But it was all of no avail.  After holding forth for several minutes, now at the top of her voice, now in a beseeching whine—­the lieutenant again got under weigh, and soon reached the parlour door; which after giving a slight tap, he entered fully prepared to take its inmate by storm.  But, lo! he had vanished!  It appeared impossible that any portion of the previous conversation could have been wafted to his ears, but certain it was, that in place of a living occupant of flesh and blood, nothing but the wavering shadow of an ancient high-backed chair near the fire—­which cast a faint and uncertain light through the apartment—­met the eyes of the angry lieutenant.  A heavy step overhead announced that he had just retired to his sleeping-room.  Thus was the now greatly increased curiosity of the smoking club doomed to receive an unexpected check.  The stranger was evidently no ordinary person—­the conversation gradually sank away—­and more than one individual of the company started in the course of the evening as the wind now wailed with a strange unearthly sound up the silent street, and now blew in violent gusts which made the old house creak and groan to its very foundations.  Our gallant friend, the lieutenant, was perhaps the only individual absolutely unmoved in the party; and his proposal to retake possession of the parlour met with a general negative.  Nettled at this, he declared that another sun should not go down over his head, without obtaining some satisfactory account of this mysterious visitant.

The third day came, and with it a partial change in the conduct of the stranger.  He appeared to have in some measure shaken off his indolence, and sallied forth betimes in the morning, apparently to examine the beauties of the coast, towards the rocky wilds of which he was seen to wend his way.  About noon he again returned to the Mermaid.  This conduct partially disarmed the suspicion which had been excited; however it was agreed that though nothing had hitherto occurred which could authorize any direct interference with his movements, yet that a watch should be kept over them for the present.

The afternoon threatened to turn out stormy.  Vast masses of clouds were continually driven across the sky:  and the increasing agitation and deep furrows of the ocean foretold a night fraught with peril and disaster to the seaman.  Drear December seemed about to assume his wildest garb.  This day of the week always brought the county paper.  A solitary copy of this journal was taken by Mrs. Teague, and it formed the sole channel (alas! for the march of intellect,) by which the smoking club and other worthies of Lanport were enlightened on the sayings and doings of the great world.  It must not be inferred from this that the demon of politics was unknown in this retired spot; on the contrary, the arrival of the ——­ Journal, was looked for with the utmost impatience from week to week; and as long as its tattered folio hung together, its contents formed a never ending subject of conversation.  On the day of its arrival, therefore, the “club” invariably met many hours before their wonted time, to discuss politics and pigtail, revolutions and small beer.