spectre
with the skeleton, and then dropping the latter to the ground in
nerveless despair. "To a single man, his umbrella is wife, mother,
sister, venerable maiden aunt from the country--all in one. In losing
mine, I've lost my whole family, and want to hear no more about
relatives. Good night, sir."

"Here! hold on! Can't you leave the lantern for a moment?" cried the
ghost. But the heart-stricken Ritualist had swarmed up the ladder and
was gone.

Then, going up too, the spectre appeared also unto two other men, who
crawled from behind pauper headstones at his summons; the face of the
one being that of J. MCLAUGHLIN, that of the other Mr. TRACY CLEWS. And
the spectre walked between these two, carrying Mr. BUMSTEAD'S skeleton
in its hand.[1]

[Footnote 1: The _cut_ accompanying the above chapter is from the
illustrated title-page of the English monthly numbers of "The Mystery of
Edwin Drood;"--in which it is the last of a series of border-vignettes;
--and plainly shows that it was the author's intention to bring back
his hero a living man before the conclusion of the story.]

* * * * *

[Illustration]

PUNCHINELLO CORRESPONDENCE

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

_Bibo_.--Is there a champagne wine having the flavor of gun-flints?

_Answer_.--The wine made at Pierry, in the Champagne country, is said by
connoisseurs to be so flavored. There is much alarm now among the
wine-growers, however, lest the next vintage may have a flavor of
percussion-caps instead, owing to the war and the modern weapons.

_Plantagenet de Vere_.--Would you believe a person named JONES on his
oath?

_Answer_.--We would not.

_Smike_. We read of houses being "gutted" by the Prussian soldiers; have
houses entrails, then?

_Answer_.--All occupied houses have livers, and most houses have lights.

_M. T. Head_.--We cannot pay strangers in advance for contributions that
have not been sent in by them.

_Icarus_.--What do the balloon scouts of Paris use for ballast?

_Answer_.--Bundles of newspapers, chiefly. Immense bales of the unsold
copies of the New York _Free Press_ are now exported for the purpose.
They are preferred to any other papers because, when placed anywhere in
the balloon, they Lie so, and, having already fallen from grace, falling
from a balloon is nothing to them.

_Taxidermist_.--What is the best material for stuffing ballot-boxes
with?

_Answer_.--Greenbacks.

_Leatherhead_.--Is i