wo gentlemen laughed together and filled their glasses.

"No, no," resumed the General, "never forget that the great thing is
drill--discipline. Keep the machinery well oiled, and your hand upon the
crank, and all goes well."

"Until somebody knocks off your hand," said Abel.

"Yes, of course--of course; but that is the very point. The fight is
never among the sheep, but only among the shepherds. Look at our splendid
system, beginning with Tom, Jim, and Ned, and culminating in the
President--the roots rather red and unsightly, but oh! such a pretty
flower, all broadcloth, kid gloves, and affability--contemplate the
superb machinery," continued the General, warming, "the primaries, the
ward committees, the--in fact, all the rest of it--see how gloriously it
works--the great result of the working of the whole is--"

"To establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, promote the general
welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our
posterity," interrupted Abel, who had been scanning the Constitution,
and who delivered the words with a rhetorical pomp of manner.

General Belch smiled approvingly.

"That's it--that's the very tone. You'll do. The great result is, who
shall have his hand on the crank. And there are, therefore, always three
parties in our beloved country."

Abel looked inquiringly.

"First, the _ins_, who are in two parties--the clique that have, and the
clique that haven't. They fight like fury among themselves, but when they
meet t'other great party they all fight together, because the hopes of
the crank for each individual of each body lie in the party itself, and
in their obedience to its discipline. These are two of the parties. Then
there is the great party of the _outs_, who have a marvelous unanimity,
and never break up into quarrelsome bodies until there is a fair chance
of their ousting the _ins_. I say these things not because they are not
pretty obvious, but because, as a man of fashion and society, you have
probably not attended to such matters. It's dirty work for a gentleman.
But I suppose any of us would be willing to pick a gold eagle out of the
mud, even if we did soil our fingers."

"Of course," replied Abel, in a tone that General Belch did not entirely
comprehend--"of course no gentleman knows any thing of politics.
Gentlemen are the natural governors of a country; and where they are not
erected into a hereditary governing class, self-respect forbids them to