hurriedly up to his
chin. "Was he--was he like _that_?"

"I thank the Lord he was not," Mr. Tamblyn answered, slowly and
piously. "Leavin' out the question o' colour and the material, which
is plaster pallis and terrible crips, and the shortage, which is no
more than the head an' henge of 'en, so to speak, 'tis no more like
the man than _you_ be. And I say again that I thank the Lord for it.
For to have the old feller stuck up in the corner an' glazin' at me
nat'rel as life every time I turned my head would be more than nerves
could stand."

"You wouldn't wish him back, then, in the flesh?"

Cai Tamblyn turned around smartly and gazed at the patient, whose
face, however, rested in shadow.

"Look 'ee here. You've a-been in a French war prison, I hear, but
that's no excuse for talkin' irreligious. The man was blowed to
pieces, I tell you, by a thing called a catamaran, off the coast o'
France; not so much left of 'en as would cover a half-crown piece.
And you ask me if I want 'en back in the flesh!"

"But suppose that should turn out to be a mistake?" muttered the
Major.

"Hey?" Cai Tamblyn gave a start. "Oh, I see; you're just puttin' it
so for the sake of argyment. Well, then,"--the old man turned his
quid deliberately--"did you ever hear tell what old Sammy Mennear
said when his wife died an' left him a widow-man? 'I wouldn' ha' lost
my dear Sarah for a hundred pound,' said he; 'an' I dunno as I'd have
her back for five hundred.' That's about the size o't with Hymen, I
reckon--though, mind you, I bear en no grudge. He left me fifty
pound by will, and a hundred an' fifty to a heathen nigger; and how
that can be reconciled with Christian principle I leave you to
answer. But I bear 'en no grudge."

"What? They proved his will?" The Major stared at his portrait and
shivered.

"_In_ course they did. The man was blowed to pieces, I tell you.
'Tis written up on the pedestal. 'Take 'en for all in all'--or piece
by piece, they might ha' said, for that matter--'we shall not look
upon his like agen.' No, nor they don't want to, for all their
speechifyin'. I ain't what the parson calls a _pessimist_; I thinks
poorly o' most things, that's all; _and_ folks; and I say they don't
want to. Why, one way and another, he left close on twelve thousand
pound!"

The Major drew the bed-clothes maybe an inch farther over his chin
and so lay still, answering nothing, his eyes fastened on the bust.
Beneath its hy