sir, I am always persuaded to accept a bonus on such occasions
for _abstaining_. I have been under pay from both parties, each
suspecting me of standing with the opposition. Needless to say, I have
religiously kept my contract. I never vote. It involves too much
duplicity for a man of my profession."

"Not necessarily. I resided comfortably for quite a period in the
basement of the dwelling of a certain political leader in this
metropolis, once. He wished to have me register for his butler, but I
stickled for private secretary, and private secretary I was written,
sir, though I discovered later that the rogue had registered me as
secretary to his coachman. However, the latter was the better man of the
two--dropped his h's so fast that his master seemed to feel constrained
to send everything to H---- for repairs."

"What else could you expect for a man of _aspirations_?"

"By thunder, Humphrey, that's not bad. But do you see, by yon clock,
that the dinner-hour approacheth?"

The Colonel took from his waistcoat-pocket two bits of paper.

"Somehow, I miss Irving to-day. There's nothing Irving enjoyed so much
as a free dinner-ticket. I see the X. Y. Z.'s are to entertain us at 1
P.M., and the K. R. G.'s at 4."

Sir Humphrey produced two similar checks.

"Well, sir, were Irving here to-day I'd willingly present him with this
Presbyterian chip. There are some things to which I remain sensitive,
and I look this ticket in the face with misgivings. It means being
elbowed by a lot of English-slaying mendicants in a motto-bedecked
saloon, where every bite at the Presbyterian fowl seems a confession of
faith that that particular gobbler, or hen, as the case may be, was
fore-ordained, before the beginning of time, to be chewed by
yourself--or eschewed, should you decline it. Somehow theology takes the
zest out of the cranberries for me. However, _de gustibus_--"

"Well, sir, I am a philosopher, and so was Irving. Poor Irving! He was
never quite square. It was he, you know, who perpetrated that famous
roach fraud that went the rounds of the press. I've seen him do it. He
would enter a restaurant, order a dinner, and, just before finishing,
discover a huge roach, a Croton bug, floating in his plate. Of course
the insects were his own contribution, but the fellow had a knack of
introducing them. He could slip a specimen into his omelette souffle,
for instance, dexterously slicing it in half with his knife, with a
pressure that