Two weeks from the day this conversation took place, doctor Lane and his friend James Everett met at a supper-party, where all kinds of liquors were introduced, and every kind of inducement held out for the company to drink freely.  Both of the young men soon forgot their resolutions to be guarded in respect to the use of wine.  As the first few glasses began to take effect, in an elevation of spirits, each felt a kind of pride in the thought that he could bear as much as any one there, and not show signs of intoxication.

By eleven o’clock, there was not one at the table who was not drunk enough to be foolish.  The rational and intelligent conversation that had been introduced early in the evening, had long since given place to the obscene jest—­the vulgar story—­or the bacchanalian song.  Gayest of the gay were our young men, who had already, one would think, received sufficient lessons of prudence and temperance.

“Take care, James!” cried Lane, across the table to his friend Everett, familiarly, late in the evening.  “You are pouring the wine on the table, instead of in your glass.”

“You are beginning to see double,” was Everett’s reply, lifting his head with a slight drunken air, and throwing a half-angry glance upon his friend.

“That is more than you can do,” was the retort, with a meaning toss of the head.

“I don’t understand you,” Everett said, pausing with the decanter still in his hand, and eyeing his friend, steadily.

“Don’t you, indeed!  You see yourself in a state of blessed singleness—­ha!  Do you take?”

“Look here, James,—­you are my friend.  But there are things that I will not allow even a friend to utter.  So take care now!”

“Ha! ha!  There comes the raw.  Do I rub too hard, my boy?”

“You ’re drunk, and a fool into the bargain!” was the angry retort of Everett.

“Not so drunk as you were when you hugged and kissed Ernestine Lee!  How do you like—?”

Lane could not finish the sentence, before the decanter which Everett had held in his hand glanced past his head with fearful velocity, and was dashed into fragments against the wall behind him.  The instant interference of friends prevented any further acts of violence.

It was about ten o’clock on the next morning that young doctor Lane sat in his office, musing on the events of the previous night, of which he had only a confused recollection, when a young man entered, and presented a note.  On opening it, he found it to be a challenge from Everett.

“Leave me your card, and I will refer my friend to you,” was his reply, with a cold bow, as he finished reading the note.  The card was left, and the stranger, with a frigid bow in return, departed.

“Fool, fool that I have been!” ejaculated Lane, rising to his feet, and pacing the floor of his office backwards and forwards with hurried steps.  This was continued for nearly half an hour, during which time his countenance wore a painful and gloomy expression.  At last, pausing, and seating himself at a table, he murmured, as he lifted a pen,