Full of ambitious thought, I now and then caught wild sounds from the violin that was being played next door,--notes like sobbing cries of pain, and anon rippling runs like a careless woman's laughter,--and all at once I remembered I had not yet opened the third letter addressed to me,--the one coroneted in scarlet and gold, which had remained where it was on the table almost unnoticed till now. I took it up and turned it over with an odd sense of reluctance in my fingers, which were slow at the work of tearing the thick envelope asunder. Drawing out an equally thick small sheet of notepaper also coroneted, I read the following lines written in an admirably legible, small and picturesque hand. Dear Sir. I am the bearer of a letter of introduction to you from your former college companion Mr John Carrington, now of Melbourne, who has been good enough to thus give me the means of making the acquaintance of one, who, I understand, is more than exceptionally endowed with the gift of literary genius. I shall call upon you this evening between eight and nine o'clock, trusting to find you at home and disengaged. I enclose my card, and present address, and beg to remain, Very faithfully yours Lucio Rimânez. The card mentioned dropped on the table as I finished reading the note. It bore a small, exquisitely engraved coronet and the words PRINCE LUCIO RIMÂNEZ. while, scribbled lightly in pencil underneath was the address 'Grand Hotel.' I read the brief letter through again,--it was simple enough,--expressed with clearness and civility. There was nothing remarkable about it,--nothing whatever; yet it seemed to me surcharged with meaning. Why, I could not imagine. A curious fascination kept my eyes fastened on the characteristic bold handwriting, and made me fancy I should like the man who penned it. How the wind roared!--and how that violin next door wailed like the restless spirit of some forgotten musician in torment! My brain swam and my heart ached heavily,--the drip drip of the rain outside sounded like the stealthy footfall of some secret spy upon my movements. I grew irritable and nervous,--a foreboding of evil somehow darkened the bright consciousness of my sudden good fortune. Then an impulse of shame possessed me,--shame that this foreign prince, if such he were, with limitless wealth at his back, should be coming to visit me,--_me_, now a millionaire,--in my present wretched lodging. Already, before I had touched my riches, I was tainted by the miserable vulgarity of seeking to pretend I had never been really poor, but only embarrassed by a little temporary difficulty! If I had had a sixpence about me, (which I had not) I should have sent a telegram to my approaching visitor to put him off.