al gayety than generally belongs to the German character, and his
good-temper was inexhaustible. He enjoyed everything; he made the best
of everything; he saw food for laughter in everything. He was always
amused, and therefore was always amusing. Above all, there was a
spontaneity in his mirth which acted upon others as a perpetual
stimulant. He was in short, what the French call a _bon garcon_, and the
English a capital fellow; easy without assurance, comic without
vulgarity, and, as Sydney Smith wittily hath it--"a great number of
other things without a great number of other things."

Upon Dalrymple, who had been all day silent, abstracted, and unlike his
usual self, this joyous influence acted like a tonic. As entertainer, he
was bound to exert himself, and the exertion did him good. He threw off
his melancholy; and with the help, possibly, of somewhat more than his
usual quantity of wine, entered thoroughly into the passing joyousness
of the hour. What a _recherche_, luxurious extravagant little dinner it
was, that evening at the Maison Doree! We had a charming little room
overlooking the Boulevard, furnished with as much looking-glass,
crimson-velvet, gilding, and arabesque painting as could be got together
within the space of twelve-feet by eight. Our wine came to table in a
silver cooler that Cellini might have wrought. Our meats were served
upon porcelain that would have driven Palissy to despair. We had nothing
that was in season, except game, and everything that was out; which,
by-the-way, appears to be our modern criterion of excellence with
respect to a dinner. Finally, we were waited upon by the most imposing
of waiters--a waiter whose imperturbable gravity was not to be shaken by
any amount of provocation, and whose neckcloth alone was sufficient to
qualify him for the church.

How merry we were! How Mueller tormented that diplomatic waiter! What
stories we told! what puns we made! What brilliant things we said, or
fancied we said, over our Chambertin and Johannisberger! Mueller knew
nothing of the substratum of sadness underlying all that jollity. He
little thought how heavy Dalrymple's strong heart had been that morning.
He had no idea that my friend and I were to part on the morrow, for
months or years, as the case might be--he to carry his unrest hither and
thither through distant lands; I to remain alone in a strange city,
pursuing a distasteful study, and toiling onward to a future without
fascinat