Why, I had an elegant shroud stolen from there one morning--think a party by the name of Smith took it, that resides in a plebeian graveyard over yonder--I think so because the first time I ever saw him he hadn't anything on but a check shirt, and the last time I saw him, which was at a social gathering in the new cemetery, he was the best-dressed corpse in the company--and it is a significant fact that he left when he saw me; and presently an old woman from here missed her coffin--she generally took it with her when she went anywhere, because she was liable to take cold and bring on the spasmodic rheumatism that originally killed her if she exposed herself to the night air much.

She was named Hotchkiss--Anna Matilda Hotchkiss--you might know her?
She has two upper front teeth, is tall, but a good deal inclined to stoop, one rib on the left side gone, has one shred of rusty hair hanging from the left side of her head, and one little tuft just above and a little forward of her right ear, has her underjaw wired on one side where it had worked loose, small bone of left forearm gone--lost in a fight--has a kind of swagger in her gait and a 'gallus' way of going with her arms akimbo and her nostrils in the air--has been pretty free and easy, and is all damaged and battered up till she looks like a queensware crate in ruins--maybe you have met her ?" "God forbid!" I involuntarily ejaculated, for somehow I was not looking for that form of question, and it caught me a little off my guard.

But I hastened to make amends for my rudeness, and say, "I simply meant I had not had the honor--for I would not deliberately speak discourteously of a friend of yours.

You were saying that you were robbed--and it was a shame, too--but it appears by what is left of the shroud you have on that it was a costly one in its day.

How did--" A most ghastly expression began to develop among the decayed features and shriveled integuments of my guest's face, and I was beginning to grow uneasy and distressed, when he told me he was only working up a deep, sly smile, with a wink in it, to suggest that about the time he acquired his present garment a ghost in a neighboring cemetery missed one.