, hastening his return to the Crescent City,
where he was soon forced to make an assignment of the remaining
property. A score of hungry lawyers hovered around the sinking estate,
greedily jealous lest some one of their number should batten too
gluttonously at this general collation. It was the one topic of
interest in the musty, dusty courthouse until the end appeared with
the following announcement in the local papers:

"_Annonce! Vente importante de Negres!_ Mauville estate in bankruptcy!"

And thereafter were specified the different lots of negroes to be
sold.

Coincident with these disasters came news from the North regarding
his supposedly immense interests in New York State. A constitutional
convention had abolished all feudal tenures and freed the fields
from baronial burdens. At a breath--like a house of cards--the
northern heritage was swept away and about all that remained of
the principality was the worthless ancient deed itself, representing
one of the largest colonial grants.

But even the sale of the negroes and his other merchandise and
property failed to satisfy his clamorous creditors or to pay his
gambling debts. Those obligations at cards it was necessary to meet,
so he moved out of his bachelor apartments, turned over his expensive
furnishings and bric-a-brac to the gamblers and snapped his fingers at
the over-anxious constables and lawyers.

As time went by evidence of his reverses insidiously crept into his
personal appearance. He who had been the leader now clung to the
tail-ends of style, and it was a novel sensation when one day he
noticed a friend scrutinizing his garments much in the same
critical manner that he had himself erstwhile affected. This
glance rested casually on the hat; strayed carelessly to the
waistcoat; wandered absently to the trousers, down one leg and up
the other; superciliously jumped over the waistcoat and paused the
infinitesimal part of a second on the necktie. Mauville learned in
that moment how the eye may wither and humble, without giving any
ostensible reason for offense. The attitude of this mincing fribble,
as he danced twittingly away, was the first intimation Mauville had
received that he would soon be relegated to the ranks of gay
adventurers thronging the city. He who had watched his estates
vanish with an unruffled countenance now became disconcerted over
the width of his trousers and the shape of his hat.

His new home was in the house of an aged qu