appreciated."

From that the old interminable story took its start and flowed on, the
faithful nose nodding assent at every turn in that winding stream.

The children came in for their share of the fun; and for the first time
in our lives we took pleasure in the old gentleman's narration of his
varied experiences.

"O hear him! see him go it!" said Robbie. "What a nose!"

"Long may it wave!" said Harry.

With other remarks of a like genial nature; while there they sat, the
two,--my uncle on one side, long, lathy, self-satisfied, gesticulating,
earnestly laying his case before a grave jury of one, whom he was bound
to convince, if time would allow; my little Jew facing him, upright in
his chair, stiff, imperturbable, devoted to business, honorably earning
his money, the nose in the air, immovable, except when it played duly up
and down at fitting intervals: in which edifying employment I left them,
and went about my business, a cheerier man.

Ah, what a relief it was to feel myself free for a season from the
attacks of the enemy--to know that my plucky little Iron-Clad was
engaging him! In a hour I passed through the hall again, heard the loud
blatant voice still discoursing (it had got as far as the difficulties
with the second parish), and saw the unflinching nasal organ perform its
graceful see-saw of assent. An hour later it was the same,--except that
the speaker had arrived at the persecutions which drove him from parish
number three. When I went to call them to dinner, the scene had changed
a little, for now the old gentleman, pounding the table for a pulpit,
was reading aloud passages from a powerful farewell sermon preached to
his ungrateful parishioners. I was sorry I couldn't give my man a hint
to use his handkerchief at the affecting periods, for the nose can
hardly be called a sympathetic feature (unless indeed you blow it), and
these nods were becoming rather too mechanical, except when the old
gentleman switched off on the argumentative track, as he frequently did.
"What think you of that?" he would pause in his reading to inquire.
"Isn't that logic? isn't that unanswerable?" In responding to which
appeals nobody could have done better than my serious, my devoted, my
lovely little Jew.

"Dinner!" I shouted over my uncle's dickey. It was almost the only word
that had the magic in it to rouse him from the feast of reason which his
own conversation was to him. It was always easy to head him toward the