solacing pieties. The ex-emperor restored the lost trespass law, and
explained that he had stolen it not to injure any one, but to further his
political projects. Therefore the nation gave the late chief magistrate
his office again, and also his alienated Property.

Upon reflection, the ex-emperor and the social democrat chose perpetual
banishment from religious services in preference to perpetual labor as
galley slaves "with perpetual religious services," as they phrased it;
wherefore the people believed that the poor fellows' troubles had
unseated their reason, and so they judged it best to confine them for the
present. Which they did.

Such is the history of Pitcairn's "doubtful acquisition."






THE CANVASSER'S TALE

Poor, sad-eyed stranger! There was that about his humble mien, his tired
look, his decayed-gentility clothes, that almost reached the mustard,
seed of charity that still remained, remote and lonely, in the empty
vastness of my heart, notwithstanding I observed a portfolio under his
arm, and said to myself, Behold, Providence hath delivered his servant
into the hands of another canvasser.

Well, these people always get one interested. Before I well knew how it
came about, this one was telling me his history, and I was all attention