a host of editorial duties in the middle and
busiest time of the day, expecting to find me lying at the point of death,
and was quite out of humor because I was not.

There is something extremely human in Barescythe.

"Criticus," I spoke as deliberately as the subject would allow, "I am going
to write a novel."

This unfortunate avowal was the rose-leaf which caused the cup of his
indignation to overflow.

"If it had been a case of cholera," commenced Barescythe, with visible
emotion, "or the measles, or the croup, or the chicken-pox--if you had
broken your thigh, spine, or neck, I wouldn't have complained. But a
_novel_--"

And Barry began whistling wildly,

[Illustration: Musical score]

as he invariably does when annoyed. After using up a variety of popular
airs, the shadow of his good-humor returned to him.

"Ralph," he said, taking my hand, "I have a great respect for you. I don't
know why, to be frank, but I have. I like your little song of--what do you
call it?--in Putnam's Monthly, and your prose sketches in the
Knickerbocker; but don't be a fool, Ralph!"

With which piece of friendly advice, he put on his brown felt hat, drew it
over his brows, and stalked out of the room, with

"A countenance more
In sorrow than in anger,"

like Mr. Hamlet's father.

I saw no more of Barescythe for two weeks.

The summer months flew away.

The nights were growing longer. The air had a vein of sparkling cold in it;
at every gust the trees in the Parade Ground shook down golden ingots; and
the grass-plots, and the graveled walks, and the marble bowl of the
fountain, were paved with emerald and amethyst--a mosaic flooring of tinted
leaves. The clouds were haggard faces, and the wind wailed like a broken
heart. Indeed,

"The melancholy days had come,
The saddest of the year,"

and Mrs. Muggins had made a fire in my grate!

Blessings on him who invented fire-places! A poor day-dreamer's benediction
go with him! The world in the grate! I have watched its fantastic palaces
and crimson inhabitants--dipped my pen, as it were, into its stained
rivers, and written their grotesqueness! Dizzy bridges, feudal castles,
great yawning caves, and red-hot gnomes, are to be found in the grate;
mimic volcanos, and ships that sail into sparry grottos, and delicate
fire-shells with pink and blue lips!

Crash!

The coals sink down, and new figures are born, like the transient pictures
in a kaleidescope.