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He took it in his hand and weighed it.

"What the deuce can it be, Hildebrand?" exclaimed he; and with that he cut the string, while I pretended to be busy with his clothes. But I saw him open the box, and when he got through a deal of tissue paper, he came to a little golden egg, quite the size of a plover's egg, and exactly like one in shape.

"Well," said he, "if that isn't rum! Who the blazes will be sending me this?"

It certainly was a funny thing, and when he passed the egg on to me, I was just as puzzled as he was. There it stood, a plain bit of gold—as you could tell by its weight—and not a mark or sign to make the giver known or to tell why it had been sent.

"Perhaps there's a letter with it, sir," said I, "or one will follow it."

"Is it gold, do you think?" he asked next.

"It should be, by its weight; but I'll put a drop of acid on it and see, sir."

It was gold right enough. The acid showed us that; yet when we had made the test, we had done nothing to answer the question, Who sent it?

"Who is it, now," he kept saying, "that is sending me golden eggs? It would be a woman most likely. Of course that's it. There'll be some message or letter to follow this. No one would be such a fool as to send the thing anonymously. Didn't I tell you that our luck would change. Bedad! it's changed already. I'll have a bottle of champagne on this, Hildebrand; it should be worth that, any way."