Kenniston's gracious mood was not of long continuance. He was of the temperament which demands a prerequisite for good nature. Given an adequate reason to be happy, and he could show you a fine article of felicity. But his heart would not bubble with gratitude on general principles for ordinary blessings enjoyed in common by humanity at large. It was not enough for him that the fried chicken was fat; that his cigar was good; that as he smoked after supper on the little porch, the air was so fragrant, so fine, so dry; that the stars were brighter for the great dark amphitheatre of mountains above whose summits, serrated against the horizon, his far-reaching gaze sought them; that Julia, as she sat on the step of the threshold, had an outline and a coiffure that he would have discriminated as classic in marble; that every trace of the battered beauty of old Cap'n Lucy's countenance vanished, leaving it a unique ideal for a gargoyle, when his guest chanced to intimate that he had written to the register in the county town, who had furnished him with the calls from his title-deeds, and that he felt very sure that Cap'n Lucy had inadvertently trespassed on his neighbor's domain. Harmoniously ugly as his countenance was, Cap'n Lucy's conduct was more so. "Waal, sir," he said, after an interval of stunned dismay, during which Kenniston leaned forward, drawing with his cane an imaginary line on the floor, and repeating the measurements for the boundaries from the paper in his hand, "ye an' the register may go to hell, sir, an' brile, sir!" Cap'n Lucy's face was very distinct in the light from the fire within the door, as he sat tilted back in the chair against the post of the porch, and a sudden sensation ensued amongst his household as they gazed upon him, astounded by this unprecedented breach of all the canons of hospitality. There was silence for a moment. Luther stirred uneasily, the legs of his chair rasping harshly on the rough flooring of the porch. Even Julia gave signs of having heard by turning her head slowly, with a certain interest and excitement on her impassive face. Adelicia's eyes dilated with alarm as she half rose from her seat on the step of the porch; she had grown pale; her delicate, fine little chin and her lips quivered with the agitation of the moment. "Oh, uncle Lucy, ye don't mean that,--ye don't mean that, now!" she urged. "Oh, I ain't partic'lar ez ter _when_!" the old man blurted out. And then he paused to chuckle in sinister fashion over his play upon the double meaning of the word "now" in this connection. He had a satisfaction, too, in thwarting the ever-ready peacemaker and apologist, and in her look of balked surprise as she cogitated upon his answer.