devoutly and artlessly prayed at her mother’s grave, can never have sunk so low.
The following morning I made it my first business to drive to the newspaper-office, for the purpose of inserting an advertisement, and making publicly known my having found the shawl, and informing the owner, where and in whose hands it was to be met with upon application. Thus, there was no doubt the riddle would be soon solved, for I had determined not to surrender the shawl into any other hands but those of the lady from whose neck I had snatched it, and, indeed, I found the mystery already explained, and myself most bitterly disappointed.
The publisher had scarcely cast his eyes upon my advertisement, when, with much pleasure depicted upon his countenance, he informed me, that the very moment before my arrival, a servant in the household of Count Barczikoff had brought him an advertisement for insertion, in which he had promised the finder of the shawl two hundred rubles as a reward, to which was added, a particular description of it. The shawl proved to be the same, and, therefore, not my Swiss girl, but a Countess Barczikoff was the owner of my honourably acquired property! The residence of the count was also most particularly described, near the Kasan Church in the Newski-Line; and, accordingly, without delay, but with a desponding heart, I proceeded thither.
From the grandeur of the building outside, and its magnificence internally, I immediately perceived, that the lady of the house might well possess a shawl of a thousand ducats value. I announced myself as the finder of the prize which I brought with me, and trembled with sad apprehension at the thought of beholding the image of my Swiss maiden. With the most intense anxiety I looked towards the door through which the owner of my precious booty was to enter, and which, opening at length, did indeed introduce to my impatient gaze the well-known form of—Liesli! She knew me immediately; the crimson blush of surprize and astonish-
