range. Very strange . . . .
I must chance to meet him to-day."

Laura dressed and went out, thinking she was perhaps too early for Mr.
Buckstone to come from the house, but as he lodged near the bookstore she
would drop in there and keep a look out for him.

While Laura is on her errand to find Mr. Buckstone, it may not be out of
the way to remark that she knew quite as much of Washington life as
Senator Dilworthy gave her credit for, and more than she thought proper
to tell him. She was acquainted by this time with a good many of the
young fellows of Newspaper Row; and exchanged gossip with them to their
mutual advantage.

They were always talking in the Row, everlastingly gossiping, bantering
and sarcastically praising things, and going on in a style which was a
curious commingling of earnest and persiflage. Col. Sellers liked this
talk amazingly, though he was sometimes a little at sea in it--and
perhaps that didn't lessen the relish of the conversation to the
correspondents.

It seems that they had got hold of the dry-goods box packing story about
Balloon, one day, and were talking it over when the Colonel came in.
The Colonel wanted to know all about it, and Hicks told him. And then
Hicks went on, with a serious air,

"Colonel, if you register a letter, it means that it is of value, doesn't
it? And if you pay fifteen cents for registering it, the government will
have to take extra care of it and even pay you back its full value if it
is lost. Isn't that so?"

"Yes. I suppose it's so.".

"Well Senator Balloon put fifteen cents worth of stamps on each of those
seven huge boxes of old clothes, and shipped that ton of second-hand
rubbish, old boots and pantaloons and what not through the mails as
registered matter! It was an ingenious thing and it had a genuine touch
of humor about it, too. I think there is more real: talent among our
public men of to-day than there was among those of old times--a far more
fertile fancy, a much happier ingenuity. Now, Colonel, can you picture
Jefferson, or Washington or John Adams franking their wardrobes through
the mails and adding the facetious idea of making the government
responsible for the cargo for the sum of one dollar and five cents?
Statesmen were dull creatures in those days. I have a much greater
admiration for Senator Balloon."

"Yes, Balloon is a man of parts, there is no denying it"

"I think so. He is spoken of for the post of Minister to Chin