room, he had to go and take his sister's place, so that he found himself in the thick of the babble. Mr. Quirk was no longer goring spiders' webs; he was now attacking a solid and substantial subject—nothing less than the condition of the British army; and a pretty poor opinion he seemed to have of it. As it chanced, the only person who had seen service was Lord Rockminster (at Knightsbridge), but he did not choose to open his mouth, so that Mr. Quirk had it all his way—except when Maurice Mangan thought it worth while to give him a cuff or a kick, just by way of reminding him that he was mortal. Ichabod, in silence, stuck to the port wine. Quincey Hooper, the American journalist, drew in a chair by the side of Lord Rockminster and humbly fawned. And meanwhile Quirk, head downward, so to speak, charged rank and file, and sent them flying; arose again and swept the heads off officers; and was just about to annihilate the volunteers when Mangan interrupted him.
"Oh, you expect too much," he said, in his slow and half-contemptuous fashion. "The British soldier is not over well-educated, I admit; but you needn't try him by an impossible standard. I dare say you are thinking of ancient days when a Roman general could address his troops in Latin and make quite sure of being understood; but you can't expect Tommy Atkins to be so learned. And our generals, as you say, may chiefly distinguish themselves at reviews; but the reviews they seem to me to be too fond of are those published monthly. As for the volunteers—"
"You will have a joke about them, too, I suppose," Quirk retorted. "An excellent subject for a joke—the safety of the country! A capital subject for a merry jest; Nero fiddling with Rome in flames—"
"I beg your pardon? Nero never did anything of the kind," Mangan observed, with a perfectly diabolical inconsequence, "for violins weren't invented in those days."
This was too much for Mr. Quirk; he would not resume argument with such a trifler; nor, indeed, was there any opportunity; for Lord Rockminster now suggested they should go into the drawing-room—and Ichabod had to leave that decanter of port.
Now, if Maurice Mangan had come to this house to see how Lionel was feted and caressed by "the great"—in order that he
might carry the tale down to Winstead to please the old folk and Miss Francie—he was doomed to disappointment. There were very few of "the great" present, to begin with; and those who were paid no particular attention to Lionel Moore. It was Octavius Quirk who appeared to be the hero of the evening, so far as the attention devoted to him by Lady Adela and her immediate little circle was concerned. But Maurice himself was not wholly left neglected. When tea was brought in, his hostess came over to where he was standing.
"Won't you sit down, Mr. Mangan?—I want to talk to you about something of very great importance—importance to me, that is, for you know how vain young authors are. You have heard of my new book?—yes, I thought Mr. Moore must have told you. Well, it's all ready, except the title-page. I am not quite settled about the title yet; and you literary gentlemen are so quick and clever with suggestions—I am sure you will give me good advice. And I've had a number of different titles printed, to see how they look in type; what do you think of this one? At present it seems to be the favorite; it was Mr. Quirk's suggestion—"
She showed him a slip with "North and South" printed on it in large letters.
"I don't like it at all," Mangan said, frankly. "People will think the book has something to do with the American civil war. However, don't take my opinion at all. My connection with literature is almost infinitesimal—I'm merely a newspaper hack, you know."