ly.
What do you say?"

"What you say, Sir Patrick."

"Very good. May I begin by making an inquiry relating to your past
life?"

"Certainly!"

"Very good again. When you were in the merchant service, did you ever
have any experience in buying provisions ashore?"

Arnold stared. If any relation existed between that question and the
subject in hand it was an impenetrable relation to _him_. He answered,
in unconcealed bewilderment, "Plenty of experience, Sir."

"I'm coming to the point," pursued Sir Patrick. "Don't be astonished.
I'm coming to the point. What did you think of your moist sugar when you
bought it at the grocer's?"

"Think?" repeated Arnold. "Why, I thought it was moist sugar, to be
sure!"

"Marry, by all means!" cried Sir Patrick. "You are one of the few men
who can try that experiment with a fair chance of success."

The suddenness of the answer fairly took away Arnold's breath. There was
something perfectly electric in the brevity of his venerable friend. He
stared harder than ever.

"Don't you understand me?" asked Sir Patrick.

"I don't understand what the moist sugar has got to do with it, Sir."

"You don't see that?"

"Not a bit!"

"Then I'll show you," said Sir Patrick, crossing his legs, and setting
in comfortably for a good talk "You go to the tea-shop, and get your
moist sugar. You take it on the understanding that it is moist sugar.
But it isn't any thing of the sort. It's a compound of adulterations
made up to look like sugar. You shut your eyes to that awkward fact, and
swallow your adulterated mess in various articles of food; and you and
your sugar get on together in that way as well as you can. Do you follow
me, so far?"

Yes. Arnold (quite in the dark) followed, so far.

"Very good," pursued Sir Patrick. "You go to the marriage-shop, and
get a wife. You take her on the understanding--let us say--that she
has lovely yellow hair, that she has an exquisite complexion, that her
figure is the perfection of plumpness, and that she is just tall enough
to carry the plumpness off. You bring her home, and you discover that
it's the old story of the sugar over again. Your wife is an adulterated
article. Her lovely yellow hair is--dye. Her exquisite skin is--pearl
powder. Her plumpness is--padding. And three inches of her height
are--in the boot-maker's heels. Shut your eyes, and swallow your
adulterated wife as you swallow your adulterated sugar--and, I tell you
again, you are one