Many warm-hearted people felt a great sympathy for Doctor Vardaman in his isolation and solitude after Miss Clara's death; I suspect that had the doctor been an old maid instead of an old bachelor, he would not have received so much attention. There is something in the spectacle of an elderly unattached male being, no matter how independent he may be, or how capable of taking care of himself, that at once engages the solicitude of all his friends, men and women alike. Everybody felt sorry for him; everybody wondered how he got along. Doctor Vardaman was a hale old gentleman verging on seventy, it is true, but still vigorous of mind and body, and with pronounced notions of his own on the subject of diet, hygiene, and the conduct of life generally. No one could have needed benevolent supervision less; but he might well have prayed with the antique worthy to be delivered from his friends. At Christmas he used to describe himself as blushing to his very heels and retreating in shamed confusion before the stern gaze of the expressman who unloaded case after case of expensive wines and spirits before his door; that he already had a whole cellar-full partly of his own collecting, partly inherited from his father, a man of means and discernment in such matters, made no manner of difference to these eager and generous givers. If he had smoked as diligently as a factory-chimney, he could not have vanquished the army of cigars he received yearly. A centipede would not have accommodated all the doctor's pairs of knit and crocheted slippers; he solemnly avowed that there were bales of smoking-jackets and pen-wipers stored in his garret. He could have paved his walk with paper-weights, yet I never saw him use but one--a glass globe with a remarkable cameo-looking head encircled by a wreath of flowers mysteriously embedded beneath the surface, which Gwynne and I, clubbing our pennies, had presented to him the first Christmas after we were enlightened on the Santa Claus subject. He used to laugh and make little jokes about his being an "universal favourite" like certain patent medicines; yet he had a sentiment for all this trash, and would not allow it to be thrown or given away, except when kindness took the form of sending some perishable delicacy for his table, a frequent occurrence after Miss Clara's death, as it was known he had some trouble in getting competent "help." It would have been physically impossible for the doctor to get through all the aspic jelly, mango-pickle, and fruit-cake bestowed on him, and he said that it went against his medical conscience to give these rich dainties away, yet that must be done sometimes.