ription was obscured. It was in the ordinary black
letter.

"Can ye mak ought o't?" said Edie to the adept.

"S," said the philosopher, like a child getting his lesson in the
primer--"S, T, A, R, C, H,--Starch!--dat is what de woman-washers put into
de neckerchers, and de shirt collar."

"Search!" echoed Ochiltree; "na, na, Mr. Dusterdeevil, ye are mair of a
conjuror than a clerk--it's search, man, search--See, there's the Ye clear
and distinct."

"Aha! I see it now--it is search--number one. Mein himmel! then there must
be a number two, mein goot friend: for search is what you call to seek
and dig, and this is but number one! Mine wort, there is one great big
prize in de wheel for us, goot Maister Ochiltree."

"Aweel, it may be sae; but we canna howk fort enow--we hae nae shules,
for they hae taen them a' awa--and it's like some o' them will be sent
back to fling the earth into the hole, and mak a' things trig again. But
an ye'll sit down wi' me a while in the wood, I'se satisfy your honour
that ye hae just lighted on the only man in the country that could hae
tauld about Malcolm Misticot and his hidden treasure--But first we'll rub
out the letters on this board, for fear it tell tales."

And, by the assistance of his knife, the beggar erased and defaced the
characters so as to make them quite unintelligible, and then daubed the
board with clay so as to obliterate all traces of the erasure.

Dousterswivel stared at him in ambiguous silence. There was an
intelligence and alacrity about all the old man's movements, which
indicated a person that could not be easily overreached, and yet (for
even rogues acknowledge in some degree the spirit of precedence) our
adept felt the disgrace of playing a secondary part, and dividing
winnings with so mean an associate. His appetite for gain, however, was
sufficiently sharp to overpower his offended pride, and though far more
an impostor than a dupe, he was not without a certain degree of personal
faith even in the gross superstitions by means of which he imposed upon
others. Still, being accustomed to act as a leader on such occasions,
he felt humiliated at feeling himself in the situation of a vulture
marshalled to his prey by a carrion-crow.--"Let me, however, hear this
story to an end," thought Dousterswivel, "and it will be hard if I do
not make mine account in it better as Maister Edie Ochiltrees makes
proposes."

The adept, thus transformed into a pupil from a teacher