e into contact with something. Bonaparte drew
it forth--a small, square parcel, sewed up in sail-cloth. He gazed at
it, squeezed it; it cracked, as though full of bank-notes. He put it
quickly into his own waistcoat pocket, and peeped over the half-door to
see if there was any one coming. There was nothing to be seen but the
last rays of yellow sunset light, painting the karoo bushes in the
plain, and shining on the ash-heap, where the fowls were pecking. He
turned and sat down on the nearest chair, and, taking out his pen-knife,
ripped the parcel open. The first thing that fell was a shower of yellow
faded papers. Bonaparte opened them carefully one by one, and smoothed
them out on his knee. There was something very valuable to be hidden so
carefully, though the German characters he could not decipher. When he
came to the last one, he felt there was something hard in it.

"You've got it, Bon, my boy! you've got it!" he cried, slapping his leg
hard. Edging nearer to the door, for the light was fading, he opened the
paper carefully. There was nothing inside but a plain gold wedding-ring.

"Better than nothing!" said Bonaparte, trying to put it on his little
finger, which, however, proved too fat.

He took it off and set it down on the table before him, and looked at it
with his crosswise eyes.

"When that auspicious hour, Sannie," he said, "shall have arrived, when,
panting, I shall lead thee, lighted by Hymen's torch, to the connubial
altar, then upon thy fair amaranthine finger, my joyous bride, shall
this ring repose.

"Thy fair body, oh, my girl,
Shall Bonaparte possess;
His fingers in thy money-bags,
He therein, too, shall mess."

Having given utterance to this flood of poesy, he sat lost in joyous
reflection.

"He therein, too, shall mess," he repeated meditatively.

At this instant, as Bonaparte swore, and swore truly to the end of his
life, a slow and distinct rap was given on the crown of his bald head.

Bonaparte started and looked up. No riem or strap, hung down from
the rafters above, and not a human creature was near the door. It
was growing dark; he did not like it. He began to fold up the papers
expeditiously. He stretched out his hand for the ring. The ring was
gone! Gone, although no human creature had entered the room; gone,
although no form had crossed the doorway. Gone!

He would not sleep there, that was certain.

He stuffed the papers into his pocket. As he did s