Now, a clever host would know how to get out of this; he would start some other subject.  I can think of no other subject.  Happy thought:  gradually glide into American cookery, clams, canvas-backed ducks, what is that dish with a queer name—­Jumbo?  I don’t feel as if it were Jumbo.  Squambo?  Terapin soup?  It sounds rather like the Hebrew for a talisman, or an angel of some sort.  However, they are talking about cookery now, and wines.  Is there not an American wine called Catawampus?  The Mad Doctor has his eye on me; he seems interested.  I thought I heard him murmur Aspasia, or Aphasia, or something like that.  It is not Catawampus—­it is Catawba.  I feel that I patauge—­flounder, I mean.  I am getting quite nervous; feel like a man in a powder-magazine, with lighted cigarettes everywhere.  If one can withdraw them to the smoking-room, they will settle down somehow.  They do.  The Military Critic gets into a corner with BEILBY.  The Americans and I consort together.  Most agreeable fellows; have been everywhere, and seen everything.  CRIMPTON, luckily, is reading one of his own reviews in the evening paper.  I glance at it; it is a review of the Professor’s novel.  Not a kind review—­rather insulting than otherwise.  He hates BEILBY, and he does not know the Military Critic.  If he joins us, there will be more international discussion.  I get them on to the balcony, and pretend to go to ring the bell for coffee.  I whisper to CRIMPTON.  He is quite taken aback.  “Awfully sorry; never dreamed the Professor was not English.”  He wants to tell the Professor that, thinks he will be pleased.  He apologises to me; it is dreadfully disagreeable to be apologised to by a guest.  “All my fault,” I say; and, really, so it is.  CRIMPTON remembers an evening engagement, and goes off a l’Anglaise.

[Illustration:  A PENNY FOR THE MEMBER’S THOUGHTS.]

The Americans go off; say they have enjoyed themselves.  I feel inclined to apologise for CRIMPTON.  On second thoughts, I don’t.  They do not look like men who write about their adventures in their native newspapers.  Ladies do that.  A weight is off my mind.  The Military Writer goes home.  He asks, “Who was that old man who fancied himself so about SHERMAN’s March?” “That was General HOME, who held a command under SHERMAN.”  The Military Writer whistles; wishes I had told him that before dinner.  I wish I had, but I got so flurried and confused.  It is midnight; I am tired to death.  Yes, BEILBY will have something to drink, and another cigar—­a very large one.  He begins to talk about the University Match, about all University Matches, about old scores, and old catches, from MITCHELL’s year to the present day.

It is three o’clock before I get home; the Americans may have enjoyed themselves, I have not.  I dream about the Mad Doctor; perhaps he will put me into his next book on Incipient Insanity.  Serve me right.

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