had continued to hold in my hand during his inspection.
Perhaps he dreaded my changing my mind, and thought it best to make sure
of the prize at once--you know how enthusiastic he is on all subjects
connected with Natural History. At the same time, without being
conscious of it, I must have deposited the parchment in my own pocket.

"You remember that when I went to the table, for the purpose of making a
sketch of the beetle, I found no paper where it was usually kept. I
looked in the drawer, and found none there. I searched my pockets,
hoping to find an old letter, and then my hand fell upon the parchment.
I thus detail the precise mode in which it came into my possession; for
the circumstances impressed me with peculiar force.

"No doubt you will think me fanciful--but I had already established a
kind of _connection_. I had put together two links of a great chain.
There was a boat lying on a seacoast, and not far from the boat was a
parchment--_not a paper_--with a skull depicted on it. You will, of
course, ask 'where is the connection?' I reply that the skull, or
death's-head, is the well-known emblem of the pirate. The flag of the
death's-head is hoisted in all engagements.

"I have said that the scrap was parchment, and not paper. Parchment is
durable--almost imperishable. Matters of little moment are rarely
consigned to parchment; since, for the mere ordinary purposes of drawing
or writing, it is not nearly so well adapted as paper. This reflection
suggested some meaning--some relevancy--in the death's-head. I did not
fail to observe, also, the _form_ of the parchment. Although one of its
corners had been, by some accident, destroyed, it could be seen that the
original form was oblong. It was just such a slip, indeed, as might have
been chosen for a memorandum--for a record of something to be long
remembered and carefully preserved."

"But," I interposed, "you say that the skull was _not_ upon the
parchment when you made the drawing of the beetle. How then do you trace
any connection between the boat and the skull--since this latter,
according to your own admission, must have been designed (God only knows
how or by whom) at some period subsequent to your sketching the
_scarabaeus_?"

"Ah, hereupon turns the whole mystery; although the secret, at this
point, I had comparatively little difficulty in solving. My steps were
sure, and could afford but a single result. I reasoned, for example,
thus: When I drew the