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[26] This man, whose case I have read in some French Medical Memoirs, was a desperate fellow: he cared no more for an ounce of opium, than for a stone of beef, or half a bushel of potatoes: all three would not have made him a breakfast. As to children, he denied in the most tranquil manner that he ate them. ”Pon my honour,’ he sometimes said, ‘between ourselves, I never do eat children.’ However, it was generally agreed, that he was paedophagous, or infantivorous. Some said that he first drowned them; whence I sometimes called him the paedobaptist. Certain it is, that wherever he appeared, a sudden scarcity of children prevailed.–Note of the Translator.

At this moment a cry of ‘murder, murder!’ drew the student’s eyes to the street below him; and there, to afflict his heart, stood his graceless Juno, having just upset the servant of a cook’s shop, in the very act of rifling her basket; the sound of the drum was yet ringing through the streets; the crowd collected to hear it had not yet withdrawn from the spot; and in this way was Juno expressing her reverence for the proclamation of the town-council of B—-.

‘Fiend of perdition!’ said Mr. Schnackenberger, flinging his darling pipe at her head, in the anguish of his wrath, and hastening down to seize her. On arriving below, however, there lay his beautiful sea-foam pipe in fragments upon the stones; but Juno had vanished–to reappear no more in B—-.

CHAPTER XXIV.

AND SET YOU DOWN THAT IN ALEPPO ONCE–OTHELLO.

The first thing Mr. Schnackenberger did was to draw his purse-strings, and indemnify the cook-maid. The next thing Mr. Schnackenberger did was to go into the public-room of the Gun, call for a common pipe, and seat himself growling in a corner.–Of all possible privileges conferred by the laws, the very least desirable is that of being created game: Juno was now invested with that ‘painful pre-eminence;’ she was solemnly proclaimed game: and all qualified persons, i. e. every man, woman, and child, were legally authorised to sink–burn–or destroy her. ‘Now then,’ said Mr. Schnackenberger to himself, ‘if such an event should happen–if any kind soul should blow out the frail light of Juno’s life, in what way am I to answer the matter to her purchaser, Mr. Fabian Sebastian?’ Such were the thoughts which fumed away from the anxious mind of Mr. Schnackenberger in surging volumes of smoke.

Together with the usual evening visitors of the public-rooms at the Gun, were present also Mr. Von Pilsen, and his party. Inflamed with wine and insolence, Mr. Von Pilsen began by advancing the following proposition: That in this sublunary world there are marvellous fools. ‘Upon this hint’ he spake: and ‘improving’ his text into a large commentary, he passed in review various sketches from the life of Mr. Schnackenberger in B—-, not forgetting the hunting scene; and everywhere threw in such rich embellishments and artist-like touches, that at last the room rang with laughter.

Mr. Jeremiah alone sat moodily in his corner, and moved no muscle of his face; so that even those, who were previously unacquainted with the circumstances, easily divined at whose expense Mr. Von Pilsen’s witty performance proceeded.

At length Von Pilsen rose and said, ‘Gentlemen, you think, perhaps, that I am this day in the best of all possible humours. Quite the contrary, I assure you: pure fiction–mere counterfeit mirth–put on to disguise my private vexation; for vexed I am, and will be, that I can find nobody on whom to exercise my right arm. Ah! what a heavenly fate were mine, if any man would take it into his head to affront me; or if any other man would take it into his head to think that I had affronted him, and would come hither to demand satisfaction!’ So saying, he planted himself in a chair in the very middle of the saloon; and ever and anon leered at Mr. Schnackenberger in so singular a manner, that no one could fail to see at whom his shafts were pointed.