he wrong? What if I be not the person who is
accused of this crime? What if the real man be now at liberty? What if
the accuser himself will declare, when he sees me, that he never met me
before, nor so much as heard of me?"

"Well, all that may happen; I won't say it is impossible, but it cannot
occur here, for the Herr von Rigges has already set off for Innspruck,
and you are to follow him to-morrow."

CHAPTER XLII. A GLIMPSE OF AM OLD FRIEND

If there be anything in our English habits upon which no difference of
opinion can exist, it is our proneness to extend to a foreigner a degree
of sympathy and an amount of interest that'we obstinately deny to our
own people. The English artist struggling all but hopelessly against the
town's indifference has but to displace the consonants or multiply the
vowels of his name to be a fashion with it and a success. Strange and
incomprehensible tendency in a nation so overwhelmingly impressed with
a sense of its own vast superiority! But so it is. Mr. Brady may sing
to empty benches, while il Signor Bradini would "bring down the house."
What set me thinking over this was, that though Silvio Pellico was a
stock theme for English pity and compassion, I very much doubted if a
single tear would fall for the misfortunes of Potts. And yet there was
a marvellous similarity in our suffering. In each case was the Austrian
the jailer; in each case was the victim a creature of tender mould and
gentle nature.

I travelled in a sort of covered cart, with a mounted gendarme at either
side of me. Indeed, the one faintly alleviating circumstance of my
captivity was the sight of those two heavily equipped giants, armed to
the teeth, who were supposed to be essential to my safe conduct. It was
such an acknowledgment of what they had to apprehend from my well-known
prowess and daring, so palpable a confession that every precaution was
necessary against the bold intrepidity of a man of my stamp! At times,
I almost wished they had put chains upon me. I thought how well it
would read in my Memoirs; how I was heavily "manacled,"--a great word
that,--"orders being given to the escort to shoot me if I showed the
slightest intention to escape." It was an intense pleasure to me to
imagine myself a sort of Nana Sahib, and whenever we halted at some
wayside public, and the idle loungers would draw aside the canvas
covering and stare in at me, I did my utmost to call up an expression of
ogre-like feroc