Serene and dignified, Gran'pa raised a hand for quiet. But the uproar increased. Was there ever a worse example of obstinate, greedy old age? "Confound them!" I heard Gran'pa say. Then he stood on the table and shouted at them as if they were dogs. "_Be quiet!_" he yelled. A sudden silence followed his words and, roused to fury at last, Gran'pa shouted out:-- "If there's another murmur I'll scrap the damned lot of those glands! What the devil do you mean by all this commotion? A nice lot of miserable cowards you are . . ." He turned to his supporters on the platform and made a gesture in the direction of the audience. "These are the men," he sneered, "who fattened on the late war--men who boasted of what they would have done had they been thirty years younger! Look at their courage now! My God! . . ." He said very little more in this strain, but what he did say was to the point. It shamed those seventy-nine resentful and spiteful old men into the most abject silence I have ever seen. They cringed and wilted before the tornado of his passion, until at last one of them stood up and apologized for himself and the rest of the company. "That's quite all right! . . ." murmured Gran'pa, diffidently. "I think we all lost our heads for a moment. Please forgive me if I broke the bad news too suddenly." How could they help cheering him after that? More noise! Then quietness, as Gran'pa counted out the beans. "With your permission, gentlemen," he said tactfully, "I am retaining the first white one for my fiancée." (A voice: "Yes! Yes!"--followed by unanimous approval!) "That," he continued, "leaves twenty-one. . . . Now for the red ones." After a momentary and dramatic silence, Gran'pa said:-- "Fifty-eight! Would you mind checking the numbers, George? . . . Oh! We want a hat! . . ." A battered old thing was handed up by an octogenarian company promoter, and the proceedings began. I would a thousand times rather have died from old age than face that terrible ordeal. It was gruesome, piteous, cruel. It seemed as if we were executioners taking part in some frightful Bolshevik rite. And yet it had to be. . . . One by one, they filed past the Altar of Youth and Death, plunging shaking hands into that innocent-looking symbol of the future, fumbling therein for awhile, and then bringing forth--everything or nothing. A groan, a sigh, a sharp exclamation of despair, or satisfaction, or joy escaped each one of them as they went slowly by. Some of those who drew the white beans of youth tried to conceal their good luck, as if afraid that their unfortunate brothers might think they were gloating. It was that spirit of consideration more than anything, which moved me almost to tears. On the other hand, there was one man who branded himself for all time. I should imagine that he was a retired card-sharper. His crime consisted of taking out three beans, quickly separating the white one from two reds, and dropping the latter back in the hat.