The man who was munching cheese and crackers wore a hat rather large for him, pulled down over his eyes. He now said that he did not care if he took a gin-sling, and the bar-keeper promptly set it before him on the counter, and saluted with “Good evening, Colonel,” a large man who came in, carrying a small dog in his arms. Bartley recognized him as the manager of a variety combination playing at one of the theatres, and the manager recognized the little man with the gin-sling as Tommy. He did not return the bar-keeper's salutation, but he asked, as he sat down at a table, “What do I want for supper, Charley?” The bar-keeper said, oracularly, as he leaned forward to wipe his counter with a napkin, “Fricassee chicken.” “Fricassee devil,” returned the manager. “Get me a Welsh rabbit.” The bar-keeper, unperturbed by this rejection, called into the tube behind him, “One Welsh rabbit.” “I want some cold chicken for my dog,” said the manager. “One cold chicken,” repeated the bar-keeper, in his tube. “White meat,” said the manager. “White meat,” repeated the bar-keeper. “I went into the Parker House one night about midnight, and I saw four doctors there eating lobster salad, and devilled crab, and washing it down with champagne; and I made up my mind that the doctors needn't talk to me any more about what was wholesome. I was going in for what was _good_. And there aint anything better for supper than Welsh rabbit in _this_ world.” As the manager addressed this philosophy to the company at large, no one commented upon it, which seemed quite the same to the manager, who hitched one elbow over the back of his chair, and caressed with the other hand the dog lying in his lap. The little man in the large hat continued to walk up and down, leaving his gin-sling on the counter, and drinking it between his visits to the cracker and cheese. “What's that new piece of yours, Colonel?” he asked, after a while. “I aint seen it yet.” “Legs, principally,” sighed the manager. “That's what the public wants. I give the public what it wants. I don't pretend to be any better than the public. Nor any worse,” he added, stroking his dog. These ideas struck Bartley in their accordance with his own ideas of journalism, as he had propounded them to Ricker. He had drunk half of his hot-scotch. “That's what I say,” assented the little man. “All that a theatre has got to do is to keep even with the public.” “That's so, Tommy,” said the manager of a school of morals, with wisdom that impressed more and more the manager of a great moral engine. “The same principle runs through everything,” observed Bartley, speaking for the first time. The drink had stiffened his tongue somewhat, but it did not incommode his utterance; it rather gave dignity to it, and his head was singularly clear. He lifted his empty glass from the table, and, catching the bar-keeper's eye, said, “Do it again.” The man brought it back full.