f ours."

"Yes; but it may be, though. It's all very well to say 'go to sleep.'
That happens to be a thing I can't do. There's something amiss."

"Well, what's that to you?"

"Perhaps nothing; but, perhaps, everything."

Mr. Chillingworth sprang from his bed, and began dressing, a process
which he executed with considerable rapidity, and in which he was much
accelerated by two or three supplementary shouts from the people below.

Then, in a temporary lull, a loud voice shouted,--

"Down with the vampyre--down with the vampyre!"

The truth in an instant burst over the mind of Mr. Chillingworth; and,
turning to his wife, he exclaimed,--

"I understand it now. You've been gossipping about Sir Francis Varney,
and have caused all this tumult."

"I gossip! Well, I never! Lay it on me; it's sure to be my fault. I
might have known that beforehand. I always am."

"But you must have spoken of it."

"Who have I got to speak to about it?"

"Did you, or did you not?"

"Who should I tell?"

Mr. Chillingworth was dressed, and he hastened down and entered the
street with great desperation. He had a hope that he might be enabled to
disperse the crowd, and yet be in time to keep his appointment at the
duel.

His appearance was hailed with another shout, for it was considered, of
course, that he had come to join in the attack upon Sir Francis Varney.
He found assembled a much more considerable mob than he had imagined,
and to his alarm he found many armed with all sorts of weapons of
offence.

"Hurrah!" cried a great lumpy-looking fellow, who seemed half mad with
the prospect of a disturbance. "Hurrah! here's the doctor, he'll tell us
all about it as we go along. Come on."

"For Heaven's sake," said Mr. Chillingworth, "stop; What are you about
to do all of you?"

"Burn the vampyre--burn the vampyre!"

"Hold--hold! this is folly. Let me implore you all to return to your
homes, or you will get into serious trouble on this subject."

This was a piece of advice not at all likely to be adopted; and when the
mob found that Mr. Chillingworth was not disposed to encourage and
countenance it in its violence, it gave another loud shout of defiance,
and moved off through the long straggling streets of the town in a
direction towards Sir Francis Varney's house.

It is true that what were called the authorities of the town had become
alarmed, and were stirring, but they found themselves in such a
frightful minority, that it