How very little does the amateur, dwelling at home at ease, comprehend the labours and perils of the author, and, when he smilingly skims the surface of a work of fiction, how little does he consider the hours of toil, consultation of authorities, researches in the Bodleian, correspondence with learned and illegible Germans-in one word, the vast scaffolding that was first built up and then knocked down, to while away an hour for him in a railway train Thus I might begin this tale with a biography of Tonti-birthplace, parentage, genius probably inherited from his mother, remarkable instance of precocity, etc-and a complete treatise on the system to which he bequeathed his name. The material is all beside me in a pigeon-hole, but I scorn to appear vainglorious. Tonti is dead, and I never saw anyone who even pretended to regret him; and, as for the tontine system, a word will suffice for all the purposes of this unvarnished narrative.