164 



MARK 7'WAJN'S SKETCHES. 



instantly. * However. Ctesar shook him off, and refused to read any petition in the street. He 

 then entered the capitol, and the crowd followed him. 



" About this time the following conversation was overheard, and we consider that, taken in con- 

 nection with the events which succeeded it, it bears an appalling significance : Mr. Papilius Lena 

 remarked to George W. Cassius (commonly known as the ' Nobby Boy of the Third Ward'), a 

 bruiser in the pay of the Opposition, that he hoped his enterprise to-day might thrive ; and when 

 Cassius asked ' What enterprise ? ' he only closed his left eye temporarily and said with simulated 

 indifference:, ' Fare you well,' and sauntered towards Csesar. Marcus Brutus who is suspected of 

 being the ringleaderof the band that killed Csesar,askedwhatitwas that Lena had said. Cassius told 

 him, and added in a low tone, ' I fear our purpose is discovered.' 



" Brutus told his wretched accomplice to keep an eye on Lena, and a moment after Cassius urged 



that lean and hungry vagrant, Casca whose reputation here is none of the best, to be sudden for 

 he feared prevention. He then turned to Brutus, apparently much excited, and asked what should 

 be done, and swore that either he or Caesar should never turn back — he would kill himself first. At 

 this time Caesar wes talking to some of the back-country members about the approaching fall 

 elections, and paying little attention to what was going on around him. Billy Trebonius got into 



• Mark that : it is hinted by William Shakespeare, who saw the besinnine and the end of the unfortunate aftay 

 that this "schedule" was eimply a note discovering to Cseear that a plot was brewing to take his life. 



