I protested at the way in which these gentlemen were mentioned:  they were friends of mine, and highly esteemed citizens.

“Sir, they are Moderate Drinkers,” said Mrs. Romulus, with an emphasis which claimed the settlement of the whole question.  “The Gladiators are full of pity for the poor lost inebriate.  They propose to convert their bar-keeping brothers by a course of moral suasion.  But they will ever proscribe and defy those relentless Moderate Drinkers who admit the wine-cup into their families, and—­and—­why, Sir, did you ever see the stomach of a Moderate Drinker?”

I never had.

“Mr. Stellato has one fourteen times the size of life, colored after Nature by a progressive artist.  It is a fearful sight!”

I did not question it.

“Once more, there is not a moment to spare,” said Mrs. Romulus, turning suddenly upon the clergyman.  “The question is, Shall we put you upon our Order of Exercises?”

“It would not sound badly,” insinuated Stellato, perusing the document in imagination:  “’Chant, by the Choir; Recitation of Original Verses, by Jane Romulus; Prayer, by the Reverend Charles Clifton’”—­

“Stop!” cried the clergyman.  “I decline all connection with this business.  I have no sympathy with its promoters, and I will never cower before the mob-tyranny they evoke.  If I have yet any influence in the First Church, it shall be used in solemnly counselling all youths and maidens of the congregation to report themselves at Mrs. Widesworth’s singing-school.  The feverish paroxysms of these public meetings are doubtless more stimulating than the humble duties of home, or the modest pleasures at which a lady of Mrs. Widesworth’s character is willing to preside; but it is not the wholesome activity which a wise man may promote.  And I know that to the children of our public schools such excitement is far more fatal than the cup they never coveted:  their minds should be nurtured in moderation and simplicity, even as their bodies are best nourished upon bread and milk.”

“Bread and milk!” echoed Mrs. Romulus in shrill falsetto; “say rather loaves of plaster and alum crumbed into bowls of chalk-mixture!  This is the sort of bread and milk furnished by your barbarous civilization!  But the beginning of the end of this priestridden world has at length come.  A new era is dawning upon earth.  Much-oppressed Woman asserts her entire freedom; she insists upon her passional independence, and demands harmonial development.  She is going to get it, too!  Stellato, come along!”

We watched them up the gravel-walk, and then off upon the dusty road.