y? I have a flask of brandy
in my pocket, and while we are moistening our clay, you shall listen to
the history of one whose proudest boast is, he never did a good action,
but has perpetrated every enormity in the dark catalogue of crimes.'

Ragged Pete expressed his desire to hear the story; and even Dr.
Sinclair, in his place of concealment, prepared to listen with
attention. Probably the reader has already guessed that the robber was
no other than the terrible _Dead Man_; such was indeed the case; it was
that same villain, who has occupied so prominent a place in the criminal
portions of our narrative. We shall devote a separate chapter to his
story.

CHAPTER XVIII

_The Dead Man's story; being a tale of many Crimes._

'I never knew who my parents were; they may have been saints--they may
have been devils; but in all probability they belonged to the latter
class, for when I was three weeks old, they dropped me upon the highway
one fine morning near the great city of Boston, to which famous city
belongs the honor of my birth! Well, I was picked up by some Samaritans,
who wrapped me up in red flannel, and clapped me in the Alms House.
Behold me, then, a pauper!

'I throve and grew; my constitution was iron--my sinews were steel, and
my heart a lion's. Up to the age of twelve, I was as other children
are--I cried when I was whipped, and submitted when oppressed. At
twelve, I began to reason and think; I said to myself,--Before me lies
the world, created for the use of all its inhabitants. I am an
inhabitant and entitled to my share--but other inhabitants, being rogues
and sharpers, refuse to let me have my share. The world plunders me--in
turn, I will plunder the world!

'At fourteen, I bade adieu to the Alms House, without the knowledge or
consent of the overseer. I exchanged my grey pauper suit for a
broadcloth of a young nabob, which I accidentally found in one of the
chambers of a fashionable hotel, in Court street. Behold me, then, a
gentleman! But I had no money; and so took occasion to borrow a trifling
sum from an old gentleman, one night, upon one of the bridges which lead
from Boston to Charleston. Do you ask how he came to give me credit?
Why, I just tapped him on the head with a paving stone tied up in the
corner of a handkerchief, after which delicate salutation he made not
the slightest objection to my borrowing what he had about him. The next
day it was said that a man's body had been found