w or the day
after; and as for the barrel, depend upon it, it's a testimonial from
one of your young ladies, and probably contains oysters.'

'O, don't speak so loud!' cried the little artist. 'It would cost me my
place if I were heard to speak lightly of the young ladies; and besides,
why oysters from Italy? and why should they come to me addressed in
Signor Ricardi's hand?'

'Well, let's have a look at it,' said Michael. 'Let's roll it forward to
the light.'

The two men rolled the barrel from the corner, and stood it on end
before the fire.

'It's heavy enough to be oysters,' remarked Michael judiciously.

'Shall we open it at once?' enquired the artist, who had grown decidedly
cheerful under the combined effects of company and gin; and without
waiting for a reply, he began to strip as if for a prize-fight, tossed
his clerical collar in the wastepaper basket, hung his clerical coat
upon a nail, and with a chisel in one hand and a hammer in the other,
struck the first blow of the evening.

'That's the style, William Dent' cried Michael. 'There's fire for--your
money! It may be a romantic visit from one of the young ladies--a sort
of Cleopatra business. Have a care and don't stave in Cleopatra's head.'

But the sight of Pitman's alacrity was infectious. The lawyer could
sit still no longer. Tossing his cigar into the fire, he snatched the
instrument from the unwilling hands of the artist, and fell to himself.
Soon the sweat stood in beads upon his large, fair brow; his stylish
trousers were defaced with iron rust, and the state of his chisel
testified to misdirected energies.

A cask is not an easy thing to open, even when you set about it in the
right way; when you set about it wrongly, the whole structure must be
resolved into its elements. Such was the course pursued alike by the
artist and the lawyer. Presently the last hoop had been removed--a
couple of smart blows tumbled the staves upon the ground--and what
had once been a barrel was no more than a confused heap of broken and
distorted boards.

In the midst of these, a certain dismal something, swathed in blankets,
remained for an instant upright, and then toppled to one side and
heavily collapsed before the fire. Even as the thing subsided, an
eye-glass tingled to the floor and rolled toward the screaming Pitman.

'Hold your tongue!' said Michael. He dashed to the house door and locked
it; then, with a pale face and bitten lip, he drew near, pulled