“She set before chance-comers,
      But such whose father-grape grew fat
     On Lusitanian summers.”

That the beverage fulfilled this condition may be doubted.  But it was certainly sweet and potent, and for the children at any rate a couple of glasses of it induced a haze upon the feast—­a sort of golden fog through which Mr. Mortimer loomed in a halo of diffusive hospitality.  He used his handkerchief for a table-napkin, and made great play with it as they do in banquets on the stage.

He pronounced the tripe-and-onions “fit for Lucullus,” whatever that might mean.  He commended the flouriness of the potatoes, in the cooking of which he claimed to be something of an amateur—­“being Irish, my dear Smiles, on my mother’s side.”  He sipped the port and passed it for “sound, sir, a wine of unmistakable body,” though for bouquet not comparable with the contents of a famous bin once the pride of his paternal cellars at Scaresby Hall, Northamptonshire.  He became reminiscential, and spoke with a break in his voice of a certain—­

   “Banquet hall deserted,
     Whose lights were fled,
     Whose garlands dead,
    And all but he [Mr. Mortimer] departed.”

Here he wiped his eyes with the handkerchief that had hitherto done duty for napkin, and passed, himself, with equal adaptability to a new role.  He would give them the toast of “Their Youthful Guests.”—­

“They are, I understand, about to leave us.  It is not ours to gaze too closely into the crystal of fate; nor, as I gather, do they find it convenient to specify the precise conditions of their departure.  But of this”—­with a fine roll of the voice, and a glance at Mrs. Mortimer—­” of this we may rest assured:  that the qualities which, within the span of our acquaintance, they have developed, will carry them far; yet not so far that they will forget their fellow-travellers whose privilege it was to watch over them while they fledged their wings; and perhaps not so far but they may hear, and rejoice in, some echo of that fame which (if I read the omens aright)”—­here again he glanced at his wife—­ “the public will be unable much longer to withhold.”

Altogether, and in spite of his high-flown language, Mr. Mortimer gave the children an impression that he and his wife were honestly sorry to part with them.  And when the supper—­protracted by his various arts to the semblance of a banquet of many courses—­came at length to an end, Mrs. Mortimer dropped a quite untheatrical tear as she embraced them and bade them good-bye.

Sam Bossom walked with them to the bridge and there took his leave, promising to meet them faithfully on the morrow by Weston Lock.

“Though,” said he, “there be scenes hereabouts that I finds painful, and I’m doin’ a great deal to oblige you.”

“It’s a strange thing to me,” said Tilda reflectively, gazing after him until his tall figure was lost in the darkness between the gas-lamps, “’ow all these grown-ups get it fixed in their ’eads that they’re doin’ the pertectin’.  I reckon their size confuses ’em.”