know that _you_ were to meet me, Dick Ganlesse?" answered
their host. "And can you suspect me of such an omission? It is true,
you must make champagne and claret serve, for my burgundy would not bear
travelling. But if you have a fancy for sherry, or Vin de Cahors, I
have a notion Chaubert and Tom Beacon have brought some for their own
drinking."

"Perhaps the gentlemen would not care to impart," said Ganlesse.

"Oh, fie!--anything in the way of civility," replied Smith. "They are,
in truth, the best-natured lads alive, when treated respectfully; so
that if you would prefer----"

"By no means," said Ganlesse--"a glass of champagne will serve in a
scarcity of better."

"The cork shall start obsequious to my thumb."

said Smith; and as he spoke, he untwisted the wire, and the cork struck
the roof of the cabin. Each guest took a large rummer glass of the
sparkling beverage, which Peveril had judgment and experience enough to
pronounce exquisite.

"Give me your hand, sir," said Smith; "it is the first word of sense you
have spoken this evening."

"Wisdom, sir," replied Peveril, "is like the best ware in the pedlar's
pack, which he never produces till he knows his customer."

"Sharp as mustard," returned the _bon vivant_; "but be wise, most noble
pedlar, and take another rummer of this same flask, which you see I
have held in an oblique position for your service--not permitting it
to retrograde to the perpendicular. Nay, take it off before the bubble
bursts on the rim, and the zest is gone."

"You do me honour, sir," said Peveril, taking the second glass. "I wish
you a better office than that of my cup-bearer."

"You cannot wish Will Smith one more congenial to his nature," said
Ganlesse. "Others have a selfish delight in the objects of sense, Will
thrives, and is happy by imparting them to his friends."

"Better help men to pleasures than to pains, Master Ganlesse," answered
Smith, somewhat angrily.

"Nay, wrath thee not, Will," said Ganlesse; "and speak no words in
haste, lest you may have cause to repent at leisure. Do I blame thy
social concern for the pleasures of others? Why, man, thou dost therein
most philosophically multiply thine own. A man has but one throat, and
can but eat, with his best efforts, some five or six times a day; but
thou dinest with every friend that cuts a capon, and art quaffing wine
in other men's gullets, from morning to night--_et sic de caeteris_."

"Friend Ganlesse," return