It is in the unrestricted ease of these “little dinners,” where two or three old friends are met, that social intercourse assumes its most charming form. The usages of the great world, which exact a species of uniformity of breeding and manners, are here laid aside, and men talk with all the bias and prejudices of their true nature, dashing the topics discussed with traits of personality, and even whims, that are most amusing. How little do we carry away of tact or wisdom from the grand banquets of life; and what pleasant stores of thought, what charming memories remain to us, after those small gatherings!
How, as I write this, one little room rises to my recollection, with its quaint old sideboard of carved oak; its dark-brown cabinets, curiously sculptured; its heavy old brocade curtains, and all its queer devices of knick-knackery, where such meetings once were held, and where, throwing off the cares of life,—shut out from them, as it were, by the massive folds of the heavy drapery across the door,—. we talked in all the fearless freedom of old friendship, rambling away from theme to theme, contrasting our experiences, balancing our views in life, and mingling through our converse the racy freshness of a boy's enjoyment with the sager counsels of a man's reflectiveness. Alas! how very early is it sometimes in life that we tread “the banquet-hall deserted.” But to our story: the evening wore pleasantly on; Upton talked, as few but himself could do, upon the public questions of the day; and Harcourt, with many a blunt interruption, made the discourse but more easy and amusing. The soldier was, indeed, less at his ease than the others. It was not alone that many of the topics were not such as he was most familiar with, but he felt angry and indignant at Glencore's seeming indifference as to the fate of his son. Not a single reference to him even occurred; his name was never even passingly mentioned. Nothing but the careworn, sickly face, the wasted form and dejected expression before him, could have restrained Harcourt from alluding to the boy. He bethought him, however, that any indiscretion on his part might have the gravest consequences. Upton, too, might have said something to quiet Glencore's mind. “At all events, I'll wait,” said he to himself; “for wherever there is much delicacy in a negotiation, I generally make a mess of it.” The more genially, therefore, did Glencore lend himself to the pleasure of the conversation, the more provoked did Harcourt feel at his heartlessness, and the more did the struggle cost him to control his own sentiments.
Upton, who detected the secret working of men's minds with a marvellous exactness, saw how the poor Colonel was suffering, and that, in all probability, some unhappy explosion would at last ensue, and took an opportunity of remarking that though all this chit-chat was delightful for them, Glencore was still a sick man.
“We must n't forget, Harcourt,” said he, “that a chicken-broth diet includes very digestible small-talk; and here we are leading our poor friend through politics, war, diplomacy, and the rest of it, just as if he had the stomach of an old campaigner and—”
“And the brain of a great diplomatist! Say it out, man, and avow honestly the share of excellence you accord to each of us,” broke in Harcourt, laughing.
“I would to Heaven we could exchange,” sighed Upton, languidly.
“The saints forbid!” exclaimed the other; “and it would do us little good if we were able.”
“Why so?”
“I'd never know what to do with that fine intellect if I had it; and as for you, what with your confounded pills and mixtures, your infernal lotions and embrocations, you'd make my sound system as bad as your own in three months' time.”
“You are quite wrong, my dear Harcourt; I should treat the stomach as you would do the brain,—give it next to nothing to do, in the hopes it might last the longer.”