Long Quiet Hall,

With its Wine-Colored Wealth of Turkish-Bath Toweling thrown back.

And as we Sat Beneath the Iridescent Glow Of the Keely-Motor

Electric Lamp, which

Glistened and Shimmered Its Stained-Glass Iridescence on all about it, and gave its hue to The Invigorating Beverage, we heeded not the Elemental war waging upon the Queen Anne Exterior of the Hospitable Mansion of my Friend.

And when we were left to our Coffee and our Pipes, we talked of Daggers, and Epitaphs, and Tombs!

And as he told me in a Mysterious Whisper the Story of the Malay Dagger, "Guiltless of all Guile," the Vitreous Eye of that Quaintly Carved Odalisque—for such my fevered fancy Pictured it—was ever Glaring at me with its Sinister Glare!

And when our Ghostly Talk was Interrupted By the Entrance of other Guests, I Quaffed Another Crystal Goblet of My Friend's Brain-Maddening Concoction, and casting a long, lingering Look at the Persian Rug which hid the Graeco-Romanesque Architecture of the vaulted Ceiling, I passed from the Gothic Portals of this Esthetic Shrine into the outer darkness—beyond the glamour of the Seven Lamps of Architecture.

But,—Oh Fitful Fate!—as I passed though The Long, Quiet Hall and by the wine-colored Plush Corner from whose Voluptuous Shadow The Sinister-Eyed, Carved-