y means of an aperture in the face,
devised by nature for that express purpose. And besides, nobody looked
at Bibbs.

He was better content to be left to himself; his voice was not strong
enough to make itself heard over the hubbub without an exhausting
effort, and the talk that went on about him was too fast and too
fragmentary for his drawl to keep pace with it. So he felt relieved when
each of his neighbors in turn, after a polite inquiry about his health,
turned to seek livelier responses in other directions. For the talk
went on with the eating, incessantly. It rose over the throbbing of the
orchestra and the clatter and clinking of silver and china and glass,
and there was a mighty babble.

"Yes, sir! Started without a dollar."... "Yellow flounces on the
overskirt--"... "I says, 'Wilkie, your department's got to go bigger
this year,' I says."... "Fifteen per cent. turnover in thirty-one
weeks."... "One of the biggest men in the biggest--"... "The wife says
she'll have to let out my pants if my appetite--"... "Say, did you see
that statue of a Turk in the hall? One of the finest things I ever--"...
"Not a dollar, not a nickel, not one red cent do you get out o' me,' I
says, and so he ups and--"... "Yes, the baby makes four, they've lost
now."... "Well, they got their raise, and they went in big."... "Yes,
sir! Not a dollar to his name, and look at what--"... "You wait! The
population of this town's goin' to hit the million mark before she
stops."... "Well, if you can show me a bigger deal than--"

And through the interstices of this clamoring Bibbs could hear the
continual booming of his father's heavy voice, and once he caught the
sentence, "Yes, young lady, that's just what did it for me, and that's
just what'll do it for my boys--they got to make two blades o' grass
grow where one grew before!" It was his familiar flourish, an old
story to Bibbs, and now jovially declaimed for the edification of Mary
Vertrees.

It was a great night for Sheridan--the very crest of his wave. He sat
there knowing himself Thane and master by his own endeavor; and his big,
smooth, red face grew more and more radiant with good will and with the
simplest, happiest, most boy-like vanity. He was the picture of health,
of good cheer, and of power on a holiday. He had thirty teeth, none
bought, and showed most of them when he laughed; his grizzled hair was
thick, and as unruly as a farm laborer's; his chest was deep and big
beneath it