d mean to go to the ball?"
Ask'd the waiter, who linger'd.
"Perhaps. I don't know.
You may keep me a ticket, in case I should go."

XXII.

Oh, better, no doubt, is a dinner of herbs,
When season'd by love, which no rancor disturbs,
And sweeten'd by all that is sweetest in life,
Than turbot, bisque, ortolans, eaten in strife!
But if, out of humor, and hungry, alone,
A man should sit down to a dinner, each one
Of the dishes of which the cook chooses to spoil
With a horrible mixture of garlic and oil,
The chances are ten against one, I must own,
He gets up as ill-temper'd as when he sat down.
And if any reader this fact to dispute is
Disposed, I say... "Allium edat cicutis
Nocentius!"
Over the fruit and the wine
Undisturb'd the wasp settled. The evening was fine.
Lord Alfred his chair by the window had set,
And languidly lighted his small cigarette.
The window was open. The warm air without
Waved the flame of the candles. The moths were about.
In the gloom he sat gloomy.

XXIII.

Gay sounds from below
Floated up like faint echoes of joys long ago,
And night deepen'd apace; through the dark avenues
The lamps twinkled bright; and by threes and by twos,
The idlers of Luchon were strolling at will,
As Lord Alfred could see from the cool window-sill,
Where his gaze, as he languidly turn'd it, fell o'er
His late travelling companion, now passing before
The inn, at the window of which he still sat,
In full toilet,--boots varnish'd, and snowy cravat,
Gayly smoothing and buttoning a yellow kid glove,
As he turned down the avenue.
Watching above,
From his window, the stranger, who stopp'd as he walk'd
To mix with those groups, and now nodded, now talk'd,
To the young Paris dandies, Lord Alfred discern'd,
By the way hats were lifted, and glances were turn'd,
That this unknown acquaintance, now bound for the hall,
Was a person of rank or of fashion; for all
Whom he bow'd to in passing, or stopped with and chatter'd,
Walk'd on with a look which implied... "I feel flatter'd!"

XXIV.

His form was soon lost in the distance and gloom.

XXV.

Lord Alfre