t of yourself--the real Cardiff
Giant is in Albany!--[A fact. The original fraud was ingeniously and
fraudfully duplicated, and exhibited in New York as the "only genuine"
Cardiff Giant (to the unspeakable disgust of the owners of the real
colossus) at the very same time that the latter was drawing crowds at a
museum is Albany,]--Confound it, don't you know your own remains?"

I never saw such an eloquent look of shame, of pitiable humiliation,
overspread a countenance before.

The Petrified Man rose slowly to his feet, and said:

"Honestly, is that true?"

"As true as I am sitting here."

He took the pipe from his mouth and laid it on the mantel, then stood
irresolute a moment (unconsciously, from old habit, thrusting his hands
where his pantaloons pockets should have been, and meditatively dropping
his chin on his breast); and finally said:

"Well-I never felt so absurd before. The Petrified Man has sold
everybody else, and now the mean fraud has ended by selling its own
ghost! My son, if there is any charity left in your heart for a poor
friendless phantom like me, don't let this get out. Think how you would
feel if you had made such an ass of yourself."

I heard his stately tramp die away, step by step down the stairs and out
into the deserted street, and felt sorry that he was gone, poor fellow
--and sorrier still that he had carried off my red blanket and my
bath-tub.

THE CAPITOLINE VENUS

CHAPTER I

[Scene-An Artist's Studio in Rome.]

"Oh, George, I do love you!"

"Bless your dear heart, Mary, I know that--why is your father so
obdurate?"

"George, he means well, but art is folly to him--he only understands
groceries. He thinks you would starve me."

"Confound his wisdom--it savors of inspiration. Why am I not a
money-making bowelless grocer, instead of a divinely gifted sculptor
with nothing to eat?"

"Do not despond, Georgy, dear--all his prejudices will fade away as soon
as you shall have acquired fifty thousand dol--"

"Fifty thousand demons! Child, I am in arrears for my board!"

CHAPTER II

[Scene-A Dwelling in Rome.]

"My dear sir, it is useless to talk. I haven't anything against you, but
I can't let my daughter marry a hash of love, art, and starvation--I
believe you have nothing else to offer."

"Sir, I am poor, I grant you. But is fame nothing? The Hon. Bellamy
Foodle of Arkansas says that my new statue of America, is a clever piece
of sculpture, an