disturbed by it.  The main feature of the feast was a piping hot Irish stew made of the potatoes and meat left over from a procession of previous meals.  Everybody was liberally supplied with this dish.  On the table were a couple of great dishes of sliced ham, and there were some other eatables of minor importance—­preserves and New Orleans molasses and such things.  There was also plenty of tea and coffee of an infernal sort, with brown sugar and condensed milk, but the milk and sugar supply was not left at the discretion of the boarders, but was rationed out at headquarters—­one spoonful of sugar and one of condensed milk to each cup and no more.  The table was waited upon by two stalwart negro women who raced back and forth from the bases of supplies with splendid dash and clatter and energy.  Their labors were supplemented after a fashion by the young girl Puss.  She carried coffee and tea back and forth among the boarders, but she made pleasure excursions rather than business ones in this way, to speak strictly.  She made jokes with various people.  She chaffed the young men pleasantly and wittily, as she supposed, and as the rest also supposed, apparently, judging by the applause and laughter which she got by her efforts.  Manifestly she was a favorite with most of the young fellows and sweetheart of the rest of them.  Where she conferred notice she conferred happiness, as was seen by the face of the recipient; and; at the same time she conferred unhappiness—­one could see it fall and dim the faces of the other young fellows like a shadow.  She never “Mistered” these friends of hers, but called them “Billy,” “Tom,” “John,” and they called her “Puss” or “Hattie.”

Mr. Marsh sat at the head of the table, his wife sat at the foot.  Marsh was a man of sixty, and was an American; but if he had been born a month earlier he would have been a Spaniard.  He was plenty good enough Spaniard as it was; his face was very dark, his hair very black, and his eyes were not only exceedingly black but were very intense, and there was something about them that indicated that they could burn with passion upon occasion.  He was stoop-shouldered and lean-faced, and the general aspect of him was disagreeable; he was evidently not a very companionable person.  If looks went for anything, he was the very opposite of his wife, who was all motherliness and charity, good will and good nature.  All the young men and the women called her Aunt Rachael, which was another sign.  Tracy’s wandering and interested eye presently fell upon one boarder who had been overlooked in the distribution of the stew.  He was very pale and looked as if he had but lately come out of a sick bed, and also as if he ought to get back into it again as soon as possible.  His face was very melancholy.  The waves of laughter and conversation broke upon it without affecting it any more than if it had been a rock in the sea and the words and the laughter veritable waters.