The dinner hour arrived, and there was the same singular provision for one.  He rang the bell, and ordered John to furnish the table for another.  John obeyed, though not without some strong misgiving of his master’s sanity, as the edibles consisted of a sole, a mutton chop, and a partridge.  When John left the room at his master’s request, Collumpsion rose and locked the door.  Having placed a chair opposite, he resumed his seat, and commenced a series of pantomimic gestures, which were strongly confirmatory of John’s suspicions.  He seemed to be holding an inaudible conversation with some invisible being, placing the choicest portion of the sole in a plate, and seemingly desiring John to deliver it to the unknown.  As John was not there, he placed it before himself, and commenced daintily and smilingly picking up very minute particles, as though he were too much delighted to eat.  He then bowed and smiled, and extending his arm, appeared to fill the opposite glass, and having actually performed the same operation with his own, he bowed and smiled again, and sipped the brilliant Xeres.  He then rang the bell violently, and unlocking the door, rushed rapidly back to his chair, as though he were fearful of committing a rudeness by leaving it.  The table being replenished, and John again dismissed the room, the same pantomime commenced.  The one mutton chop seemed at first to present an obstacle to the proper conduct of the scene; but gracefully uncovering the partridge, and as gracefully smiling towards the invisible, he appeared strongly to recommend the bird in preference to the beast.  Dinner at length concluded, he rose, and apparently led his phantom guest from the table, and then returning to his arm-chair, threw himself into it, and, crossing his hands upon his breast, commenced a careful examination of the cinders and himself.  His rumination ended in a doze, and his doze in a dream, in which he fancied himself a Brobdignag Java sparrow during the moulting season.  His cage was surrounded by beautiful and blooming girls, who seemed to pity his condition, and vie with each other in proposing the means of rendering him more comfortable.  Some spoke of elastic cotton shirts, linsey-wolsey jackets, and silk nightcaps; others of merino hose, silk feet and cotton tops, shirt-buttons and warming-pans; whilst Mrs. Greatgirdle and Mrs. Waddledot sang an echo duet of “What a pity the bird is alone.”

  “A change came o’er the spirit of his dream.”

He thought that the moulting season was over, and that he was rejoicing in the fulness of a sleeky plumage, and by his side was a Java sparrowess, chirping and hopping about, rendering the cage as populous to him as though he were the tenant of a bird-fancier’s shop.  Then—­he awoke just as Old John was finishing a glass of Madeira, preparatory to arousing Collumpsion, for the purpose of delivering to him a scented note, which had just been left by the footman of Mrs. Waddledot.