sacrifices rather than go without that which
imaginatively styled their "supper."  Only
with Mrs. Bunnycastle did the meal assume the
aspect of substantiality, and not of an airy and
fanciful myth.  She really supped.  A nice bit
of rumpsteak, or a boiled collop, or an egg and
a slice of ham, or a mutton-chop; something
warm, and meaty, and comfortable, in fact, was
always prepared for her.

The beverage in which, and in the strictest
moderation, the Miss Bunnycastles indulged
during their unpretending banquet, was the no
more aristocratic one than table-ale of the very
smallest brewing.  There could scarcely have
been malt enough, in a whole cask of it, to have
given a headache to the rat that ate the malt
that lay in the House that Jack built.  The
ladies took two or three sips of the mawkish
infusion of gyle and hops, which had been more
frightened than fermented by the yeast, and
the ceremonial supper beer was over.  But
Mrs. Bunnycastle was nightly provided a pint
of the very best bottled stout.  Nor—my
protest of candour being duly allowed—shall I
be taking an unwarrantable liberty, I infer, in
hinting that after supper the good old lady was
accustomed to refect herself with a tumbler
three parts full of a curious and generously
smelling mixture, of which the component parts
appeared to be hot water, lemon-peel, sugar,
and juniper.

On this particular flower-show evening, the
Bunnycastle meal was of an extraordinary festive
character, and the conversation of an unusually
animated nature.  Not that there was anything
more to eat than usual, but there was a guest.
The Midsummer holidays were just over, nearly
all the pupils had returned, and some new pupils
(all of them to learn extras) had arrived.  Hence
one reason for jubilation.  Then, the quarterly
bills had been paid by the majority of the
parents and guardians, and with not more
grumbling or reductions than usual.  Another
cause for joyfulness.  Finally, Mr. Drax, the
apothecary, had looked in to supper, and the
Bunnycastles were all very glad to see him.

Mr. Drax was the very discreetest of
apothecaries to be found in College-street, Clapham,
in the county of Surrey, or anywhere else you
like to name.  The first evidence of his discretion
was in his keeping, by word and deed, his
age a profound secret.  He was the oldest
looking young man, or the youngest looking
old man in the medical profession, or, for the
matter of that, out of it.  You might have
fancied Drax to be just over sixteen, or just on
the verge of sixty.  I am not exaggerating.
How are you to judge of a man's age, when
upon his face not a vestige of hirsute adornment
is to be seen—when his cheeks are as round
and as smooth as apples (apples in wax, before
the colouring matter is applied: for Mr. Drax
was pale)—when he wears spectacles, and a wig,
and a white tie?  He had lost all his hair, he
said, through a fever in his early youth, and was
thus compelled to adopt an artificial coiffure.
When occurred the period of that early youth?
Two years ago?  Or half a century ago?  I must
answer, with Montaigne, "que sçais-je?"  and
the inquisitive ladies of Clapham, although
their acquaintance with the works of the quaint
old essayist may have been but slender, were
constrained to give a similar reply to the oft-
posed question.  There were no actual wrinkles
on the Draxian countenance, and the slight
puckerings under his eyes and about his mouth
might have been the result of arduous study of
his art; for, although I have hastily dubbed
him apothecary, Parfitt Drax had passed both
Hall and College, and was a general practitioner.
He wore spectacles, he said, because
he was short-sighted; but nobody knew whether
his imperfect vision was inborn, or had grown
upon him with years.  He was too discreet
to tell you.  If he were, indeed, a profound
dissembler and young, his spectacles, his wig,
and his white tie, relieved him from that appearance
of juvenility which, in discreet boarding-
schools, at Clapham and elsewhere, would
have been a reproach and a stumbling-block
to him.  If he were old, his make-up was
perfect, and he, or his wig-maker, or his tailor,
had triumphed over Time, who ordinarily
triumphs over all.  The accomplished Madame
Rachel, and her more accomplished daughter,
with all their Arabian, Indo-Syriac, and
Mesopotamian enamels and varnishes, could not have
made Drax look more "beautiful for ever" than
he looked of himself under the influence of
imperturbable discretion, scrupulous cleanliness, a
neckerchief of white cambric, a pair of glasses,
and a false head of hair.  This head, this wig,
was in itself an achievement.  It was discreet,
like its possessor.  It showed no tell-tale parting.
It was rigid with no unnaturally crisp curls.
It was a waving, flowing, reasonably tumbled,
human-looking scalp covering, of a discreet
mouse colour, that might have begun to turn
grey the next moment, or have preserved its
natural hue until Drax was gathered to his
fathers.  It was a wig for any age, or for no
age at all.

Drax, I say, wore a white tie; a strictly
medical neckband, a consulting neckcloth, a
family cravat—symmetrical without being formal
—dégagé without being careless—tied in a
little square bow.  Drax wore very large and stiff
wristbands, in hue and consistence belonging to
the glacial period.  They added to his discreet
appearance.  His right middle finger was adorned
with a mourning ring containing a lady's hair,
and an indecipherable monogram.  The hair was of
an ambiguous shade.  It might have been that of
his deceased wife, or of his sister, or of his sweet-
heart, or of his grandmother.  It formed an additional
piece of artillery in his discretional battery.

Mr. Drax was a frequent visitor at the school,
not only in his professional capacity, but as a
friend of the family.  He was allowed to come
as often as he liked, and to supper uninvited.
In fact, he "dropped in."  But on this particular
evening his presence at the usual repast was
not due to the immediate exercise of his own
personal volition. The Bunnycastles had agreed,