servant, and the name of Marcel, is not.

As for me, I think a great deal, and say nothing; but if the young
Pontalba, who now studies type-setting with the Prince Imperial, was not
the baby whose clothes I once saw examined at a _café_ there is no truth
in these "Leaves of an Idler."




MR. BUTTERBY RECORDS HIS CASE.[A]


J. Moses Butterby, aged 40 years; a licensed broker; nativity, American;
temperament, sanguine; habit, slightly obese; constitution, robust.
History of the case as related by himself.

* * * * *

I don't see how I ever came to _be_ married. It was certainly the last
thing my friends expected of me, and it was the last thing I ever
expected of myself; but that I am married, Mrs. J. Moses Butterby, and
Master Alphonso Moses Butterby, are both here to testify.

What so aristocratic a family found in me to admire is as much a secret
now as then. I don't think it was intellect; for I am afraid that when
Nature designed me the "shining" element was left out. Somehow, at
school, the composition sent to the village journal was never mine; the
declamation repeated at every fresh arrival of directors was always
another's; and if, by any chance, a visitor asked to hear a recitation,