with doctors, whom he vituperated as a rabble
of quacks, dosing himself with a patent medicine and stuffing himself
almost to bursting with liver pills and dried prunes.

He had taken a trip to Europe after this sickness to put himself
completely to rights. He intended to be gone a year, but returned at
the end of six weeks, fulminating abuse of European cooking. Nearly his
entire time had been spent in Paris; but of this sojourn he had brought
back but two souvenirs, an electro-plated bill-hook and an empty bird
cage which had tickled his fancy immensely.

He was wealthy. Only a year previous to this his father--a widower, who
had amassed a fortune in land speculation--had died, and Annixter, the
only son, had come into the inheritance.

For Presley, Annixter professed a great admiration, holding in deep
respect the man who could rhyme words, deferring to him whenever there
was question of literature or works of fiction. No doubt, there was
not much use in poetry, and as for novels, to his mind, there were only
Dickens's works. Everything else was a lot of lies. But just the same,
it took brains to grind out a poem. It wasn't every one who could rhyme
"brave" and "glaive," and make sense out of it. Sure not.

But Presley's case was a notable exception. On no occasion was
Annixter prepared to accept another man's opinion without reserve.
In conversation with him, it was almost impossible to make any direct
statement, however trivial, that he would accept without either
modification or open contradiction. He had a passion for violent
discussion. He would argue upon every subject in the range of
human knowledge, from astronomy to the tariff, from the doctrine of
predestination to the height of a horse. Never would he admit himself to
be mistaken; when cornered, he would intrench himself behind the remark,
"Yes, that's all very well. In some ways, it is, and then, again, in
some ways, it ISN'T."

Singularly enough, he and Presley were the best of friends. More than
once, Presley marvelled at this state of affairs, telling himself
that he and Annixter had nothing in common. In all his circle of
acquaintances, Presley was the one man with whom Annixter had never
quarrelled. The two men were diametrically opposed in temperament.
Presley was easy-going; Annixter, alert. Presley was a confirmed
dreamer, irresolute, inactive, with a strong tendency to melancholy;
the young farmer was a man of affairs, decisive, combative,