hen," said the landlord, "move out of the way, and allow the
corpse to pass out. Let me have no indecent conduct; let everything be
as it should be."

The people soon removed from the passage and vicinity of the doorway,
and then the mournful procession--as the newspapers have it--moved
forward. They were heard coming down stairs, and thence along the
passage, until they came to the street, and then the whole number of
attendants was plainly discernible.

How different was the funeral of one who had friends. He was alone; none
followed, save the undertaker and his attendants, all of whom looked
solemn from habit and professional motives. Even the jocose man was as
supernaturally solemn as could be well imagined; indeed, nobody knew he
was the same man.

"Well," said the landlord, as he watched them down the street, as they
slowly paced their way with funereal, not sorrowful, solemnity--"well, I
am very glad that it is all over."

"It has been a sad plague to you," said one.

"It has, indeed; it must be to any one who has had another such a job as
this. I don't say it out of any disrespect to the poor man who is dead
and gone--quite the reverse; but I would not have such another affair on
my hands for pounds."

"I can easily believe you, especially when we come to consider the
disagreeables of a mob."

"You may say that. There's no knowing what they will or won't do,
confound them! If they'd act like men, and pay for what they have, why,
then I shouldn't care much about them; but it don't do to have other
people in the bar."

"I should think not, indeed; that would alter the scale of your profits,
I reckon."

"It would make all the difference to me. Business," added the landlord,
"conducted on that scale, would become a loss; and a man might as well
walk into a well at once."

"So I should say. Have many such occurrences as these been usual in this
part of the country?" inquired the stranger.

"Not usual at all," said the landlord; "but the fact is, the whole
neighbourhood has run distracted about some superhuman being they call a
vampyre."

"Indeed!"--"Yes; and they suspected the unfortunate man who has been
lying up-stairs, a corpse, for some days."

"Oh, the man they have just taken in the coffin to bury?" said the
stranger.

"Yes, sir, the same."

"Well, I thought perhaps somebody of great consequence had suddenly
become defunct."--"Oh, dear no; it would not have caused half the
sensation; peopl