the fruit that
promised best.'"

"And how often do you think Conrad got drunk?"

"I don't think he got drunk at all. There is no reason why he should,
any more than William. Come along, and take me down to dinner. After
all, papa's leg of mutton is better than Medora's apples, when one is
as hungry as I am."

The leg of mutton on this occasion consisted of soup, fish, and a
bit of roast beef, and a couple of boiled fowls. "If I had only two
children instead of twelve, Mr. Walker," said the host, "I'd give you
a dinner a la Russe."

"I don't begrudge Mrs. Toogood a single arrow in her quiver on that
score," said Mr. Walker.

"People are getting to be so luxurious that one can't live up to them
at all," said Mrs. Toogood. "We dined out here with some new-comers in
the square only last week. We had asked them before, and they came
quite in a quiet way,--just like this; and when we got there we found
they'd four kinds of ices after dinner!"

"And not a morsel of food on the table fit to eat," said Toogood.
"I never was so poisoned in my life. As for soup,--it was just the
washings of the pastrycook's kettle next door."

"And how is one to live with such people, Mr. Walker?" continued Mrs
Toogood. "Of course we can't ask them back again. We can't give them
four kinds of ices."

"But would that be necessary? Perhaps they haven't got twelve
children."

"They haven't got any," said Toogood, triumphing; "not a chick
belonging to them. But you see one must do as other people do. I
hate anything grand. I wouldn't want more than this for myself, if
bank-notes were as plenty as curl-papers."

"Nobody has any curl-papers now, papa," said Lucy.

"But I can't bear to be outdone," said Mr. Toogood. "I think it's very
unpleasant,--people living in that sort of way. It's all very well
telling me that I needn't live so too;--and of course I don't. I
can't afford to have four men in from the confectioner's, dressed a
sight better than myself, at ten shillings a head. I can't afford it,
and I don't do it. But the worst of it is that I suffer because other
people do it. It stands to reason that I must either be driven along
with the crowd, or else be left behind. Now, I don't like either.
And what's the end of it? Why I'm half carried away and half left
behind."

"Upon my word, papa, I don't think you're carried away at all," said
Lucy.

"Yes, I am; and I'm ashamed of myself. Mr. Walker, I don't dare to ask
you to drink a