"It is all my doing! " she exclaims,
weeping, " All my doing!"

"Your doing?" repeat Mr. and Mrs.
Crample both at once.

"Yes! It was I who suggested that papa
should write to those wicked men; and now
ruin has come of it!"

The kind old man takes his daughter's
hand, and says all he can think of to soothe
her. He assures her, in his simplicity, that
there is, without any manner of doubt, some
mistake. He will write to Mr. Wrinkle, or,
better perhaps, to Mr. l'Evy—probably a
French gentleman—and explain to him that,
from some oversight on the part of Messrs.
Thompson and Co., he never was favoured with
a shilling of the money; and that, consequently,
they will at once perceive he is not their
debtor. Mrs. Crample proposes that, to make
assurance doubly sure, an additional letter be
forwarded to Messrs. Thompson and Co., to
their old address in Cecil Street, Strand,
London, with a memorandum requesting the
postman to inquire whither they have
removed; and then to be good enough to take
it without delay to their new residence.

Jane, after re-perusing Wrinkle and Clip's
letter, and considering awhile, weeps afresh,
despite every effort to repress her grief. Without
being able to disentangle the affair, she feels
a distinct conviction that her father has been
caught in meshes, spread in the newspapers,
by a gang of swindlers. Her advice is, that
her father lose no time in laying the whole
case, in person, before his patron.

Poor Mr. Crample recoils at the thought.
He will never have sufficient courage. Besides,
the Reverend Dr. Recumber, vicar of
Crookenden, and rector of No Souls, City, lives in
London; and how is the expense of a journey
thither to be borne?

"And then the exposure!" hinted Mrs.
Crample.

"Exposure, anything, is better than ruin!"
urged Jane, turning to her mother; "I feel
convinced that the wretches will put papa in
prison, unless he gets proper advice how to
act. Dr. Recumber will, perhaps, know some
solicitor who will tell him how to defend
himself from these bad people. Besides, being
chaplain to the Duke of Lummersley, he will
have great influence in London."

"But who is to do duty in my absence?" asks
the curate, rubbing his eyes like a man awakening
out of one dream to be drawn into another.

"Doubtless the Doctor will recommend
some friend of his!"

The next morning, the Reverend Carmichael
Crample was seen in a second-class carriage,
duly booked for London; paying the expenses
of his journey out of the quarter's scanty stipend,
which his careful wife had been, for previous
days and weeks, calculating and contriving,
to spread over the largest possible surface of
debt.

With trembling knees and a palsied knock
at the great Belgravian door, Mr. Crample
announced his advent to the portentous pluralist.
The Honourable Mrs. Recumber (daughter of
the Earl of Pompton) passed him on the stairs
on her way to the Opera; and he was ushered
into the drawing-room by a powdered footman.
The splendour to which Mr. Crample was
here suddenly introduced, at first bewildered
him. Scarcely an article upon which his
wondering eyes fell, but would pay the whole
of his Crookenden creditors, and leave a
handsome surplus to liquidate the dreadful
acceptance. The vicar—a large, pompous
man—received his curate with bland surprise.
He inquired after each member of his family,
seriatim, with an appearance of interest in
their welfare, which quite touched the husband
and father. When Mr. Crample explained the
object of his visit, the Doctor first appeared
extremely shocked, and then said he was
"deeply grieved." He assured his curate that
he was in the hands of swindlers: he advised
him by all means to pay the money; and
thus save himself endless vexation and certain
exposure. It was much better to put up
with the first loss. Going to law with such
scoundrels was not only unsatisfactory, but,
in the end, decidedly expensive.

Poor Mr. Crample felt precisely like the
sick pauper, when a fashionable physician
prescribed him chicken broth and carriage exercise.
He stuttered out something about not
having the ability to pay, and expressed—
more audibly—a wish that Dr. Recumber
would recommend him to a respectable
solicitor.

"Well, my dear sir, if you will be rash,
nothing," said the Doctor, " would give me
greater pleasure."

The bell was rung; another floury footman
brought in a silver standish and a mother-'o-
pearl writing-case: the letter was penned;
and the curate, with a profusion of thanks,
backed himself out of the apartment.—The
next morning at the earliest business hour, he
presented it.

Mr. Blindle, of the firm of Blindle and
Blob, received Dr. Recumber's epistle with
reverential awe. (The agency for the Doctor's
property was worth five hundred a year to
the "office.") Mr. Blindle produced a pair of
scissors; and, instead of profanely tearing open
the letter, carefully cut away the coat-of-
arms, not to disfigure it with the slightest
crack. Had he lived in Pekin, and not in
Furnival's Inn, he would have burnt incense
before the revered document.

The nature of Mr. Crample's business,
however, produced a considerable change in Mr
Blindle's mind.

"This," said Mr. Blindle, "is a case rather
for the Police than for Common-Law practice.
You are at the mercy of a gang of bill-
stealers. I presume the transaction began
by your answering an advertisement in the
'Times' newspaper, headed, 'To Clergymen
(and others) in Difficulties?"

Mr. Crample breathed forth "Yes!" with