THE PRISONER.Friday, 17th.
Ah, this is certainly the strangest event of the whole year! Yesterday morning my father took me to the suburbs of Moncalieri, to look at a villa which he thought of hiring for the coming summer, because we shall not go to Chieri again this year, and it turned out that the person who had the keys was a teacher who acts as secretary to the owner. He showed us the house, and then he took us to his own room, where he gave us something to drink. On his table, among the glasses, there was a wooden inkstand, of a conical form, carved in a singular manner. Perceiving that my father was looking at it, the teacher said:—
“That inkstand is very precious to me: if you only knew, sir, the history of that inkstand!” And he told it.
Years ago he was a teacher at Turin, and
