already had too much is sure to want more,
and I followed the man in the grey
coat. How many chopines of brandy I had
at the Grüne Gans I know not; but I
found myself in bed next morning with an
intolerable thirst and a racking headache.
My first action was to spring out of bed, and
search in the pocket of my coat for my pocket-
book. It was gone. The waiters and the
landlord were summoned; but no one knew
anything about it. I had been brought
home in a carriage, very inebriated, by
a stout man in a grey great-coat, who
said he was my friend, helped me upstairs,
and assisted me to undress. The investigation
ended with a conviction that the man in
the grey coat was the thief. He had
manifestly been tempted to the robbery by no
pecuniary motive; for the whole of my
remaining stock of bank-notes, which I always
kept in the pocket-book. I found in my waistcoat
pocket neatly rolled up.

That evening I walked down to the beer-
house where I usually met my friend—not
with the remotest idea of seeing him, but
with the hope of eliciting some information
as to who and what he was.

To my surprise he was sitting at his accustomed
table, smoking and drinking as usual;
and, to my stern salutation, replied with a
good humoured hope that my head was not
any the worse for the branntwein overnight.

"I want a word with you," said I.

"With pleasure," he returned. Whereupon
he put on his broad-brimmed hat and
followed me into the garden behind the house,
with an alacrity that was quite surprising.

"I was drunk last night," I commenced.

"Zo," he replied, with an unmoved countenance.

"And while drunk," I continued, "I was
robbed of my pocket-book."

"Zo," he repeated, with equal composure.

"And I venture to assert that you are the
person who stole it."

"Zo. You are quite right, my son," he
returned, with the most astonishing coolness.
"I did take your pocket-book; I have it here.
See."

He tapped the breast of his grey great-
coat; and, I could clearly distinguish, through
the cloth, the square form of my pocket-book
with its great clasp in the middle. I sprang
at him immediately, with the intention of
wrenching it from him; but he eluded my
grasp nimbly, and, stepping aside, drew forth
a small silver whistle, on which he blew a
shrill note. In an instant a cloak or sheet
was thrown over my head. I felt my hands
muffled with soft but strong ligatures; and,
before I had time to make one effort in self-
defence, I was lifted off my feet and swiftly
conveyed away, in total darkness. Presently
we stopped, and I was lifted still higher; was
placed on a seat; a door was slammed to; and
ihe rumbling motion of wheels convinced me
that I was in a carriage.

My journey must have lasted some hours.
We stopped from time to time: to change
horses, I suppose. At the commencement of
the journey I made frantic efforts to disengage
myself, and to cry out. But I was so well
gagged, and bound, and muffled, that in sheer
weariness and despair, I desisted. We halted
at last for good. I was lifted out, and again
carried swiftly along for upwards of ten
minutes. Then, from a difficulty of respiration,
I concluded that I had entered a house,
and was perhaps being borne along some
underground passage. We ascended and
descended staircases. I heard doors locked and
unlocked. Finally, I was thrown violently
down on a hard surface. The gag was
removed from my mouth, and the mufflers from
my hands; I heard a heavy door clang to, and
I was at liberty to speak and to move.

My first care was to disengage myself from
the mantle, whose folds still clung around
me. I was in total darkness—darkness so
black, that at first I concluded some infernal
device had been made use of to blind me. But
after straining my eyes in every direction, I was
able to discern high above me a small circular
orifice, through which permeated a minute
thread of light. Then I became sensible that
I was not blind, but in some subterranean
dungeon. The surface on which I was lying
was hard and cold—a stone pavement. I
crawled about, feeling with my hands,
endeavouring to define the limits of my prison.
Nothing was palpable to the touch, but the
bare smooth pavement, and the bare smooth
walls. I tried for hours to find the door,
but could not. I shouted for help; but no
man came near me.

I must have lain in this den two days and
two nights—at least the pangs of hunger and
thirst made me suppose that length of time
to have elapsed. Then the terrible thought
possessed me that I was imprisoned there to
be starved to death. In the middle of the
third day, as it seemed to me, however, I
heard a rattling of keys; one grated in the
lock; a door opened, a flood of light broke
in upon me; and a well-remembered voice
cried "Come out!" as one might do to a
beast in a cage.

The light was so dazzling that I could not
at first distinguish anything. But I crawled
to the door; and then standing up, found I
was in a small courtyard, and that opposite
to me was my enemy, the man of the grey
coat.

In a grey coat no longer, however. He
was dressed in a scarlet jacket, richly laced
with gold; which fitted him so tightly with
the short tails sticking out behind, that, under
any other circumstances, he would have
seemed to me inconceivably ridiculous. He
took no more notice of me than if he had never
seen me before in his life; but, merely
motioning to two servants in scarlet liveries to
take hold of me under the arms, waddled on
before.