s what I like to see. I hold industrious
citizens in the highest esteem."

Mr. Boltay was not the sort of man to accept indiscriminate laudation
from any one, so he somewhat curtly interrupted this eulogistic flux of
words.

"To whom have I the pleasure of speaking, pray? and what are your
honour's commands?"

"I am Abellino Karpathy," replied the stranger.

It was only the armoury behind him that prevented Mr. Boltay from
falling flat. On such a surprise as this he had not counted.

The great gentleman did not condescend to observe the expression of the
artisan's face, opining, as he no doubt did, that an artisan's face has
no business to have any expression whatever; but he continued as
follows:--

"I have come to you to bespeak an order for a whole _etablissement_, and
I have come personally because I hear that you draw very fine, artistic
specimens of furniture."

"Sir, it is not I who draw, but my head apprentice, who lives at Paris."

"That doesn't matter. I have come myself, I say, that I may choose from
these patterns, for I should like something particularly neat, and at
the same time a simple middle-class production, quite in the
middle-class style, you understand. And I'll tell you why. I am about to
marry, and my future wife is a young girl, a citizen's daughter. Does it
surprise you that I am going to make a middle-class girl my actual,
lawful wife? Why do I do this? you may ask. Well, I have my own special
reasons for it. I am a bit of an oddity, you must know. My father before
me was an oddity, and so is every member of my family. Now, I had
resolved to marry, and my sweetheart was a small tradesman's daughter,
who used to sing beautifully in church."

Aha! the old story!

"And marry her I would have done," continued the fluent dandy, "but the
poor thing died. I then determined that I would never marry until I had
found another middle-class girl who should be just as beautiful, just as
virtuous, as she was, and who could sing the 'Stabat Mater' just as
nicely. And now I have been knocking about in the world these nine years
without being able to find what I seek; for either she whom I found sang
well and was not beautiful, or she was beautiful but not virtuous, or
she was virtuous but could not sing, and therefore could not be mine.
And now, sir, in this little town, I have actually found at last the
very thing I seek--a girl who is beautiful, virtuous, and can sing; and
her I am going to tak