antly than the S---- family and no one is
more informal. If you come on the minute for your dinner, it is likely
that none of the family is about. After a search J---- is found in a
flannel shirt in his garden with a watering-can. "Hello!" he says in
surprise. "What time is it? Have you come already for dinner?"

"For God's sake," you reply--for I assume you to be of familiar and
profane manners--"get up and wash yourself! Don't you know that you
are giving a party?"

J---- affects to be indignant. "Who is giving this party, anyway?" he
asks. "If it's yours, you run it!" And then he leads you to the house,
where you abuse each other agreeably as he dresses.

Once a year on Christmas Eve they give a general party. This has been
a custom for a number of years and it is now an institution as fixed
as the night itself. Invitations are not issued. At most a rumor goes
abroad to the elect that nine o'clock is a proper time to come, when
the children, who have peeked for Santa Claus up the chimney, have at
last been put to bed. There is a great wood fire in the sitting-room
and, by way of andirons, two soldiers of the Continental Army keep up
their endless march across the hearth. The fireplace is encircled by a
line of leather cushions that rest upon the floor, like a window-seat
that has undergone amputation of all its legs.

But the center of the entertainment is a prodigious egg-nog that rises
from the dining table. I do not know the composition of the drink, yet
my nose is much at fault if it includes aught but eggs and whiskey. At
the end of the table J---- stands with his mighty ladle. It is his
jest each year--for always there is a fresh stranger who has not heard
it--it is his jest that the drink would be fair and agreeable to the
taste if it were not for the superfluity of eggs which dull the
mixture.

No one, even of a sour prohibition, refuses his entreaty. My aunt, who
speaks against the Demon, once appeared at the party. She came
sniffing to the table. "Ought I to take it, John?" she asked.

"Mildest thing you ever drank," said John, and he ladled her out a
cup.

My aunt smelled it suspiciously.

"It's eggs," said John.

"Eggs?" said my aunt, "What a funny smell they have!" She said this
with a facial expression not unlike that of Little Red Ridinghood,
when she first saw the old lady with the long nose and sharp eyes.

"Nothing bad, I hope," said John.

"N-no," said my aunt slowly, and she took a s