"A man of feeling, gentlemen, has a heart. He is not oblivious either of the needs of his neighbor, his community, or the world in general. Although he is vulnerable to wounds in the house of his friends,"--a severe look falls upon Wiggins,--"he is not impervious to appeal for sympathy from without. I trust I have defined a man of feeling, gentlemen, a man of heart, as regards the world in general. And now, to make an abrupt descent from the abstract to the concrete, from the general to the particular, I will permit myself to say that those aspersions cast upon me fourteen years ago as a mere promoter, irrespective of my manhood, hurt me as a man of feeling--a man of heart. "Sir--" he turned again to Elmer Wiggins who was apparently the lightning conductor for the Colonel's fourteen years of pent-up injury--"a father has his feelings. You are _not_ a father--I draw no conclusions; but _if_ you had been a father fourteen years ago in this very room, I would have trusted to your magnanimity not to give expression to your decided views on the subject of the native Americans' intermarriage with those of a race foreign to us. I assure you, sir, such a view not only narrows the mind, but constricts humanity, and ossifies the heart--that special organ by which the world, despite present-day detractors, lives and moves and has its being." (Murmuring assent.) "But, sir, I believe you have come to see otherwise, else as my guest on this happy occasion, I should not permit myself to apply to you so personal a remark. And, gentlemen," the Colonel swelled visibly, but those nearest him caught the shimmer of a suspicious moisture in his eyes, "I am in a position to-night--this night whereon you have added to my happiness by your presence at this board--to repeat now what I said fourteen years ago in this very room: I consider myself honored in that a member of my immediate family, one very, very dear to me," his voice shook in spite of his effort to strengthen it, "is contemplating entering into the solemn estate of matrimony at no distant date with--a foreigner, gentlemen, but a naturalized citizen of our great and glorious United States. Gentlemen," he filled his glass again and held it high above his head,--"I give you with all my heart Mr. Luigi Poggi, an honored and prosperous citizen of Flamsted--my future son-in-law--the prospective husband of my youngest daughter, Dulcibella Caukins." The company rose to a man, young Caukins assisting Quimber to his feet. With loud and hearty acclaim they welcomed the new member of the Caukins family; they crowded about the Colonel, and no hand that grasped his and Luigi's in congratulation was firmer and more cordial than Elmer Wiggins'. The Colonel's smile expanded; he was satisfied--the old score was wiped out.