e slightest droop, and
pouring out wine in an off-hand and quite obviously hostile manner. I
have seen him, towards the end of the meal, yawning. I remember another
whom, positively, I heard humming--a faint sound indeed, but menacing as
the roll of tumbrils.

These were exceptional cases, I grant. For the most part, the butlers
observed by me have had a manner as correctly smooth and colourless as
their very shirt-fronts. Aye, and in two or three of them, modern though
they were in date and aspect, I could have sworn there was 'a flame of
old-world fealty all bright.' Were these but the finer comedians?
There was one (I will call him Brett) who had an almost dog-like way
of watching his master. Was this but a calculated touch in a merely
aesthetic whole? Brett was tall and slender, and his movements were
those of a greyhound under perfect self-control. Baldness at the temples
enhanced the solemnity of his thin smooth face. It is more than twenty
years since first I saw him; and for a long period I saw him often, both
in town and in country. Against the background of either house he was
impeccable. Many butlers might be that. Brett's supremacy was in the
sense he gave one that he was, after all, human--that he had a heart, in
which he had taken the liberty to reserve a corner for any true
friend of his master and mistress. I remember well the first time he
overstepped sheer formality in relation to myself. It was one morning in
the country, when my entertainers and my fellow guests had gone out in
pursuit of some sport at which I was no good. I was in the smoking room,
reading a book. Suddenly--no, Brett never appeared anywhere suddenly.
Brett appeared, paused at precisely the right speaking distance, and
said in a low voice, 'I thought it might interest you to know, sir, that
there's a white-tailed magpie out on the lawn. Very rare, as you know,
sir. If you look out of the window you will see the little fellow
hopping about on the lawn.' I thanked him effusively as I darted to
the window, and simulated an intense interest in 'the little fellow.' I
greatly overdid my part. Exit Brett, having done his to perfection.

What worries me is not that I showed so little self-command and so much
insincerity, but the doubt whether Brett's flawless technique was the
vehicle for an act of true good feeling or was used simply for the
pleasure of using it. Similar doubts abide in all my special memories
of him. There was an evening