But all at once--half an hour had not elapsed since the clown had disappeared--the door was sharply opened, and behold, in his black spangled tunic, the yellow tuft upon his head, the golden butterfly upon his breast and back, a large smile opening his mouth like a money-box, his face white with flour, Slap-bang, the true Slap-bang, the Slap-bang of the circus, burst into view. And in his little white cot, with the joy of life in his eyes, laughing, crying, happy, saved, the little fellow clapped his feeble hands, and, with the recovered gaiety of seven years old, cried out: [Illustration: "BRAVO, SLAP-BANG!"] "Bravo! Bravo, Slap-bang! It is he this time! This is Slap-bang! Long live Slap-bang! Bravo!" CHAPTER IV. When the doctor called that day, he found, sitting beside the little patient's pillow, a white-faced clown, who kept him in a constant ripple of laughter, and who was observing, as he stirred a lump of sugar at the bottom of a glass of cooling drink: "You know, Francis, if you do not drink your medicine, you will never see Slap-bang again." And the child drank up the draught. "Is it not good?" "Very good. Thank you, Slap-bang." [Illustration: "THANK YOU, SLAP-BANG."] "Doctor," said the clown to the physician, "do not be jealous, but it seems to me that my tomfooleries have done more good than your prescriptions." The poor parents were both crying; but this time it was with joy. From that time till little Francis was on foot again, a carriage pulled up every day before the lodging of the workman in the Rue des Abbesses; a man descended, wrapped in a greatcoat with the collar turned up to his ears, and underneath arrayed as for the circus, with his gay visage white with flour. "What do I owe you, sir?" said Jacques to the good clown, on the day when Francis left the house for the first time. "For I really owe you everything!" The clown extended to the parents his two hands, huge as those of Hercules: "A shake of the hand," he said. Then, kissing the little boy on both his rosy cheeks, he added, laughing, "And permission to inscribe on my visiting-cards, 'Slap-bang, doctor-acrobat, physician in ordinary to little Francis!'" [Illustration] _Portraits of Celebrities at different times of their Lives._ [Illustration: AGE 4. _From a Miniature._] [Illustration: AGE 36. _From a Painting by G. Richmond, R.A._] [Illustration: AGE 81. _From a Photo by Messrs. Elliott & Fry._] CARDINAL MANNING. BORN 1808.