lorious old fellow would come over to me for a short lark,"
rejoined Mr. Tiffany. "But he couldn't live here long; there's nothing
old here."

"Who's Baden Baden?" asked Sylvester.

"Only a prince of my acquaintance on the other side of the water, and a
devilish clever fellow. But he could'nt stand it here--I'm
afraid--everything's so new."

"I'm rather old," suggested Sylvester, smiling on the young man.

"So you are, by Jove--But that aint the thing I want exactly; I want an
old castle or two, and a donjon-keep, and that sort of thing.--You
understand."

"Something," suggested the grandfather, "in the style of the old
revolutionary fort on Fort Hill?"

"No--no--you don't take exactly. I mean something more in the
antique--something or other, you see"--here he began twirling his
forefinger in the air and sketching an amorphous phantom of some sort,
of an altogether unattainable character, "in a word--Jehoshaphat!"

The moment the eye of Mrs. Carrack fell upon the blue and white
crockery, the pewter plates which had been in use time out of mind in
the family, and the plain knives and forks of steel, she cast on her son
a significant glance of mingled surprise and contempt. "Thomas," she
said, standing before the place assigned to her, her son doing the same,
"the napkins!"

The napkins were brought from a great basket which had accompanied the
leathern trunk.

"The other things!"

The other things, consisting of china plates, cups and saucers, and
knives and forks of silver for two, were duly laid--Mrs. Carrack and her
son having kept the rest of the family waiting the saying of grace by
old Sylvester, were good enough to be seated at the old farmer's (Mrs.
Carrack's father's) board.

When old Sylvester unclosed his eyes from the delivery of thanks, he
discovered at the back of Mrs. Carrack and her son's chairs, the two
city servants in livery, with their short cut hair and embroidered coats
of the fashion of those worn in English farces on the stage, standing
erect and without the motion of a muscle. There is not a doubt but that
old Sylvester Peabody was a good deal astonished, although he gave no
utterance to his feelings. But when the two young men in livery began to
dive in here and there about the table, snapping up the dishes in
exclusive service on Mrs. Carrack and Mr. Tiffany Carrack, he could
remain silent no longer.

"Boys," he said, addressing himself to the two fine personages in
question,