bray, I think," said Tom, in despair. "Do you know where Mr.
Briggs is now?"

"And why the devil do you want to know?
For that's a verse, sir, although somewhat slow."

The two men laughed in spite of themselves.

"Better tell the fellow the plain truth," said Campbell to Thurnall.

"Come out with us, and I will tell you." And Campbell threw down the
money, and led him off, after he had gulped down his own brandy, and
half Tom's beside.

"What? leave the nepenthe untasted?"

They took him out, and he tucked his arms through theirs, and strutted
down Drury Lane.

"The fact is, sir,--I speak to you, of course, in confidence, as one
gentleman to another--"

Mr. Barker replied by a lofty and gracious bow.

"That his family are exceedingly distressed at his absence, and his
wife, who, as you may know, is a lady of high family, dangerously ill;
and he cannot be aware of the fact. This gentleman is the medical man of
her family, and I--I am an intimate friend. We should esteem it
therefore the very greatest service if you would give us any information
which--"

"Weep no more, gentle shepherds, weep no more;
For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead,
Sunk though he be upon a garret floor,
With fumes of Morpheus' crown about his head."

"Fumes of Morpheus' crown?" asked Thurnall.

"That crimson flower which crowns the sleepy god,
And sweeps the soul aloft, though flesh may nod."

"He has taken to opium!" said Thurnall to the bewildered Major. "What I
should have expected."

"God help him! we must save him out of that last lowest deep!" cried
Campbell. "Where is he, sir?"

"A vow! a vow! I have a vow in heaven!
Why guide the hounds toward the trembling hare?
Our Adonais hath drunk poison; Oh!
What deaf and viperous murderer could crown
Life's early cup with such a draught of woe?"

"As I live, sir," cried Campbell, losing his self-possession in disgust
at the fool; "you may rhyme your own nonsense as long as you will, but
you shan't quote the Adonais about that fellow in my presence."

Mr. Barker shook himself fiercely free of Campbell's arm, and faced
round at him in a fighting attitude. Campbell stood eyeing him sternly,
but at his wit's end.

"Mr. Barker," said Tom blandly, "will you have another glass of brandy
and water, or shall I call a policeman?"

"Sir," sputtered he, speaking prose at last, "this gentleman has
insulted me! He has called my poetry nonsense, and my friend a