sat between Hamlet and Lazarus, and Father Tombs between
their wives; where Sister March was in the prettiest good humor
conceivable and the puns were of the sort that need to be italicized,
and the anecdotes were family heirlooms, and the mirth was as
spontaneous as the wit was scarce, and not one bad conscience was hidden
beneath it all. The true social event of that hour was the repast given
by John March to Mr. Fair in Swanee Hotel, at which General Halliday,
Captain Champion, and Dr. Coffin were on John's left, Ravenel sat at the
foot of the board, and at John's right were Fair, in the place of honor,
then Garnet, and then Shotwell in the seat appointed for Gamble, who had
suddenly found he couldn't possibly stay.

Here were no mothers' quotations of their children's accidental wit, nor
husbands' and wives' betrayals of silly sweetnesses of long-gone
courtships and honeymoons. Passing from encomiums upon Parson Tombs's
powers to the subject of eloquence in general, the allusions were mainly
to Edmund Burke, John C. Calhoun, Sargent S. Prentiss, and Lorenzo Dow.
The examples of epigram were drawn from the times of Addison, those of
poetic wisdom from Pope, of witty jest from Douglas Jerrold and Sidney
Smith, of satire from Randolph of Roanoke. John March told, very
successfully, how a certain great poet of the eighteenth century
retorted impromptu upon a certain great lord in a double-rhymed and
triple-punned repartee. Champion and Shotwell, in happy alternation,
recited two or three incredible nonsense speeches attributed to early
local celebrities, and Garnet and Halliday gave the unpublished inside
histories of three or four hitherto inexplicable facts, or seeming
facts, in the personal or political relations of Marshall, Jackson,
Webster, and Clay. Burns and Byron were there in spirit, and John could
have recited one of his mother's poems if anyone had asked for it.

As for Ravenel and Fair, they had their parts and performed them
harmoniously with the rest, so that John could see that he himself and
everyone else were genuinely interesting to those two and that they were
growingly interesting to each other. Both possessed the art of provoking
the others to talk; they furnished the seed of conversation and were its
gardeners, while the rest of the company bore its fruits and flowers.
Ravenel seemed always to keep others talking for his diversion, Fair for
his information.

John pointed this out to Miss Garnet