cuse me," said Marcus Wilkeson, who divined that Tiffles wished his
diamond to be remarked upon, "but that is pretty!"

"Pretty! What?" said Tiffles, looking about the room.

"That diamond."

"Oh! the diamond. Perhaps you would like to look at it?" (hands it round
for inspection). "Cost forty dollars. Rather a hard draw on my
exchequer" (that was Mr. Tiffles's word for a friend's pocket); "but I
considered it a most judicious investment for a young man just going
into business."

The novelty of this idea was not lost on Fayette Overtop. "Pray explain,
Tiffles," said he.

"Cheerfully," said Tiffles, replacing the gem in his shirt front, after
it had been duly handled and admired. "Nobody will acknowledge that he
is taken in by a diamond. He will say, 'Anybody can buy a diamond, by
saving up thirty or forty dollars; and why should I believe a man to be
rich who wears one?' Yet, in his heart of hearts, he does believe it,
unless the possessor of the diamond has the bad taste to dress flashily.
Then he passes for an impostor, and people will doubt, even against
their own senses, the genuineness of the stone. But let him dress
plainly, as I do," continued Mr. Tiffles, stroking down the left leg of
his black trowsers, shiny with wear, "and that little diamond shall
stand, in the eyes of the whole world, as the representative of a fat
bank account, a brown stone house, and a couple of corner lots."

Marcus and Matthew laughed, but Fayette Overtop, who absolutely revelled
in paradoxes, said, "True, Tiffles, true!"

"Don't think," pursued Tiffles, "that I expected to impose on you with
it. You know that I am a poor devil, living on my wits." (Tiffles was
delightfully frank with his intimate acquaintances.) "I hold out this
glittering bait, not for my friends, but for my old foe and natural
enemy, the world. You must know that I am on the eve of a grand
speculation--probably the grandest I have ever undertaken."

"Another plan of advertising with large kites by day, and pictorial
lanterns attached to their tails at night?" asked Marcus Wilkeson.

"Or another Submarine Pneumatic Parcel-Delivering Tube to Brooklyn?"
asked Matthew Maltboy.

"Or an Association for the Cultivation of Mushrooms in Dark Cellars?"
asked Fayette Overtop.

"Capital hits!" replied Wesley Tiffles, who took an unfeigned delight in
a friendly allusion to his failures. "But allow me to inform you
definitely, that those unfortunate speculations are