hing. Is there a light in my study?"

"Yes. But, before you go, can you give me a moment or two?"

Mr. Rightbody turned a little impatiently towards his wife. She had
thrown herself languidly on the sofa; her hair was slightly disarranged,
and part of a slippered foot was visible. She might have been a
finely-formed woman; but even her careless deshabille left the general
impression that she was severely flannelled throughout, and that any
ostentation of womanly charm was under vigorous sanitary SURVEILLANCE.

"Mrs. Marvin told me to-night that her son made no secret of his serious
attachment for our Alice, and that, if I was satisfied, Mr. Marvin would
be glad to confer with you at once."

The information did not seem to absorb Mr. Rightbody's wandering
attention, but rather increased his impatience. He said hastily, that he
would speak of that to-morrow; and partly by way of reprisal, and partly
to dismiss the subject, added--

"Positively James must pay some attention to the register and the
thermometer. It was over 70 degrees to-night, and the ventilating
draught was closed in the drawing-room."

"That was because Professor Ammon sat near it, and the old gentleman's
tonsils are so sensitive."

"He ought to know from Dr. Dyer Doit that systematic and regular
exposure to draughts stimulates the mucous membrane; while fixed air
over 60 degrees invariably--"

"I am afraid, William," interrupted Mrs. Rightbody, with feminine
adroitness, adopting her husband's topic with a view of thereby
directing him from it,--"I'm afraid that people do not yet appreciate
the substitution of bouillon for punch and ices. I observed that Mr.
Spondee declined it, and, I fancied, looked disappointed. The fibrine
and wheat in liqueur-glasses passed quite unnoticed too."

"And yet each half-drachm contained the half-digested substance of
a pound of beef. I'm surprised at Spondee!" continued Mr. Rightbody
aggrievedly. "Exhausting his brain and nerve force by the highest
creative efforts of the Muse, he prefers perfumed and diluted alcohol
flavored with carbonic acid gas. Even Mrs. Faringway admitted to me
that the sudden lowering of the temperature of the stomach by the
introduction of ice--"

"Yes; but she took a lemon ice at the last Dorothea Reception, and asked
me if I had observed that the lower animals refused their food at a
temperature over 60 degrees."

Mr. Rightbody again moved impatiently towards the door. Mrs. Rightbod