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 transact, and to fail to do it now was to forfeit the life of one exceeding dear. Therefore this thought gave me the courage to say:

"I have sent for you, Mr. Snark, in the hope that you will undertake a delicate matter on my behalf; a most delicate matter, I might say."

"A reg'lar tantaliser, as it were?" says Mr. Snark.

"Yes," says I, "a regular tantaliser, Mr. Snark."

"Well, now you know," says Mr. Snark, "Snark's blue death on tantalisers—a plain job's not a bit o' good to Snark. There's lots o' the perfession can undertake a plain job just as well as Snark, and charges lesser. But in the higher branches, as they says at Bow Street, there's none like good old Snark. Why, that man fair takes a pride in the higher branches. Just look at the case o' William Milligan. Talk about hartistic! Why, Miss, the case of William Milligan was the wonder o' the age."

"And, pray, who was William Milligan?" I asked in my hasty ignorance.

"Never heard o' William Milligan? Stop my vitals, is this England?"

And then he turned to Emblem.

"Now then, Mary Jane, pipe up, just for to tell the lady who was William Milligan!"

The luckless Mrs. Polly shook her head, turned pale, and clutched a chair.

"What, never heard o' William Milligan?" says he. "Come, now, I call that good. Strike me