ay. He
recognized me at once, and as he held out his huge hand, which I took in
mine, we exclaimed simultaneously: 'How are you, Owen?' 'How are you,
Tom?'

The greeting was something more than cordial. We had once been quite
intimate, and it was seventeen years since we had met. I had lost sight
of him that number of years before, and getting no satisfactory response
to any inquiries I had from time to time made after him of mutual
acquaintances, I had gradually dropped the subject, and never expected
to meet him again.

Tom Winters was a Marylander by birth, and I had known him in Ohio
during the Presidential canvass of 1844, when he had supported the
gallant son of Kentucky, Henry Clay, with all the ardor of his generous,
rash, and passionate nature; while I had supported James K. Polk,
because--because he was nominated by the Democratic party.

I can appreciate at its true worth now that political infatuation which
led me to reject the 'Mill Boy of the Slashes,' and to 'decline upon'
Polk. There was no comparison between the two men.

----'That was, to this,'
Hyperion to a satyr.'

But that is passed. Polk was elected, and the gallant 'Harry of the
West' died of a broken heart. Thence came Texas, the repeal of the
Compromise, the Rebellion,

'Sin, and death, and all our woes.'

After a few hasty questions and answers on each side, we parted to meet
at dinner at Tom's residence, and to sit down then for a general
_palabre_.

I was punctual to my appointment, and after being introduced to Mrs.
Winters, (Tom was now married and held an important position under the
State government,) and after having been presented to Master Henry Clay
Winters, a lad of three years, and being informed--in an aside--that the
next was to be named John Fremont Winters, we sat down to the table and
accomplished our dinner and our explanations 'by piece-meal
simultaneously,'

Having satisfied my quondam friend upon the subject of my various
wanderings, successes, and reverses since we parted--which were
decidedly too dull and commonplace to interest the reader, although Tom,
from a sense of duty, probably, listened to their rehearsal with a great
deal of attention--I, in turn, questioned him of the events of his life.
He ran them hastily over, and seemed inclined to treat them with so much
brevity that I had frequently to call him back upon his narrative by a
question on some point where I required more detailed inform