My father used to carry in his pocket a strange key, whereof the figure was very unusual, as it folded up, and though large he carried it in his pocket habitually: and he used to say in his quietly humorous and reserved manner, 'under that key lies a fortune;' my mother and I and others remember this well.

When I came to be executor, there was nearly nothing to guide me as to the amount of my father's property,--and I certainly did not succeed in realising all that he was supposed to have acquired.

It was wonderful that with his large income he left so little.

So, we all thought that some hoard locked by this key contained the missing treasure; my father's habitual taciturnity, and secretiveness favouring this idea.

But, nowhere could the lock to fit it be found; nowhere either at banks or lawyers or anywhere about our old house in Burlington Street or at Albury, appeared the chest or cupboard containing the fancied accumulations; and to this hour, June 12, 1873, nearly thirty years after my father's sudden death, has the mystery not been cleared up.