, never mind putting any back. It's a long walk to the ferry, and a
wet day beside.'

'True, true,' he said meditatively, looking at Mary carrying in the
dinner, and drinking the whisky in an abstracted manner.

Just then my sister beckoned me out. She said it was very thoughtless of
me to pour gallons of whisky down the poor old fellow's throat, upon an
empty stomach.

'Perhaps you would like me to ask him to have dinner with us?' I said
with dignified sarcasm.

'I think we might at least let Mary give him something to eat.'

Of course I yielded, and my sister bade Mary give our visitor a good
dinner. For such a small man he had an appetite that would have done
credit to a long-fasting tiger shark tackling a dead whale; and every
time I glanced at Mary's face as she waited on my sister and myself I
saw that she was verging upon frenzy. At last, however, we heard him
shuffling about on the verandah, and thought he was going without saying
'thank you.' We wronged him, for presently he called to Mary and asked
her if I would kindly grant him a few words after I had finished dinner.

'Confound him! What the deuce--'

My sister said, 'Don't be cruel to the poor old fellow. _You may be like
him yourself some day._'

I said I didn't doubt it, if my womenfolk encouraged every infernal old
dead-beat in the colony to come and loaf upon me. Two large tears at
once ran down Kate's nose, and dropped into the custard on her plate. I
softened at once and went out.

'Permit me, sir,' he said, in a wobbly kind of voice, as he lurched to
and fro in the doorway, and tried to jab the point of his umbrella into
a knot-hole in the verandah boards in order to steady himself, 'permit
me, sir, to thank you for your kindness and to tender you my private
card. Perhaps I may be able to serve you in some humble way'--here the
umbrella point stuck in the hole, and he clung to the handle with both
hands--'some humble way, sir. Like yourself, I am a literary man, as
this will show you.' He fumbled in his breast pocket with his left hand,
and would have fallen over on his back but for the umbrella handle, to
which he clung with his right. Presently he extracted a dirty card and
handed it to me, with a bow, which he effected by doubling himself
on his stomach over the friendly gamp, and remained in that position,
swaying to and fro, for quite ten seconds. I read the card:--

MR HORATIO BILGER
Journalist and Litterateur