ce as
that which gathered round me, as I sat in that hospitable parlor, and
told about my adventure on the ice.

Such an audience was enough to stimulate any man. I felt the stimulus.
I'm not generally considered fluent, or good at description, and I'm
not much of a talker; but all that I ever lacked on ordinary occasions
I made amends for on that evening. I began at the beginning, from the
time I was ordered off. Then I led my spellbound audience over the
crumbling ice, till the sleigh came. Then I indulged in a thrilling
description of the runaway horse and the lost driver. Then I portrayed
the lady floating in a sleigh, and my rescue of her. Of course, for
manifest reasons, which every gentleman will appreciate, I didn't bring
myself forward more prominently than I could help. Then followed that
journey over the ice, the passage of the ice-ridge, the long,
interminable march, the fainting lady, the broad channel near the
shore, the-white gleam of the ice-cone at Montmorency, my wild leap,
and my mad dash up the bank to the Frenchman's house.

Up to this moment my audience sat, as I have before remarked, I think,
simply spellbound. O'Halloran was on one side of me, with his chin on
his breast, and his eyes glaring at me from beneath his bushy eyebrows.
Marion sat rigid and motionless, with her hands clasped, and her eyes
fixed on the floor. Miss O'Halloran never took her eyes off my face,
but kept them on mine as though they were riveted there. At times she
started nervously, and shifted her position, and fidgeted in her chair,
but never did she remove her eyes. Once, when I came to the time when I
led my companion over the ice-ridge, I saw a shudder pass through her.
Once again, when I came to that moment when my companion fainted,
Marion gave a kind of gasp, and I saw Miss O'Halloran reach out her
hand, and clasp the clinched hands of her sister; but with these
exceptions there was no variation in their attitude or manner.

And now I tuned my harp to a lighter strain, which means that I
proceeded to give an account of my journey after the doctor, his start,
my slumbers, my own start, our meeting, the doctor's wrath, my
pursuasion, our journey, our troubles, our arrival at the house, our
final crushing disappointment, the doctor's brutal raillery, my own
meekness, and our final return home. Then, without mentioning Jack
Randolph, I explained the object of the advertisement--

"Sic Sandy Macrorie, intentis omnibus