And there in that crowded little southern opera-house on that hot February night, the actor who followed the trained seals proceeded to go back. With unfaltering touch he sketched for his audience the great stone country seat called Rakedale Hall, where for centuries the Harrowbys had dwelt. It was as though he took his audience there to visit--through the massive iron gates up the broad avenue bordered with limes, until the high chimneys, the pointed gables, the mullioned windows, and the walls half hidden by ivy, creeping roses and honeysuckles were revealed to them. He took them through the house to the servants' quarters--which he called "the offices"--out into the kitchen gardens, thence to the paved quadrangle of the stables with its arched gateway and the chiming clock above. Tennis-courts, grape-houses, conservatories, they visited breathlessly; they saw over the brow of the hill the low square tower of the old church and the chimneys of the vicar's modest house. And far away, they beheld the trees that furnished cover to the little beasts it was the Earl of Raybrook's pleasure to hunt in the season. Becoming more specific, he spoke of the neighbors, and a bit of romance crept in in the person of the fair-haired Honorable Edith Townshend, who lived to the west of Rakedale Hall. He described at length the picturesque personality of the "racing parson," neighbor on the south, and in full accord with the ideas of the sporting Earl of Raybrook. The events of his youth, he said, crowded back upon him as he recalled this happy scene, and emotion well-nigh choked him. However, he managed to tell of a few of the celebrities who came to dinner, of their bon mots, their preferences in cuisine. He mentioned the thrilling morning when he was nearly drowned in the brook that skirted the "purple meadow"; also the thrilling afternoon when he hid his mother's famous necklace in the biscuit box on the sideboard, and upset a whole household. And he narrated a dozen similar exploits, each garnished with small illuminating details. His audience sat fascinated. All who listened felt that his words rang true--even Lord Harrowby himself, sitting far forward, his hand gripping the seat in front of him, until the white of his knuckles showed through. Next the speaker shifted his scene to Eton, thrilled his hearers with the story of his revolt against Oxford, of his flight to the States, his wild days in Arizona. And he pulled out of his pocket a letter written by the old Earl of Raybrook himself, profanely expostulating with him for his madness, and begging that he return to ascend to the earldom when the old man was no more. The "real Lord Harrowby" finished reading this somewhat pathetic appeal with a little break in his voice, and stood looking out at the audience. "If my brother Allan himself were in the house," he said, "he would have to admit that it is our father speaking in that letter."