"Me head, yer honor!"
"What ails your head?"
"Vare-tigo!"
"How came that?"
"What did you strike but water?"
"Wood; it nearly was the death of me. For weeks I was wid a cracked head and a cracked leg, yer honor!"
Still there was something evasive about the man, and he had as many moods and lights as a sea Proteus, ugly and common, like that batrachian order, but often enkindled and exceedingly satisfactory as a servant. He often forgot the place where he left off a certain day's work, and it had to be recalled to him. He was irregular, too, in going and coming, and was quite as likely to come when not wanted as not to be on the spot when due and expected. Duff Salter made up his mind that all the Eastern people must have bumped their heads and became subject to vertigo.
One day Duff Salter received this note:
"Mr. Deaf Duff: Excuse the familiarity, but the coincidence amuses me. I want you to make me a visit this evening after dark at my quarters in my brother, Knox Van de Lear's house, on Queen Street nearly opposite your place of lodging. If Mars crosses the orbit of Venus to-night, as I expect—there being signs of it in the milky way,—you will assist me in an observation that will stagger you on account of its results. Do not come out until dark, and ask at my brother's den for