at had suffered so serious a comminuted fracture
as to be past all surgery--this was all except some little plaster
images of saints, strangers to the Cash Customer, and a black
rosary, which article would seem to show that efforts had been
put forth to Christianize this nut-brown gipsy maid.

A clinking of glasses was heard in the adjoining apartment, then
the door was opened with an independent flirt, and the gay
Bohemian appeared on the scene.

If it were desired to fancy visions of enchanting loveliness it
would be necessary to insert therein other ingredients than the
gipsy girl of the Third Avenue; alone she would be insufficient;
too much would be left to the imagination; and in any event the
illusion would be too great to last long.

She is of medium height, her eyes are brown and bright, and her
hands are very large and red. She has no hair, but wears a
scratch red wig, which gives her head a utilitarian character.
Her face is deeply pitted with the small-pox, more than
pitted--gullied, scarred, and seamed, as though some jealous rival
had been trying to plough her complexion under; little short
light hairs are thinly scattered on her cheek bones and upper
lip, and in the shadows of the little ridges that disease had
left, irresistibly compelling the mind to make an absurd
comparison of her face with a sterile field, and imagine that at
some past day it had been spaded up to plant a beard, which had
only grown in scanty patches, here and there. Her nails were
horny and ill-shaped, and underneath them and at their roots were
large deposits of dirt and other fertilizing compounds, under the
stimulating influence of which they had grown lank and long. Her
attire was a sort of cross between the picturesque wildness of
the gipsy, and the more civilized and unbecoming dress of Third
Avenue Christians.

She was apparelled, principally, in a red flannel jacket, and a
check handkerchief, which was passed under her chin and tied on
the top of her wig, where the knot looked like a blue butterfly.
There was a gown, but a series of subsoiling experiments would
have been necessary to determine the material and texture; the
surface was palpably dirt. Accompanying her there was a strong
smell of gin, and from the odor of the liquor the visitor judged
that it was a very poor article.

This gay old gipsy drew a chair to the table, and sat down, not
in a graceful and composed manner, but more as if she had been
dumped fr