t.

It was a wild, blustering night, and the wind howled mournfully around
the street corners, blinding the pedestrians with the clouds of dust
that it caught up from the gutters and hurled into their faces.

Old man Sweeny, the stage doorkeeper, dozing in his little glazed box,
was awakened by a sudden gust that banged the stage door and then went
howling along the corridor, almost extinguishing the gas-jets and making
the minstrels shiver in their dressing-rooms.

"What! You here to-night!" exclaimed old man Sweeny, as a frail figure,
muffled up in a huge ulster, staggered through the doorway and stood
leaning against the wall, trying to catch his breath.

"Yes; I felt that I couldn't stay away from the footlights to-night.
They tell me I'm old and worn out and had better take a rest, but I'll
go on till I drop," and with a hollow cough the Old Gag plodded slowly
down the dim and drafty corridor and sank wearily on a sofa in the big
dressing-room, where the other Gags and Conundrums were awaiting their
cues.

"Poor old fellow!" said one of them, sadly. "He can't hold out much
longer."

"He ought not to go on except at matinees," replied another veteran, who
was standing in front of the mirror trimming his long, silvery beard,
and just then an attendant came in with several basins of gruel, and the
old Jests tucked napkins under their chins and sat down to partake of a
little nourishment before going on.

The bell tinkled and the entertainment began. One after another the
Jokes and Conundrums heard their cues, went on, and returned to the
dressing-room, for they all had to go on again in the after-piece. The
house was crowded to the dome, and there was scarcely a dry eye in the
vast audience as one after another of the old Quips and Jests that had
been treasured household words in many a family came on and then
disappeared to make room for others of their kind.

As the evening wore on the whisper ran through the theater that the Old
Gag was going on that night--perhaps for the last time; and many an eye
grew dim, many a pulse beat quicker at the thought of listening once
more to that hoary Jest, about whose head were clustered so many sacred
memories.

Meanwhile the Old Gag was sitting in his corner of the dressing-room,
his head bowed on his breast, his gruel untasted on the tray before him.
The other Gags came and went, but he heeded them not. His thoughts were
far away. He was dreaming of old days, of his