The tall gentleman with the auburn whiskers wiped his face with a handkerchief, which he took from his hat, and stated with some timidity that he hoped he did not intrude at that late hour. He had sent his pass-book, and-- "I have looked it over, suh, repeatedly, with the greatest pleasure. It is a custom new to us in my county, but it meets with my hearty approval. Give yo' hat to my servant, suh, and take this seat by the fire." The proprietor of the hat after some protestations suffered Chad to bear away that grateful protection to his slightly bald head,--retaining his handkerchief, which he finally rolled up into a little wad and kept tightly clenched in the perspiring palm of his left hand,--and then threw out the additional hope that everything was satisfactory. "Delicious, suh; I have not tasted such Madeira since the wah. In my cellar at home, suh, I once had some old Madeira of '28 that was given to my father, the late General John Caarter, by old Judge Thornton. You, of course, know that wine, suh. Ah! I see that you do." And then followed one of the colonel's delightful monologues descriptive of all the vintages of that year, the colonel constantly appealing to the dazed and delighted grocerman to be set right in minor technical matters,--the grocer understanding them as little as he did the Aztec dialects,--the colonel himself supplying the needed data and then thanking the auburn gentleman for the information so charmingly that for the moment that worthy tradesman began to wonder why he had not long before risen from the commonplace level of canned vegetables to the more sublime plane of wines in the wood. "Now the Madeira you sent me this mornin', suh, is a trifle too fruity for my taste. Chad, open a fresh bottle." The owner of the pass-book instantly detected a very decided fruity flavor, but thought he had another wine, which he would send in the morning, that might suit the colonel's palate better. The colonel thanked him, and then drifted into the wider field of domestic delicacies,--the preserving of fruits, the making of pickles as practiced on the plantations by the old Virginia cooks,--the colonel waxing eloquent over each production, and the future wine merchant becoming more and more enchanted as the colonel flowed on. When he rose to go the grocer had a mental list of the things he would send the colonel in the morning all arranged in his commercial head, and so great was his delight that, after shaking hands with me once and with the colonel three times, he would also have extended that courtesy to Chad had not that perfectly trained servant checkmated him by filling his extended palm with the rim of his own hat. [Illustration]