"Ah--grieve, rather, that the jury did. He was hanged. His star crosses

yours in the fourth division, fifth sphere. Consequently you will be

hanged also."

"In view of this cheerful--"

I must have silence. Yours was not, in the beginning, a criminal

nature, but circumstances changed it. At the age of nine you stole

sugar. At the age of fifteen you stole money. At twenty you stole

horses. At twenty-five you committed arson. At thirty, hardened in

crime, you became an editor. You are now a public lecturer. Worse

things are in store for you. You will be sent to Congress. Next, to the

penitentiary. Finally, happiness will come again--all will be well--you

will be hanged."

I was now in tears. It seemed hard enough to go to Congress; but to be

hanged--this was too sad, too dreadful. The woman seemed surprised at my

grief. I told her the thoughts that were in my mind. Then she comforted

me.

"Why, man," she said, "hold up your head--you have nothing to grieve

about. Listen.

--[In this paragraph the fortune-teller details the exact history of the

Pike-Brown assassination case in New Hampshire, from the succoring and

saving of the stranger Pike by the Browns, to the subsequent hanging and

227

Sketches New and Old