The landlord and a fat gentleman walked up and down the saloon and chatted.  “Nay, that I must say,” said the fat gentleman, “this Merchant P—­, who died the day before yesterday, he was a fine fellow.”

“Yes, yes,” thought I; “aha, aha, a fellow, who had heaps of money!  Hear you, my friend” (to the waiter), “could not you get me a bit of venison, or some other solid dish?  Hear you, a cup of bouillon would not be amiss.  Look after it, but quick!”

“Yes,” said mine host now, “it is strong!  Thirty thousand dollars, and they banko!  Nobody in the whole world could have dreamed of it—­thirty thousand!”

“Thirty thousand!” repeated I, in my exultant soul, “thirty thousand!  Hear you, waiter!  Make haste, give me here thirty then—­; and give me here banko—­no give me here a glass of wine, I mean;” and from head to heart there sang in me, amid the trumpet-beat of every pulse in alternating echoes, “Thirty thousand!  Thirty thousand!”

“Yes,” continued the fat gentlemen, “and would you believe that in the mass of debts there are nine hundred dollars for credit and five thousand dollars for champagne.  And now all his creditors stand there prettily and open their mouths; all the thing in the house are hardly worth two farthings; and out of the house they find, as the only indemnification—­a calash!”

“Aha, that is something quite different!  Hear you, youth, waiter!  Eh, come you here! take that meat, and the bouillon, and the wine away again; and hear you, observe well, that I have not eaten a morsel of all this.  How could I, indeed; I, that ever since I opened my eyes this morning have done nothing else but eat (a horrible untruth!), and it just now occurs to me that it would therefore be unnecessary to pay money for such a superfluous feast.”

“But you have actually ordered it,” replied the waiter, in a state of excitement.

“My friend,” I replied, and seized myself behind the ear, a place whence people, who are in embarrassment, are accustomed in some sort of way to obtain the necessary help—­“my friend, it was a mistake for which I must not be punished; for it was not my fault that a rich heir, for whom I ordered the breakfast, is all at once become poor,—­yes, poorer than many a poor devil, because he has lost more than the half of his present means upon the future.  If he, under these circumstances, as you may well imagine, cannot pay for a dear breakfast, yet it does not prevent my paying for the eggs which I have devoured, and giving you over and above something handsome for your trouble, as business compels me to move off from here immediately.”

By my excellent logic, and the “something handsome,” I removed from my throat, with a bleeding heart and a watering mouth, that dear breakfast, and wandered forth into the city, with my little bundle under my arm, to seek for a cheap room, while I considered where I w as to get the money for it.