be guessed without the exercise of much skill in
divination, and here I must leave the point, not because I am
disinclined to speak plainly and thus risk the possibility of being
mistaken, but because Dr Bataille informs us that this one confidant is
in his power, and that he could procure for him or her a term of penal
servitude. Lastly, he is not in a position to exhibit his Palladian
diplomas, which were demanded by the dispensing authorities when he
first fell under their suspicion and have not been returned to him.
While we are therefore prevented from checking his affirmations in what
most concerns our inquiry, we see that at all points where it is
possible to control him he has completely broken down; the miraculous
element of his narrative transcends credit, and his statements upon a
multitude of ordinary matters of fact are beneath it. When we connect
these points with the mode of publication he has seen fit to adopt, and
remember the kind of motive which usually attaches to that mode, we have
no other course but to set him entirely outside consideration. His book
is evidentially valuable only to close the question. He may have visited
Charleston; he may have made the personal acquaintance of Albert Pike,
Gallatin Mackey, Phileas Walder, and his daughter Sophia; three of these
persons are dead and cannot testify; the fourth acknowledges that he
attended her medically at Naples; she protests against his betrayal, but
she does not betray in return his Masonic identity, though I need
scarcely add that she does not substantiate his statements. On these
points my readers may be reasonably left to form their own judgments.

Miss Diana Vaughan is a lady who, in spite of much notoriety, is not in
evidence; with one exception no credible person has ever said that he
has seen her; that exception is Signor Margiotta. It would not, however,
be the strongest line of criticism to dispute her existence; we may
accept very gladly all that her Italian friend is good enough to say in
regard to her personal characteristics, but we know that she has tried
to deceive us, with conspicuous ill-success it is true, yet in a gross
and most wicked manner. As to Signor Margiotta himself, with all his
imperfections, he is the strongest witness to the discovery of Leo
Taxil. I have admitted the great apparent force which belongs to his
enormous array of documentary evidence, and I have established the
nature of the complications which make