found something to correct him,--some slip or error to
set right,--an annoyance all the more poignant that Karstairs seemed to
enjoy it heartily. From fabricated wines to poisons the transition
was easy, and they began to talk of certain curious trials wherein the
medical testimony formed the turning-point of conviction. Here, again,
Layton was his superior in information, and made the superiority felt.
Of what the most subtle tests consisted, and wherein their fallacy lay,
he was thoroughly master, while his retentive memory supplied a vast
variety of curious and interesting illustration.

Has our reader ever "assisted" at a scene where the great talker of
a company has unexpectedly found himself confronted by some unknown,
undistinguished competitor, who, with the pertinacity of an actual
persecution, will follow him through all the devious windings of an
evening's conversation, ever present to correct, contradict, amend, or
refute? In vain the hunted martyr seeks out some new line of country, or
starts new game; his tormentor is ever close behind him. Ogden wandered
from law to literature. He tried art, scientific discovery, religious
controversy, agriculture, foreign travel, the drama, and field sports;
and Layton followed him through all,--always able to take up the theme
and carry it beyond where the other had halted. If Millar underwent all
the tortures of an unhappy host at this, Karstairs was in ecstasy.
He had been spending a week at the Rectory in Ogden's company, and it
seemed a sort of just retribution now that this dictatorial personage
should have met his persecutor. Layton, always drinking deeply as the
wine came to him, and excited by a sort of conflict which for years back
he had never known, grew more and more daring in his contradictions,
less deferential, and less fearful of offending. Whatever little reserve
he had felt at first, oozed away as the evening advanced. The law of
physics is the rule of morals, and as the swing of the pendulum is
greater in proportion to the retraction, so the bashful man, once
emancipated from his reserve, becomes the most daringly aggressive
to mortals. Not content with refuting, he now ridiculed; his vein of
banter was his richest, and he indulged it in all the easy freedom of
one who defied reprisals. Millar tried once or twice to interpose, and
was at last fain to suggest that, as the decanters came round untouched,
they should adjourn to coffee.

Ogden rose abrup