An Uncle. Then followed a little bit of genealogy, in approved fashion, with dashes, lines, etc—the meaning of which was that Sternhold’s father, old Romy Baskette, had had a brother, who, when the original Will Baskette was shot, had departed into the unknown with his mother. What had become of Romy’s brother? The probability was that by this time he was dead and buried. But there was also the probability that he had married and had children. Those children, if they existed, were undoubtedly the nearest heirs of Sternhold Baskette, Esq, now residing at Dodd’s Hotel, South Street. As an earnest of the anxiety of the _Post_ to preserve the good city of Stirmingham from Yankee contamination, they now offered three rewards:—First, fifty pounds for proof of Romy’s brother’s death; secondly, one hundred pounds for proof of Romy’s brother’s marriage, if he had married; thirdly, one hundred and fifty pounds for the identification of his child or children. This was repeated as an advertisement in the outer sheet, and was kept in type for months. It deserves notice as being the first advertisement which appeared in the Great Baskette Claim Case—the first of a crop of advertisements which in time became a regular source of income to newspaper proprietors. When this leading article and advertisement, supported by several columns of descriptive matter and genealogies was laid on the breakfast tables of half Stirmingham, it caused a sensation. The city suddenly woke up to the fact that as soon as old Sternhold died half the place would have no owner. The Yankee visitors now had no further reason for concealment. They went about openly making inquiries. They were fêted at hotel bars and in billiard rooms. They called upon Sternhold bodily—_en masse_—forced themselves into his apartment, though, he shut the door with his own hands in their faces, shook him by the hand, patted him on the shoulder, called him “Colonel,” and asked him what he would take to drink! They walked round him, admired him from every point of view, stuck their fingers in his ribs, and really meant no harm, though their manners were not quite of the drawing-room order. They cut up the old man’s favourite armchair, whittled it up, to carry away as souvenirs. They appropriated his books—his own particular penholder, with which he had written every letter and signed every deed for fifty years, disappeared, and was afterwards advertised as on show at Barnum’s in New York City, as the Pen which could sign a cheque for Twenty Millions! When at last they did leave, one popped back, and asked if the “Colonel” believed this story about his _Uncle_? He was sure he had never had an uncle, wasn’t he? The old man sat silent, which the inquirer took for once as a negative, and wrote a letter to the _News_, denying the existence of Romy’s brother.