on. I am told that the South has very fair
treatment in the play. I confess I should like to see the performance
myself."

Miss Lydia threw up her hands in silent despair.

Still, as the tickets were bought, they might as well be used. So that
evening, as they sat in the theater listening to the lively overture,
even Miss Lydia was minded to relegate their troubles, for the hour,
to second place. The Major, in spotless linen, with his extraordinary
coat showing only where it was closely buttoned, and his white hair
smoothly roached, looked really fine and distinguished. The curtain
went up on the first act of _A Magnolia Flower_, revealing a typical
Southern plantation scene. Major Talbot betrayed some interest.

"Oh, see!" exclaimed Miss Lydia, nudging his arm, and pointing to her
program.

The Major put on his glasses and read the line in the cast of
characters that her fingers indicated.

Col. Webster Calhoun .... Mr. Hopkins Hargraves.

"It's our Mr. Hargraves," said Miss Lydia. "It must be his first
appearance in what he calls 'the legitimate.' I'm so glad for him."

Not until the second act did Col. Webster Calhoun appear upon the
stage. When he made his entry Major Talbot gave an audible sniff,
glared at him, and seemed to freeze solid. Miss Lydia uttered a
little, ambiguous squeak and crumpled her program in her hand. For
Colonel Calhoun was made up as nearly resembling Major Talbot as one
pea does another. The long, thin white hair, curly at the ends, the
aristocratic beak of a nose, the crumpled, wide, raveling shirt front,
the string tie, with the bow nearly under one ear, were almost exactly
duplicated. And then, to clinch the imitation, he wore the twin to the
Major's supposed to be unparalleled coat. High-collared, baggy,
empire-waisted, ample-skirted, hanging a foot lower in front than
behind, the garment could have been designed from no other pattern.
From then on, the Major and Miss Lydia sat bewitched, and saw the
counterfeit presentment of a haughty Talbot "dragged," as the Major
afterward expressed it, "through the slanderous mire of a corrupt
stage."

Mr. Hargraves had used his opportunities well. He had caught the
Major's little idiosyncrasies of speech, accent, and intonation and
his pompous courtliness to perfection--exaggerating all to the purpose
of the stage. When he performed that marvelous bow that the Major
fondly imagined to be the pink of all salutations, the audience sent
fort