Slocomb dun tuk de key.'

"'Well, s'pose she has,' I said; 'put yo' knee against it, and fo'ce the
do'.' I knew my man, suh. Anthony never moved a muscle.

"Here the judge called out, 'Why, major, I couldn't think of'--

"'Now, yo' Honor,' said I, 'please don't say a word. This is my affair.
The lock is not of the slightest consequence.'

"In a few minutes back comes Anthony, solemn as an owl. 'Major,' said he,
'I done did all I c'u'd, an' dere ain't no way 'cept breakin' down de do'.
Las' time I done dat, Mis' Slocomb neber forgib me fer a week.'

"The judge jumped up. 'Major, I won't have you breakin' yo' locks and
annoyin' Mrs. Slocomb.'

"'Yo' Honor,' I said, 'please take yo' seat. I'm d----d if you shan't
taste that wine, if I have to blow out the cellar walls.'

"'I tell you, major,' replied the judge in a very emphatic tone and with
some slight anger I thought, 'I ought not to drink yo' high-flavored
madeira; my doctor told me only last week I must stop that kind of thing.
If yo' servant will go upstairs and get a bottle of whiskey out of my bag,
it's just what I ought to drink.'

"Now I want to tell you, colonel, that at that time I hadn't had a bottle
of any kind of wine in my cellar for five years." Here the major closed
one eye, and laid his forefinger against his nose.

"'Of co'se, yo' Honor,' I said, 'when you put it on a matter of yo' health
I am helpless; that paralyzes my hospitality; I have not a word to say.
Anthony, go upstairs and get the bottle.' And we drank the judge's
whiskey! Now see the devotion and loyalty of that old negro servant, see
his shrewdness! Do you think this marsh-crane of Jack's"--

Here Jefferson threw open the door, ushering in half a dozen gentlemen,
and among them the rightful host, just returned after a week's
absence,--cutting off the major's outburst, and producing another equally
explosive:--

"Why, Jack!"

Before the two men grasp hands I must, in all justice to the major, say
that he not only had a sincere admiration for Jack's surroundings, but
also for Jack himself, and that while he had not the slightest
compunction in sharing or, for that matter, monopolizing his hospitality,
he would have been equally generous in return had it been possible for him
to revive the old days, and to afford a menage equally lavish.

It is needless for me to make a like statement for Jack. One half the
major's age, trained to practical business life from boyhood, frank,
spo