noble idea from the odors of a prairie fire! Surely, Lamb's roast pig was nothing to the discovery of the gentle joy of a wholesome pipe."

"What a droll fancy!" said Francis. "I envy that fellow his first smoke—the first pipe of man."

"My envy," said Chestnut, "is reserved for that medieval priest who by happy chance invented champagne. His first night in the convent wine-cellar with the delicious results of his genius must have been—I wonder no poet has dwelt on this theme."

"We were talking about Madeira," remarked Wilmington, impatiently. "You were about to say, Hamilton,—"

"Only that I am not quite so clear as to our credit for discovering Madeira," said their host.

"No? It is all in Smith's 'Wealth of Nations.' Great Britain allowed no trade with France or Spain; but as to what were called non-enumerated articles we were permitted to trade with the Canary and Madeiras. We took staves and salt fish thither, and fetched back wines. It so happened that the decisive changes of weather our winter and summer afford did more to ripen this wine than its native climate. The English officers during the French war found our Madeiras so good that they took the taste to England."

"And yet," said Chestnut, "Madeira is never good in England. Is it climate, or that they do not know how to keep it?"

"Both—both," returned Wilmington. "They bottle all wines, and that is simply fatal. Madeira was never meant to be retailed. It improves in its own society, as greatness is apt to do."

"I myself fancy," said the host, "that despite English usage, even port is better for the larger liberty of a five-gallon demijohn. I tried this once with excellent result. The wine became pale and delicate like an old Madeira."

"How all this lost lore comes back to me as I used to hear it at my father's table!" said Chestnut. "I recall the prejudice against wine in bottle."

"Prejudice, sir?" retorted Wilmington, testily. "Your demijohn has one cork; your five gallons in bottles, a dozen or two of corks, and the corks give an acrid taste. Some wise old Quaker found this out, sir. That is why there is so little good wine in Charleston and Boston. They bottle their wine. Incredible as it may seem, sir, they bottle their wine."

"That is sad," returned Chestnut, gravely.

"Keep it in demijohns in moderate darkness under the roof," returned Francis. "Then it accumulates virtue like a hermit. I once had a challenge from the Madeira Club in Charleston to test our local theory. They sent me two dozen bottles of their finest Madeira. When we came to make a trial of them, we were puzzled at finding the corks entire, but not a drop of wine in any of the bottles. At last I discovered that some appreciative colored person had emptied them by the clever device of driving a nail through the hollow at the base of the bottles. I found, on experiment, that it could easily be done. A letter from my friends forced me to tell the story. I fancy that ingenious servant may have suffered for his too refined taste."

"But he had the Madeira," said Wilmington grimly, glancing at the old servant. "I have no doubt Uncle John here has a good notion of Madeira."

The old black grinned responsively, and said, with the familiarity of an ancient retainer, "It's de smell ob it, sar. Ye gets to know 'em by de smell, sar."

"That is it, no doubt," laughed Francis. "By and by we shall all have to be content with the smell. It is becoming dearer every year."

"I found yesterday," said Hamilton, "an invoice of fifty-eight pipes of Madeira, of the date of 1760. The wine is set down as costing one dollar and four cents a gallon. I should have thought it might have been less, but then it is spoken of as very fine."

"My father," returned Wilmington, "used to say that the newer wines in his day were not much dearer than good old cider. They drank them by the mugful."

"I remember," said Francis, "that Graydon speaks of it in his 'Memoirs.'"

"Who? What?" cried Wilmington, who was a little deaf. "Oh! Graydon—yes, I know the man and the book, of course, but I do not recall the passage."

"He says: 'Our company'—this was in 1774—'our company was called "The Silk-Stocking Company." The place of rendezvous was the house of our captain,[#] where capacious demijohns of Madeira were constantly set out in the yard, where we formed for regular refreshment before marching out to exercise.' He was most amusing, too, as to why the captain was so liberal of his wine: but I can't quite recall it, and I hate to spoil a quotation. You would find the book entertaining, Chestnut."

[#] Afterward General John Cadwalader.

"How delightful!" exclaimed Chestnut. "Capacious demijohns in the yard, and the descendants of Penn's Quakers—anti-vinous, anti-pugnacious Quakers—drilling for the coming war! By George! one can see it. One guesses that it was not out of such fairy glasses as these they drank the captain's Madeira."

"I am reminded," cried Hamilton, "that I have a letter of the captain's brother, Colonel Lambert Cadwalader, to Jasper Yeates, at Lancaster, in 1776. It is interesting. Wait a moment; I will get it." And so saying, he left the table, and presently returning said, "I will read only the bit about the wine. It shows how much store they set by their good wine even in those perilous days."

"Take particular care of the red chest clampt with iron herewith sent, which contains some bonds and mortgages which I could not take out, the key being lost; and also that you would be kind enough to let the two quarter-casks of Madeira, painted green, be deposited in some safe place under lock and key in your cellar, if possible where you keep your own liquors in a safe place, as I value them more than silver and gold in these times of misfortune and distress."

"Then he goes on to tell the news of Washington's victory at Trenton."

"What a glimpse at the life of those days!" said Chestnut.

During the chat the servant had placed before the host a half-dozen quart decanters filled with wine of various hues and depths of color.

"And now for the wine! We have been losing time," exclaimed their host.

As he spoke, the servant set on either side of the fire a brass-bound, painted bucket in which were a number of decanters—the reserve reinforcements to be used if the main army gave out. Meanwhile the desultory chat went on as the servant distributed the glasses. These were arranged in rather an odd fashion. In the center of the table was set a silver bowl of water. The notches in the rim received each the stem of an inverted glass. Before every guest a glass bowl, much like a modern finger-bowl, held also two wine-glasses. Thus there was to be a glass for each wine, or at need the means for rinsing a glass.

The talk had been more entertaining to the younger men and their host than to Wilmington. He had come for the purpose of tasting wines, and was somewhat annoyed at the delay.

"Dined with Starling last week," he said. "Never was more insulted in my life, sir.