"Men of the world, are they? By Jove! Well; perhaps so; I havn't met them yet. But if it comes to pointing out men of the world, allow me to indicate our Louisiana friend, Ravenel. There's a fellow who can do the universally agreeable. You couldn't tell this evening which he liked best, Whitewood or me; and I'll be hanged if the same man can like both of us. When he was talking with the Professor he seemed to be saying to himself, 'Whitewood is my blue-book;' and when he was talking with me his whole countenance glowed with an expression which stated that 'Carter is the boy.' What a diplomatist he would make! I like him immensely. He has a charming daughter too; not beautiful exactly, but very charming." Colburne felt an oppression which would not allow him to discuss the question. At the same time he was not indignant, but only astonished, perhaps also a little pleased, at the tone of indifference with which the other spoke of the young lady. His soul was so occupied with this new train of thought that I doubt whether he heard understandingly the conversation of his interlocutor for the next few minutes. Suddenly it struck him that Carter was entirely sober, in body and brain. "Colonel, wouldn't you like to go on a pic-nic?" he asked abruptly. "Pic-nic?--political thing? Why, yes; think I ought to like it; help along our regiment." "No, no; not political. I'm sorry I gave you such an exalted expectation; now you'll be disappointed. I mean an affair of young ladies, beaux, baskets, paper parcels, sandwiches, cold tongue, biscuits and lemonade." "Lemonade!" said Carter with a grimace. "Could a fellow smoke?" "I take that liberty." "Is Miss Ravenel going?" "Yes." "I accept. How do you go?" "In an omnibus. I will see that you are taken up--say at nine o'clock to-morrow morning." CHAPTER IV. THE DRAMATIC PERSONAGES GO ON A PIC-NIC, AND STUDY THE WAYS OF NEW BOSTON. When the Lieutenant-Colonel awoke in the morning he did not feel much like going on a pic-nic. He had a slight ache in the top of his head, a huskiness in the throat, a woolliness on the tongue, a feverishness in the cuticle, and a crawling tremulousness in the muscles, as though the molecules of his flesh were separately alive and intertwining themselves. He drowsily called to mind a red-nosed old gentleman whom he had seen at a bar, trying in vain to gather up his change with shaky fingers, and at last exclaiming, "Curse the change!" and walking off hastily in evident mortification. "Ah, Carter! you will come to that yet," thought the Lieutenant-Colonel.--"To be sure," he added after a moment, "this sobering one's self by main strength of will, as I did last night, is an extra trial, and enough to shake any man's system.--But how about breakfast and that confounded pic-nic?" was his next reflection. "Carter, temperance man as you are, you must take a cocktail, or you won't be able to eat a mouthful this morning."