“So, young ladies,” said my grandfather (for whose annual tunes no one, somehow, had thought of calling), “you will have a fiddle to dance by, after all.” A remark that elicited a joyous clapping of hands; and there was a general stir for partners. “Dares any man to speak to me of fiddling,” said Billy, “before I have punished a few dozen of these bivalves?” “That’s right, Billy! Dick, some oysters for Mr. Jones! They were never better than this season!” Billy passed into the next room, where Dick and his spouse began to serve him with hospitable zeal. “How was she, Marse Billy?” Billy had just disposed of a monster that Dick had opened for him, and was looking thoughtful. “Uncle Dick, it almost makes me cry to think how much better that oyster was than any we can get at the University; indeed it does.” Dick chuckled with delight. “I believe you, Marse Billy; dey tells me dere ain’t no better oysters in all Fidginny dan de Leicester oyster.” Four or five students, who, like Billy, had run down home for the holidays, had collected round the doorway leading into the library, and with them several girls who were listening in a half-suppressed titter to Billy’s solemn waggery. Lifting a huge “bivalve” on the prongs of his fork, he contemplatively surveyed it. “You are right, Uncle Dick; Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these!” “Jess so! What I tell you, Polly?” said Dick, straightening himself and holding an unopened oyster in one hand and his knife in the other. “Didn’t I say the Nuniversity was de most high-larnt school in de Nunited States?” Polly, being Mrs. Dick, had too great an admiration for that worthy’s wisdom to do anything but simper assent. “Jess so,”—and he held his eye upon her till he felt sure that she had abandoned all thought of protesting against his dictum,—“eben so. You right, Marse Billy; Solomon nor no other man never raised ’em like one o’ dese. Ain’t you takin’ nothin’ to-night, Marse William? Dey tells me toddy help a oyster powerful.” “Uncle Dick,” exclaimed Billy, with admiring surprise, “how do you manage always to know exactly what a fellow wants?” “Marse William,”—and Dick drew himself up to his full height,—“I ain’t been ’sociatin’ wid de quality all dese years for nothin’.”