keys are in the furniture and in the cupboards; not
a drawer is locked. On the table some packages
of seeds and a book, "The Good Gardener." On
the mantel a prayer-book, whose pages are yellow,
and a little note-book, in which have been copied
various receipts for preparing encaustic, Bordelaise
stew, and mixtures of nicotine and sulphate of iron.
Not a letter anywhere; not even an account-book.
Nowhere the slightest trace of any correspondence,
either on business, politics, family matters, or
love. In the commode, beside worn-out shoes and
old hose-nozzles, piles of pamphlets, numerous
numbers of the "Libre Parole." Under the bed,
mouse-traps and rat-traps. I have felt of every-
thing, turned everything upside down, emptied
everything,——coats, mattress, linen, and drawers.
There is nothing else. In the cupboard nothing
has been changed. It is just as I left it a week
ago, when I put it in order in Joseph’s presence.
Is it possible that Joseph has nothing? Is it possible that he is so lacking in those thousand little intimate and familiar things whereby a man reveals his tastes, his passions, his thoughts, a little of that which dominates his life? Ah! yes, here! From the back of the table-drawer I take a cigar-box, wrapped in paper and strongly tied with string running four times round. With great difficulty I untie the knots, I open the box, and on a bed of wadding I see five consecrated medals, a little
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A CHAMBERMAID’S DIARY.
323