But when Bob sought a second, all his business intimates refused, like Joe Skinner, mud clerk--_i. e._ receiving clerk--at the wharf: "I don't mind knocking a man over with a dray-pin in the way of business," said he, "but this ain't in my line. If anybody wants anything out o' Joe Skinner, he gets it then and there. If he wants more, the shop ain't shut: he can get it served hot at all hours. But this cold-luncheon style o' fightin' ain't in my line." Bob succeeded in finding a second, however, with pluck enough to meet the whole Brown clan. Below is the correspondence: MASON'S NOTE. SIR: You will sign the enclosed apology, and pledge yourself not to visit in the family whose hospitality you have abused, or give me the usual satisfaction. L.B. MASON. To R. NETTLES, ESQ., _Main Street._ REPLY OF NETTLES. SIR: My relations with Mr. Brown's family have nothing to do with this difference, nor will I have them drawn into it. For yourself, I am sorry a necessary defence of my person resulted so seriously to you, but I have no apologies to make for injuries you brought upon yourself. This will be conveyed to you by Captain Deane Lee, who is authorized to act in the premises. R. NETTLES. To CAPTAIN L.B. MASON, _Galt House._ EXCHANGED CARDS OF THE SECONDS. WYLDE PAYNE, ESQ., _Galt House._ DEANE LEE, _Conductor Street Railroad._ CHAPTER III. I have often wondered at the freshness, loquacity and altogether unreal tone of the duellists' rooms pending an encounter; and I can only liken it to the mind of an assiduous chess-player, which still even in dreams is tilting with ivory knights and banning with puppet bishops. Such fancies are accepted among duelling men as the real sentiments that move and govern society. To Lind Mason, who was naturally made of paste-board and stuffed with bran, they were the breath in his nostrils. He vapored of the family as if, instead of plain Brown, it had been born in the purple. Payne on his return had said, "The funk wanted to apologize," and that "Lind had a soft thing of it," chaffing his principal not a little over the prospects of his aunt's generosity.