In this condition the _Doctor_ particularly was a subject for the freshest amusement, or for the profoundest contemplation. With all his finery and his trinkets on, and his red and yellow paint--with his shield, and bow and quiver lying by his side, he was straightened upon his back, with his feet crossed, as he rested in a corner of the room upon his buffalo robe, which was spread upon the floor. His little looking glass, which was always suspended from his belt, he was holding in his hand, as he was still arranging his beautiful feathers, and contemplating the patches of red and yellow paint, and the _tout ensemble_ of the pigments and _copper colour_ with which he was to make a sensation where he was going to _feast_ (as he had been told) with ladies, an occurrence not known in the annals of the Indian country. He had resolved, on hearing the hour was _twelve_, not to eat his breakfast (which he said might do for women and children), or to take his usual ride in the bus, that he might not injure his growing appetite, or disturb a line of paint or a feather, until the hour had arrived for the honours and the luxuries that awaited them. I reasoned awhile with these three epicures of the land of "_buffaloes' tongues_ and _beavers' tails_," telling them that they were labouring under a misconception of the ideas of gentility as entertained in the civilized and fashionable world; that in London, the genteel people practised entirely the opposite mode from theirs; that light dinners and light breakfasts were all the fashion, and the less a lady or gentleman could be seen eating, the more sentimental he or she was considered, and consequently the more transcendently genteel: and that when they went to breakfast with their friends at 12, or to dine at 7 or 8, they were generally in the habit of promoting gentility by eating a little at home before they started. My reasoning, however, had no other effect than to excite a smile from the Doctor, and the very philosophic reply, "that they should prefer to adhere to their own custom until they got to the lady's house, when they would try to conform to that of the white people of London." The drollness of these remarks from this droll old gentleman entirely prevented Mr. Melody and myself from intruding any further suggestions, until the hour arrived, and it was announced that the carriage was at the door. CHAPTER XIX.