eived nothing
for it. "Go to ----!" exclaimed we, losing all patience at the ignorance
thus plainly imputed to us, "do you think we were such a fool as to buy
_such a forgery_?" Then comes a very _douce_, quiet-mannered dealer,
wishing, if our friend will excuse him, to have a private interview with
us just for a moment, as he has something confidential to communicate.
"Signor mio," says he, "when we are in privacy," folding his hands over
his breast and looking very contrite, "I am bound to confess to you that
the man whom I have hitherto called 'cousin,' is not such, nor indeed
any relation or connexion of mine! I know you have been cheated _often_,
_sadly_, and _by him_; and, much as it has gone against my heart
whenever I have heard him and his crew plot against your ingenuousness,
I have long intended to be frank with you, as you have always treated me
with frankness. Believe me I have ever opposed your 'ingannazione,'
though without success; and, as I have no other shop in which to put my
_real_ antiques excepting this man's, I am glad to pay ten per cent to
interest him in their sale; but that _terra cotta_ cow that he sold you,
'twas a sad piece of business," and he looked at us as a Mackenzie might
have looked upon some artless victim to man's depravity! Whereupon a new
light seemed all at once to break in upon us, and we resolved to get at
the truth, if we could, by a _ruse_ which should throw him off his
guard; so, in place of appearing put out by the discovery, we merely
said--"Well, if all forgeries were but nearly as well executed as
_that_, who would care to buy antiques at all; and besides, as it _is_ a
forgery, we may have a good chance of _getting some more of the casts to
take home with us_, which we could not have done had the cow been
_ancient_. How beautifully she stood in her horns and hoofs! and how
well must _he_ have studied the antique, who could have conceived and
executed such a cow!" As we had imagined, there was no resisting such an
appeal, and Roderick Dhu stood confessed! He now owns himself an
extensive proprietor in these cows, and says they are by no means his
best productions--offering us the whole dairy at a very moderate price!

Comes Coco, a little later, with a lad who is to be forthwith forwarded
to buy an engraved stone at _Tiano_, where he is to sleep, in order to
meet our carriage to-morrow morning at Calvi, with the jacinth on his
finger! Lastly comes old Bonelli to kiss both