ything of human nature, the man who has once got
away from here, will stay away. Only single ghosts have attachments for
the houses in which they once lived. So, never mind the boots and razor,
darling; which, after all, if seen by peddlers, or men who come to fix
the gas, might keep us safe from robbers."

"As safe as any man himself, young woman, with pistols under his head
that he would never dare to fire if robbers were no more than cats
rampaging," added Mrs. SKAMMERHORN, enthusiastically. "With nothing but
an old black hat of SKAMMERHORN'S, and walking-cane, kept hanging in the
hall, I haven't lost a spoon by tramps or census takers for six mortal
years. So, make yourselves at home, I beg you both, while I go down and
cook the liver for our dinner. You'll find it tender as a chicken, after
what you've broke your teeth upon in boarding-schools; though
SKAMMERHORN declared it made him bilious in the second year, forgetting
what he'd drank with sugar to his taste, beforehand."

Thus was sweet FLORA POTTS introduced to her new home; where, but for
looking down from her windows at the fashions, making-up hundreds of
bows of ribbons for her neck, and making-over all her dresses, her
woman's mind must have been a blank. What time Miss CAROWTHERS told her
all day how she looked in this or that style of wearing her hair, and
read her to sleep each night with extracts from the pages of cheery
HANNAH MORE. As for the object nearest her young heart, to say that she
was wholly unruffled by it would be inaccurate; but by address she kept
it hidden from all eyes save her own.

[Footnote 1: Ordinary readers, while admiring the heavy humor of this
unexpected open-air episode, may wonder what on earth it has to do with
the the Story; but the cultivated few, understanding the ingenious
mechanics of novel-writing, will appreciate it as a most skilful and
happy device to cover the interval between the hiring of Mrs.
SKAMMERHORN's room, and the occupation thereof by FLORA and her late
teacher--another instance of what our profoundly critical American
journals call "artistic--elaboration." (See corresponding Chapter of
the original English Story.)]

CHAPTER XXIII.

GOING HOME IN THE MORNING.

After having thrown all his Ritualistic friends at home into a most
unholy and exasperated condition of mind, by a steady series of vague
remarks as to the extreme likelihood of their united implication in the
possible deed of darkness by