It struck me as peculiar that Lorand had written to me that he did not
wish the elegiac tone of our first gathering to be disturbed by the
voice of the stoics of Lankadomb, yet he had invited the whole Epicurean
alliance here--a fact which was likely to give a dithyrambic tone to our
meeting.

Well, amusement there must be. I like fellows who amuse themselves.

It was late evening when a five-horsed coach drove into the
courtyard--in the first to get out I recognized Gyali.

What did he want among us?

After him stepped out a brisk old man whose moustache and eyebrows I
remembered of old. It was my uncle, Topandy.

Remarkable!

Topandy came straight towards me.

So serious was his face, when, as he reached me, he grasped my hand,
that he made me feel quite confused.

"You are Desiderius Aronffy?" he said: and with his two hands seized my
shoulders, that he might look into my eyes. "Though you do not say so, I
recognize you. It is just as if I saw your departed father before me.
The very image!"

Many had already told me that I was very like what my father had been in
his young days.

Topandy embraced me feelingly.

"Where is Lorand?" I inquired. "Has he not come?"

"He is coming behind us in a wagon," he answered, and his voice betrayed
the greatest emotion. "He will soon be here. He does not like a coach.
Remain here and wait for him."

Then he turned to his comrades who were buzzing around him.

"Let us go and wait inside, comrades. Let us leave these young fellows
to themselves when they meet. You know that such a scene requires no
audience. Well, right about face, quick march!"

Therewith he drove all the fellows from the corridor: indeed did not
give Gyali time to say how glad he was to meet me again.

The gathering became all the more unintelligible to me.

Why, if Topandy himself knew best what there was to be felt in that
hour, what necessity had we to avoid him?

Now the wagon could be heard! The two steeds galloped into the courtyard
at a smart pace with the light road-cart. He was driving himself.

I scarcely recognized him. His great whiskers, his closely-cropped hair,
his dust-covered face made quite a different figure before me from that
which I had been wont to draw in my album,--as I had thought to see, as
mother or grandmother directed me, saying "that is missing, that feature
is other, that is more, that is less, that is different," times without
number we had amused ourselves