g led, and with Saxton glowing at him as warmly and greasily as
the mutton chops, Milt could only smile wanly, and reflectively feel
the table leg to see if it was loose enough to jerk out in case of need.

Saxton was being optimistic:

"In fact, Claire and I both hope that some day when you've finished your
engineering course, we'll see you in the East. I wonder---- As I say, my
dear fellow, I've taken the greatest fancy to you, and I do hope you
won't think I'm too intimate if I say that I imagine that even in your
charming friendship with Miss Boltwood, you've probably never learned
what important people the Boltwoods are. I thought I'd tell you so that
you could realize the privilege both you and I have in knowing them.
Henry B. is--while not a man of any enormous wealth--regarded as one of
the keenest intellects in New York wholesale circles. But beyond that,
he is a scholar, and a man of the broadest interests. Of course the
Boltwoods are too modest to speak of it, but he was chiefly instrumental
in the establishment of the famous Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra. And his
ancestors clear through--his father was a federal judge, and his
mother's brother was a general in the Civil War, and afterwards an
ambassador. So you can guess something of the position Claire holds in
that fine, quiet, solid old Brooklyn set. Henry Ward Beecher himself was
complimented at being asked to dine with the Boltwoods of his day,
and----"

No, the table leg wouldn't come loose, so it was only verbally that the
suddenly recovered Milt attacked:

"Certainly is nice to have one of those old families. It's something
like---- As you say, you and I have gotten pretty well acquainted along
the line, so I guess I can say it to you---- My father and his folks
came from that same kind of family. Father's dad was a judge, back in
Maine, and in the war, grand-dad was quite friendly with Grant."

This tribute of Milt to his grandsire was loyal but inaccurate. Judge
Daggett, who wasn't a judge at all, but a J. P., had seen General Grant
only once, and at the time the judge had been in company with all the
other privates in the Fourteenth Maine.

"Dad was a pioneer. He was a doctor. He had to give up all this
easy-going stuff in order to help open up the West to civilization, but
I guess it was worth it. He used to do the hardest kind of operations,
on kitchen tables, with his driver giving the chloroform. I'm mighty
proud of him. As you say, it's k