eeth, a drooping black mustache, and large, flashing
black eyes. Mary, a matronly young blonde, was washing dishes in the
little back room that served for kitchen and dining room. The front room
served as bedchamber and living room. Overhead was the week's washing,
hanging in festoons so low that Martin did not see at first the two men
talking in a corner. They hailed Brissenden and his demijohns with
acclamation, and, on being introduced, Martin learned they were Andy and
Parry. He joined them and listened attentively to the description of a
prize-fight Parry had seen the night before; while Brissenden, in his
glory, plunged into the manufacture of a toddy and the serving of wine
and whiskey-and-sodas. At his command, "Bring in the clan," Andy
departed to go the round of the rooms for the lodgers.

"We're lucky that most of them are here," Brissenden whispered to Martin.
"There's Norton and Hamilton; come on and meet them. Stevens isn't
around, I hear. I'm going to get them started on monism if I can. Wait
till they get a few jolts in them and they'll warm up."

At first the conversation was desultory. Nevertheless Martin could not
fail to appreciate the keen play of their minds. They were men with
opinions, though the opinions often clashed, and, though they were witty
and clever, they were not superficial. He swiftly saw, no matter upon
what they talked, that each man applied the correlation of knowledge and
had also a deep-seated and unified conception of society and the Cosmos.
Nobody manufactured their opinions for them; they were all rebels of one
variety or another, and their lips were strangers to platitudes. Never
had Martin, at the Morses', heard so amazing a range of topics discussed.
There seemed no limit save time to the things they were alive to. The
talk wandered from Mrs. Humphry Ward's new book to Shaw's latest play,
through the future of the drama to reminiscences of Mansfield. They
appreciated or sneered at the morning editorials, jumped from labor
conditions in New Zealand to Henry James and Brander Matthews, passed on
to the German designs in the Far East and the economic aspect of the
Yellow Peril, wrangled over the German elections and Bebel's last speech,
and settled down to local politics, the latest plans and scandals in the
union labor party administration, and the wires that were pulled to bring
about the Coast Seamen's strike. Martin was struck by the inside
knowledge they p