"One minute gone," said he, solemnly.

"I don't care if there were fifty," said I,
passionately. "I disclaim all pretension of a
perfect stranger to obtrude himself upon me,
and by the mere assumption of a pompous
manner and an imposing air, to inquire into my
private affairs."

"There are two!" said he, with the same solemnity.

"Who is Mr.Jopplyn—what is he to me?"
cried I, in increased excitement, "that he
presents himself in my apartment like a commissary
of police?  Do you imagine, sir, because I am
a young man, that—this—this—impertinence"
—Lord what a gulp it cost me—"is to pass
unpunished? Do you fancy that a red beard and
a heavy walking-cane are to strike terror into
me? You may think, perhaps, that I am
unarmed——"

"Three!" said he, with a bang of his stick
on the floor, that made me actually jump with
the stick.

"Leave the room, sir," said I. "It is my
pleasure to be alone—the apartment is mine—I
am the proprietor here. A very little sense of
delicacy, a very small amount of good breeding,
might show you, that when a gentleman declines
to receive company, when he shows himself
indisposed to the society of strangers——"

"One minute more, now," said he, in a low
growl, while he proceeded to button up his coat
to the neck, and make preparation for some
coming event.

My heart was in my mouth; I gave a glance
at the window; it was the third story, and
a leap out would have been fatal. What
would I not have given for one of those
weapons I had so proudly proclaimed myself
possessed. There was not even a poker in the
room. I made a spring at the bell-rope, and
before he could interpose, gave one pull that,
though it brought down the cord, resounded
through the whole house.

"Time is up, Porringer," said he, slowly, as
he replaced the watch in his pocket, and grasped
his murderous-looking cane.

There was a large table in the room, and I
entrenched myself at once behind this, armed
with a light cane chair, while I screamed murder
in every language I could command. Failing to
reach me across the table, my assailant tried to
dodge me by false starts, now at this side, now
at that. Though a large fleshy man, he was not
inactive, and it required all my quickness to
escape him. These manœuvres being unsuccessful,
he very quickly placed a chair beside the
table and mounted upon it. I now hurled my
chair at him; he warded off the blow and rushed
on; with one spring I bounded under the table,
reappearing at the opposite side just as he had
reached mine. This tactic we now pursued for
several minutes, when my enemy suddenly
changed his attack, and descending from the
table he turned it on edge: the effort required
strength. I seized the moment and reached the
door; I tore it open in some fashion, gained
the stairs—the court—the streets—and ran ever
onward with the wildness of one possessed with
no time for thought, nor any knowledge to
guide; I turned left and right, choosing only
the narrowest lanes that presented themselves,
and at last came to a dead halt at an open
drawbridge, where a crowd stood waiting to pass.

"How is this? What's all the hurry for?
Where are you running this fashion?" cried a
well-known voice. I turned, and saw the skipper
of the packet.

"Are you armed? Can you defend me?"
cried I, in terror;" or shall I leap in and swim
for it?"

"I'll stand by you. Don't be afraid, man,"
said he, drawing my arm within his; "no one
shall harm you. Were they robbers?"

"No, worse—assassins!" said I, gulping, for
I was heartily ashamed of my terror, and
determined to show "cause why" in the plural.

"Come in here, and have a glass of something,"
said he, turning into a little cabaret,
with whose penetralia he seemed not unfamiliar.
"You're all safe here," said he, as he closed
the door of a little room. "Let's hear all about
it, though I half guess the story already."

I had no difficulty in perceiving, from my
companion's manner, that he believed some sudden
shock had shaken my faculties, and that my
intellects were for the time deranged; nor was
it very easy for me to assume sufficient calm to
disabuse him of his error, and assert my own
perfect coherency. "You have been out for a
lark," said he, laughingly. "I see it all. You
have been at one of those tea-gardens and got
into a row with some stout Fleming. All
the young English go through that sort of
thing. Ain't I right?"

"Nevermore mistaken in your life, captain.
My conduct since I lauded would not discredit
a canon of St. Paul's. In fact, all my habits,
my tastes, my instincts, are averse to every sort
of junketing. I am essentially retiring, sensitive,
and, if you will, over fastidious in my
choice of associates. My story is simply this."
My reader will readily excuse my repeating
what is already known to him. It is enough if
I say, that the captain, although anything
rather than mirthful, held his hand several
times over his face, and once laughed out loudly
and boisterously.

"You don't say it was Christy Jopplyn, do
you?" said he, at last. "You don't tell me it
was Jopplyn?"

"The fellow called himself Jopplyn, but I
know nothing of him beyond that."

"Why, he's mad jealous about that wife of
his; that little woman with the corkscrew curls
and the scorbutic face, that came over with us.
Oh! you did not see her aboard, you went below
at once, I remember; but there was she in her
black ugly, and her old crape shawl——"

"In mourning?"

"Yes. Always in mourning. She never
wears anything else, though Christy goes about
in colours, and not particular as to the tint,
either."

There came a cold perspiration over me as I