from his case and lighting it. The Colonel ground his teeth
in silence. His first encounter with his nephew could hardly be called
satisfactory and he did not wish a repetition of it. He had come to
argue his nephew out of his folly through sheer force of logic and it
behooved him to remain as calm as possible during the interview, for his
nephew had a most surprising way of answering back and turning the
argument against one.

"Tell me," he began, "what possible attraction this country can have for
you?"

"It would be quite as impossible to explain that satisfactorily to you
as to make my reasons clear for being here at all. But since you again
ask me for those reasons, I can only answer as I did before. I have
exhausted that felicitous state called civilization. I want to be free."

"Rot!" cried the Colonel, literally snorting and bounding into the air.
"You've no right to be free! Only savages and criminals want to be free!
If that's all you have to say--" but his voice choked and he resumed his
seat in silence.

"I've never heard anything quite so silly!" exclaimed Mrs. Forest who up
to this point had maintained a discreet silence.

"It's true nevertheless," continued the Captain composedly, blowing a
ring of blue smoke into the air. "Civilization, you know, is practically
the same the world over. I have seen and heard everything, read
everything, and met everybody that's worth meeting, and I'm tired of
seeing and hearing them over and over again, year in and year out, with
always the dead certainty of their return to look forward to. Our lives
have become too stilted, too artificial--we lack poise, we live in
grooves. Everything is overdone--there is nothing left for us to
enjoy--our finer sensibilities have become dulled--the simplicity and
refinements of life have been swallowed up by luxury, tawdry display and
prudism."

"Bosh!" cried the Colonel.

"Everybody," the Captain went on, "knows exactly what his neighbor
thinks and is going to say, and should anybody by any chance begin to
think differently and seriously on life, society instantly brands that
person as stupid, if not a little queer. We have lost our independence."

"Nonsense!" said Mrs. Forest.

"Granted for the sake of argument," broke in the Colonel, flipping the
ash from off his cigar. "But what about art, science and literature, the
real things which stand for civilization?"

"Oh! as to them, they are all right in themselves. It is fort