defraud them both, and Brown remained in close custody. At length the officers returned, who said they had been obliged to let the strollers go, as they could not fix the charge on any one, and they had offered to swear before a justice that they had seen nothing of the leather case. It was at length agreed that as he had passed the evening in a crowded barn, he had probably been robbed there, if at all; and among so many, who could pretend to guess at the thief? Brown raved like a madman; he cried, tore his hair, and said he was ruined for ever. The abusive language of his old landlord, and his new creditor at the Blue Posts, did not lighten his sorrow. His landlord would be put off no longer. Brown declared he could neither find bail nor raise another shilling; and as soon as the forms of law were made out, he was sent to the county jail. Here it might have been expected that hard living and much leisure would have brought him to reflect a little on his past follies. But his heart was not truly touched. The chief thing which grieved him at first was his having abused the kindness of Stock, for to him he should appear guilty of a real fraud, where indeed he had been only vain, idle, and imprudent. And it is worth while here to remark, that vanity, idleness, and imprudence, often bring a man to utter ruin both of soul and body, though silly people do not put them in the catalogue of heavy sins, and those who indulge in them are often reckoned honest, merry fellows, with _the best hearts in the world_. I wish I had room to tell my readers what befell Jack in his present doleful habitation, and what became of him afterward. I promise them, however, that they shall certainly know the first of next month, when I hope they will not forget to inquire for the fourth part of the Shoemakers, or Jack Brown in prison. PART IV. JACK BROWN IN PRISON.