Sydney was none the livelier and none the soberer for so much application. It had taken a deal of extra wet-towelling to pull him through the night; a correspondingly extra quantity of wine had preceded the towelling; and he was in a very damaged condition, as he now pulled his turban off and threw it into the basin in which he had steeped it at intervals for the last six hours.

`Are you mixing that other bowl of punch?' said Stryver the portly, with his hands in his waistband, glancing round from the sofa where he lay on his back,

`Now, look here! I am going to tell you something that will rather surprise you, and that perhaps will make you think me not quite as shrewd as you usually do think me. I intend to marry.

`Yes. And not for money. What do you say now?'

`I don't feel disposed to say much. Who is she?'

`I am not going to guess, at five o'clock in the morning, with my brains frying and sputtering in my, head. If you want me to guess, you must ask me to dinner.

`Well then, I'll tell you,' said Stryver, coming slowly into a sitting posture. `Sydney, I rather despair of making myself intelligible to you, because you are such an insensible dog.'

`And you,' returned Sydney, busy concocting the punch, `are such a sensitive and poetical spirit.'