we present us. I am your
servant, Eloy Deville."

Having imparted his own name, the flighty Frenchman waited not for the
completion of the ceremony he had proposed, but, taking on trust the
respectability of the strangers, he hastily led the way to his
cottage. Burr noticed that he was attired in a tight-fitting suit of
brown cloth, clean and well pressed but threadbare and redeemed from
shabbiness only by the stitch in time. The feminine apparition
vanished from the threshold as the travellers approached, but the
father, ushering them in, placed chairs beside a small table, and
called out cheerily: "_Lucrece, ma chere enfant une bouteille de
vin_." The girl promptly obeyed by carrying in a salver on which were
a flask and three tiny wine-glasses. She glided to the table upon
which she set her light burden, keeping her head demurely bowed and
her eyes cast down bashfully.

"Messieurs, permit that I you present my daughter, my _aide
chirurgeon_." Thus introduced, Lucrece, raising her head, bestowed a
modest smile of welcome on her father's guests and divided between
them a coy courtesy.

She could not elude the pardonable glances cast upon her by the
strangers--glances which left in their memories the form and face of
a dainty brunette with large and very brilliant black eyes. Her waist
was slender, her hands and feet were nimble and delicate, and her
dress fitted her so neatly that she looked the personation of
trimness.

"This wine is not original of Ohio. No, no. Ze cask was from Bordeaux,
very old, very old--he has fourteen years. Presented to me by my
countryman, Comte Malartie. I speak ze truth. From this very cask I
have ze honor to drink also ze health of ze General St. Clair, and at
one time of Daniel Boone. _Eh bien!_ Long have I suffer in this
wilderness; it is fifteen years that Eloy Deville was ze fool to leave
France, to leave my native Lyons, and seek ze Terre promise--to find
ze tree of natural sugar, ze plants also with wax candles for ze
fruit, ze no work, no tax, no war, no king--ze paradise on ze ground!
_Oui_, sold I not all my property--take ze ship, take ze wagon, ze
flatboat--_en route pour Gallipolis!_ Ah! _mon dieu!_ ze damn fever
kill _ma femme_; you see ze old Frenchman in ze poverty; _voila sa
richesse! une cabane, un verre de vin--et ma bien aimee--ma
pauvre fille--ma Lucrece!_"

To justify his grievance, the excited man sprang up and ran to a
drawer, from which he took an old French