nacks and
things that go to adorn a living-room not plenty and not costly. But
there were natural flowers, and there was an abstract and unclassifiable
something about the place which betrayed the presence in the house of
somebody with a happy taste and an effective touch.

Even the deadly chromos on the walls were somehow without offence;
in fact they seemed to belong there and to add an attraction to the room
--a fascination, anyway; for whoever got his eye on one of them was like
to gaze and suffer till he died--you have seen that kind of pictures.
Some of these terrors were landscapes, some libeled the sea, some were
ostensible portraits, all were crimes. All the portraits were
recognizable as dead Americans of distinction, and yet, through labeling
added, by a daring hand, they were all doing duty here as "Earls of
Rossmore." The newest one had left the works as Andrew Jackson, but was
doing its best now, as "Simon Lathers Lord Rossmore, Present Earl."
On one wall was a cheap old railroad map of Warwickshire. This had been
newly labeled "The Rossmore Estates." On the opposite wall was another
map, and this was the most imposing decoration of the establishment and
the first to catch a stranger's attention, because of its great size.
It had once borne simply the title SIBERIA; but now the word "FUTURE" had
been written in front of that word. There were other additions, in red
ink--many cities, with great populations set down, scattered over the
vast-country at points where neither cities nor populations exist to-day.
One of these cities, with population placed at 1,500,000, bore the name
"Libertyorloffskoizalinski," and there was a still more populous one,
centrally located and marked "Capital," which bore the name
"Freedomolovnaivanovich."

The "mansion"--the Colonel's usual name for the house--was a rickety old
two-story frame of considerable size, which had been painted, some time
or other, but had nearly forgotten it. It was away out in the ragged
edge of Washington and had once been somebody's country place. It had a
neglected yard around it, with a paling fence that needed straightening
up, in places, and a gate that would stay shut. By the door-post were
several modest tin signs. "Col. Mulberry Sellers, Attorney at Law and
Claim Agent," was the principal one. One learned from the others that
the Colonel was a Materializer, a Hypnotizer, a Mind-Cure dabbler; and so
on. For he was a man who could al