s so old, yet so very much lower than
himself, that he at first thought the speaker must be in a sitting
posture there, beneath the lamp. But a second glance showed to his
wondering gaze the veriest dwarf his eyes had ever fallen upon. In
height, the figure was not taller than a child of four years; yet the
head was very large, the face possessed of its full growth of cunning
and experience, the shoulders broad, but painfully humped, and the whole
upper portion of the body immensely too large for the short and slender
limbs, which served for its support. And yet, as if all this wretched
deformity were not enough, one leg was shorter than the other, and the
foot was a club one. To assist him in walking, he carried a pair of
crutches, apparently much too long for him, which raised his spindle
arms in their loose sockets, and rendered the hump more horrible. When
he moved, his crutches spread out on either side of him, as he swung
along between them, taking up a vast deal of room without any apparent
necessity. His coat had apparently been the property of some great man
of the previous century, for it was braided and embroidered, and trimmed
to an extent rarely seen in the present age; and the immense holes in
the elbows, and the tatters in the skirt, laughed heartily at the rusty
trimmings which it bore. It was so long and large too, that it almost
precluded the necessity of any other clothes, for it quite enveloped his
whole person, as he swung along between his crutches, dragged on the
ground behind like the train of a lady's dress. His pantaloons had also
once belonged to some full grown specimen of humanity, but had been torn
off to suit the dimensions of the present owner--and, altogether, the
appearance of this miserable object, with his one blind eye, and the
cunning leer in the other, was calculated to excite both pity and
disgust. The brothers looked upon him for a moment in mute astonishment,
until again startled by that squeaking, supplicating voice--"Un
picayune, Monsieur--one picayune to buy me bread!"

Guly took a dime from his purse, and dropped it into the ragged cap
which the beggar extended, while he held his crutches by pressing his
arms close to his body. As the piece dropped into its ragged receptacle,
he shook it up from the greasy folds, and tipped his left eye down to
look upon it, not unlike a vulture glancing down at its prey. After
eyeing it a moment, he held the cap toward Arthur, as if expectin