sideboard was a wilderness of broken meats
and piled-up dishes, and an overturned card-table beside one of the
windows had strewn the floor with cards. Here, there, everywhere on
chairs, on hooks, were cast sword-belts, neckcloths, neglected wigs.

A peaceful citizen of that day had as soon found himself in a bear-pit;
and even the Colonel's face grew a trifle longer as hands, not too
gentle, conducted him towards the end of the table. "Gentlemen,
gentlemen," he began, "I have been in many companies, as I said before,
and----"

"A speech! Old Gravity's speech!" roared a middle-aged, bold-eyed man,
who had suggested the sally from the windows, and from the first had
set the younger spirits an example of recklessness. "Hear to him!" He
filled a glass of wine and waved it perilously near the Colonel's nose.
"Old Gravity's speech! Give it tongue!" he cried. "The flure's your
own, and we're listening."

Colonel John eyed him with a slight contraction of the features. But
the announcement, if ill-meant, availed to procure silence. The more
sober had resumed their seats. He raised his head and spoke.

"Gentlemen," he said--and it was strange to note the effect of his look
as his eyes fell first on one and then on another, fraught with a
dignity which insensibly wrought on them. "Gentlemen, I have been in
many companies, and I have found it true, all the world over, that what
a man brings he finds. I have the honour to speak to you as a soldier
to soldiers----"

"English or Irish?" asked a tall sallow man--sharply, but in a new
tone.

"Irish!"

"Oh, be jabers!" from the man with the wineglass.

But the Colonel's eye and manner had had their effect, and "Let him
speak!" the sallow man said. "And you, Payton, have done with your
fooling, will you?"

"Well, hear to him!"

"I have been in many camps and many companies, gentlemen," the Colonel
resumed, "and those of many nations. But wherever I have been I have
found that if a man brought courtesy with him, he met with courtesy at
the hands of others. And if he brought no offence, he received none. I
am a stranger here, for I have been out of my own country for a score
of years. On my return you welcome me," he smiled, "a little
boisterously perhaps, but I am sure, gentlemen, with a good intent. And
as I have fared elsewhere I am sure I shall fare at your hands."

"Well, sure," from the background, "and haven't we made you welcome?"

"Almost too freely," the Colonel