If, Fred added impressively, this rollicking, devil-may-care, perfectly sound and hearty young Hibernian had ever been absolutely, entirely, and completely sober since his sojourn in the land of the free, no one of his fellow-boarders had ever discovered it.
Of this motley gathering "Ruffle-shirt" Tomlins, the swell; "Fog-horn" Cranch, the auctioneer; "Walrus" Waller, the sheep-painter; "My Lord" Cockburn, the Englishman; Fred Stone and Cornelius McFudd, not only occupied the bedrooms, but had seats at Miss Teetum's table, four flights below. Bianchi and the others were the guests of the evening.
All this, and more, Fred poured into Oliver's willing ear in loud or soft tones, dependent upon the particular kind of bedlam that was loose in the room at the moment, as they sat side by side on the floor, Oliver's back supported by a pillow which Tomlins had brought from his own bed and tucked behind his shoulders with his own hand.
This courtesy had been followed by another, quite as comforting and as thoughtful. Cockburn, the moment Oliver's back touched the wall, had handed him a tooth-brush mug without a handle, filled to the brim with a decoction of Cockburn's own brewing, compounded hot according to McFudd's receipt, and poured from an earthen pitcher kept within reach of Cockburn's hand, and to which Oliver, in accordance with his habitual custom, had merely touched his lips, he being the most temperate of young gentlemen.
While they talked on, stopping now and then to listen to some outburst of Cranch, whose voice drowned all others—or to snatches of song from Wenby Simmons, the musician, or from Julius Bianchi, Waller's voice managed to make itself felt above the din with an earnestness that gained the attention and calmed all the others.
"You don't know what you're all talking about," he was heard to say. He was still astride his chair, his pipe in his hand. "Inness's picture was the best thing we had in the Exhibition, except Eastman Johnson's 'Negro Life at the South.' Kensett's 'Lake George' was—"
"What—that Inness smear?" retorted "My Lord" Cockburn, who still stood with the coal-scuttle in his hand ready for another chorus. "Positively, Waller, you Americans amuse me. Do you really think that you've got anybody about you who can paint anything worth having—"
"Oh! oh! Hear the high-cockalorum! Oh! oh!"
The sheep-painter raised his hand to command silence.
"Do I think we've got anybody about here who can paint?—you fog-headed noodle from Piccadilly? We've got a dozen young fellows in this very town that put more real stuff into their canvases than all your men put together. They don't tickle their things to death with detail. They get air and vitality and out-of-doors into their work, and—"