re myself
whether I was host or guest; but as I saw that this consideration did
not distress _him_, I resolved it should not weigh heavily on me.

"I ordered a _compote_ of peaches with maraschino. Go after them and
say it has been forgotten." And now, as he dismissed my servant on this
errand, he sat down and served the soup, doing the honors of the board
in all form. "You are called--"

"Digby is my Christian name," interrupted I, "and you can call me by
it."

"Digby, I drink to your health; and if the wine had been only a little
warmer, I 'd say I could not wish to do so in a more generous fluid. No
fellow of your age knows how to air his Bordeaux; hot flannels to the
caraffe before decanting are all that is necessary, and let your glasses
also be slightly warmed. To sip such claret as this, and then turn one's
eyes to that champagne yonder in the ice-pail, is like the sensation
of a man who in his honeymoon fancies how happy he will be one of
these days, _en secondes noces_. Don't you feel a sense of triumphant
enjoyment at this moment? Is there not something at your heart that
says, 'Hodnig and Oppovich, I despise you! To the regions I soar in you
cannot come! To the blue ether I have risen, your very vision cannot
reach!' Eh, boy! tell me this."

"No; I don't think you have rightly measured my feelings. On the whole,
I rather suspect I bear a very good will to these same people who have
enabled me to have these comforts."

"You pretend, then, to what they call gratitude?"

"I have that weakness."

"I could as soon believe in the heathen mythology! I like the man who
is kind to me while he is doing the kindness, and I could, if occasion
served, be kind to him in turn; but to say that I could retain such a
memory of the service after years that it would renew in me the first
pleasant sensations it created, and with these sensations the goodwill
to requite them, is downright rubbish. You might as well tell me that I
could get drank simply by remembering the orgie I assisted at ten years
ago."

"I protest against your sentiment and your logic too."

"Then we won't dispute the matter. We'll talk of something we can agree
upon. Let us abuse Sara."

"If you do, you'll choose some other place to do it."

"What, do you mean to tell me that you can stand the haughty airs and
proud pretensions of the young Jewess?"

"I mean to tell you that I know nothing of the Fraeulein Oppovich but
what is amiable and good