made a great ado about a dress that contained this letter. I have no
doubt it will tell a tale." Mr. Snivel draws from his breast-pocket
the letter found concealed in the old dress, and passes it to Madame
Montford, who receives it with a nervous hand. Her eyes become fixed
upon it, she glances over its defaced page with an air of
bewilderment, her face crimsons, then suddenly pales, her lips
quiver-her every nerve seems unbending to the shock. "Heavens! has
it come to this?" she mutters, confusedly. Her strength fails her;
the familiar letter falls from her fingers. For a few moments she
seems struggling to suppress her emotions, but her reeling brain
yields, her features become like marble, she shrieks and swoons ere
Mr. Snivel has time to clasp her in his arms.






CHAPTER XX.

LADY SWIGGS ENCOUNTERS DIFFICULTIES ON HER ARRIVAL IN NEW YORK.





A PLEASANT passage of sixty hours, a good shaking up at the hands of
that old tyrant, sea-sickness, and Lady Swiggs finds the steamer on
which she took passage gliding majestically up New York Bay. There
she sits, in all her dignity, an embodiment of our decayed chivalry,