Lucian was in gayest spirits. He seized the coffee-pot. "No one should be trusted to pour out coffee," he said, "but a genuine lover of the beverage. See the people pour out who are not real coffee-drinkers themselves; they pour stingily, reluctantly; they give you cold coffee, or coffee half milk, or cups half full; they cannot understand how you can wish for more. Coffee doesn't agree with them very well; they find it, therefore, difficult to believe--in fact they never do believe--that it should really agree with you. It may have been all talked over in the family circle, and a fair generosity on the part of the non-loving pourer guaranteed; but I tell you that in spite of guarantees, she _will_ scrimp." Mr. Moore, a delicate pink flush on his cheeks, now came up with his grilled slices, which proved to be excellent. "My cousin, you are a wonderful person," said Lucian. Mr. Moore made a little disclaiming murmur in his throat; "Er-um, er-um," he said, waving his hand in a deprecatory way. "--But you ought to have been a Frenchman," pursued Lucian. Mr. Moore opened his eyes. "Because then your goodness would have been so resplendent, my cousin. As it is, it shines on an American background, and eight-tenths of native-born Americans are good men." "Yes, we have, I think, a high standard of morality," said Mr. Moore, with approbation. "And also a high standard of splendor," continued Lucian; "we are, I am sure, the most splendid nation in the world. Some years ago, my cousin, a clergyman at the West was addressing his congregation on a bright Sunday morning; he was in the habit of speaking without notes, and of preaching what are called practical sermons. Wishing to give an example of appropriate Christian simplicity, he began a sentence as follows: 'For instance, my friends, none of you would think of coming to the house of the Lord in'--here he saw a glitter from diamond ear-rings in several directions--'of coming to the house of the Lord, I say, in'--here he caught the gleam from a number of breastpins--'in'--here two or three hands, from which the gloves had been removed, stirring by chance, sent back to him rays from wrists as well as fingers--'in _tiaras_ of diamonds, my friends,' he concluded at last, desperately. His congregation had on there, before his eyes, every other known arrangement of the stone." Mr. Moore smiled slightly--just enough not to be disagreeable; then he turned the conversation. Mr. Moore was strong at that; he thought it a great moral engine, and had often wondered (to Penelope) that it was not employed oftener. For instance, in difficult cases: if violent language were being used in one's presence--turn the conversation; in family quarrels and disagreements--the same; in political discussions of a heated nature--surely there could be no method so simple or so efficacious. It proved efficacious now in the face of Lucian's frivolity. "Our next course will consist of oysters," he remarked.