old negro man who fought at Bunker Hill, a mere
infant, of course, at that period. Really, now, it is quite curious to
observe how that venerable female slave--formerly an African
princess--is repeatedly dying in her hundred and eleventh year, and
coming to life again punctually every six months in the small-type
paragraphs. Are you aware, sir, that within the last twelve years no
fewer than two hundred and eighty-seven of General Washington's colored
coachmen have died?"

For the soul of me I could not tell whether this quaint little gentleman
was chaffing me or not. I laid down my knife and fork, and stared
at him.

"Then there are the mathematicians!" he cried vivaciously, without
waiting for a reply. "I take great interest in them. Hear this!" and Mr.
Jaffrey drew a newspaper from a pocket in the tail of his coat, and read
as follows:--"_It has been estimated that if all the candles
manufactured by this eminent firm_ (_Stearine & Co._)_ were placed end
to end, they would reach 2 and 7-8 times around the globe_. Of course,"
continued Mr. Jaffrey, folding up the journal reflectively, "abstruse
calculations of this kind are not, perhaps, of vital importance, but
they indicate the intellectual activity of the age. Seriously, now," he
said, halting in front of the table, "what with books and papers and
drives about the country, I do not find the days too long, though I
seldom see any one, except when I go over to K---- for my mail.
Existence may be very full to a man who stands a little aside from the
tumult and watches it with philosophic eye. Possibly he may see more of
the battle than those who are in the midst of the action. Once I was
struggling with the crowd, as eager and undaunted as the best; perhaps I
should have been struggling still. Indeed, I know my life would have
been very different now if I had married Mehetabel--if I had married
Mehetabel."

His vivacity was gone, a sudden cloud had come over his bright face, his
figure seemed to have collapsed, the light seemed to have faded out of
his hair. With a shuffling step, the very antithesis of his brisk,
elastic tread, he turned to the door and passed into the road.

"Well," I said to myself, "if Greenton had forty thousand inhabitants,
it couldn't turn out a more astonishing old party than that!"

II

THE CASE OF SILAS JAFFREY

A man with a passion for _bric-a-brac_ is always stumbling over antique
bronzes, intaglios, mosaics, and daggers of the