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After dinner he decants claret into his venerable person, and tells an old story; the company smile with innocent joy. He rejoins the ladies and leers kindly on a pretty woman; she forgives herself a month of indiscretions. He touches Lieutenant the Hon. Jupiter Smith on the elbow and inquires after his mother; a noble family is gladdened.

Her private opinion of her husband she makes into a short story forgets its origin and shows it him with pride while the husband decants his heart-beats into occasional verse and minor poetry. It is amazing what a lot of latter-day literature consists of such breaches of confidence. And not simply latter-day literature. The visitor is fortunate who leaves no marketable impression behind.

Do you only take a cup of it now and then by yourself, and then come down to your parson, and boast of it, as if it was pure old metheglin? I sat last night with the Mater Gracchorum oh! 'tis a Mater Jagorum; if her descendants taste any of her black blood, they surely will make as wry faces at it as the servant in Don John does when the ghost decants a corpse. Good night!

It is good to ask him to place his old knees under your hospitable board, and to fill him with wholesome wine, while he decants the mellow stories of an Anglo-India that is speedily dissolving from view. But you must never speak to him as if his sun were setting. He is as hopeful as a two-year-old. Every Gazette thrills him with vague expectations and alarms.