ghly, and we have also searched your servants."

"A thief of the night," cried I with mighty indignation, "may easily
search an honest man's room; and his poor servants, beaten and bruised
by your master's orders, would fall easy victims to the strength and
numbers of your ruffians; but you will find it a difficult matter to
search me."

"Sir," he replied, bowing as polite as Palermo, "I grieve to state
that you are in error. The searching of both your servants and your
rooms was accomplished, not through the employment of force, but by
the power of money. Your servants insisted they had nothing on their
persons but liniment, and they accepted one gold piece each to allow
me to verify their statements. Another gold piece gave me, for a time,
the freedom of your room. If you have not the papers upon you, then
there is no harm in allowing me to run my hand over your clothes,
because the package is a bulky one and I will speedily corroborate
your statement."

"Sir," said I, not to be outdone in courtesy by this gentleman of the
gutter, "I will tell you truthfully that I have nothing on me but my
sword, and to that you are quite welcome if you leave to me the choice
of which end I hold and which I present to you,"--and with that I
sprang with my back to the wall, under the lamp, leaving myself
partially in shadow, but having spread in front of me a semicircle of
light which any assailant attacking must cross, or indeed remain in
its effulgence if he would keep free of the point of my blade.

"It grieves me to find that you are a man of violence," replied the
scoundrel in the mildest of tones, "and you will bear witness
afterward that I did my best to keep you from harm."

"I freely acknowledge it now," said I. "Bring on your men."

To tell the truth, I had no belief at all in the existence of his force,
and thought he was playing a game on me, hoping to take me unawares; for
if the man knew anything at all he must have known what a swordsman I
was, and it was no charge of cowardice against him that he was loath to
come to close quarters with me. I speedily discovered, however, that all
he said was true; for he gave a low whistle, and out of the darkness
instantly sprang seven or eight as malicious-looking villains as a man
would care to see, each one with a sword in his hand.

As many erroneous and exaggerated accounts of this encounter have been
given in the coffee-houses, and even in the public prints, it is well