I had not.

Booth thereupon rang the bell, and when the boy presented himself, called for a Bible. Garcon disappeared, and came back soon with a Bible on a waiter.

Our tragedian took the book, and proceeded to argue his point by means of texts selected skilfully here and there, from Genesis to Revelation.  He referred to the fact that it was not till after the Deluge men were allowed, “for the hardness of their hearts,” as he maintained, to eat meat.  But in the beginning it was not so; only herbs were given to man, at first, for food.  He quoted the Psalmist (Psalm civ. 14) to show that man’s food came from the earth, and was the green herb; and contended that the reason why Daniel and his friends were fairer and fatter than the children who ate their portion of meat was that they ate only pulse (Daniel i. 12-15).  These are all of his Scriptural arguments which I now recall; but I thought them very ingenious at the time.

The argument took some time.  Then he recited one or two pieces bearing on the same subject, closing with Byron’s Lines to his Newfoundland Dog.

“In connection with that poem,” he continued, “a singular event once happened to me.  I was acting in Petersburg, Virginia.  My theatrical engagement was just concluded, and I dined with a party of friends one afternoon before going away.  We sat after dinner, singing songs, reciting poetry, and relating anecdotes.  At last I recited those lines of Byron on his dog.  I was sitting by the fireplace, my feet resting against the jamb, and a single candle was burning on the mantel.  It had become dark.  Just as I came to the end of the poem,—­

  “’To mark a friend’s remains these stones arise,
  I never knew but one, and here he lies,’—­

“my foot slipped down the jamb, and struck a dog, who was lying beneath.  The dog sprang up, howled, and ran out of the room, and at the same moment the candle went out.  I asked whose dog it was.  No one knew.  No one had seen the dog till that moment.  Perhaps you will smile at me, Sir, and think me superstitious,—­but I could not but think that the animal was brought there by occult sympathy.”

Having uttered these oracular words in a very solemn tone, Booth rose, and, taking one of the candles, said to me, “Would you like to look at the remains?”

I assented.  Asking our silent friend to excuse us, he led me into an adjoining chamber.  I looked toward a bed in the corner of the room, expecting to see a corpse.  There was none there.  But Booth went to another corner of the room, where, spread out upon a large sheet, I saw—­what do you suppose, dear reader?

About a bushel of Wild Pigeons!