food, and still less when either the company or the food or both were indifferent. Now, candidly, do you not think it would be better to eat your nice food and drink your nice wine at home, than in company of a number of stupid uninteresting people, whose society must be more of a bore than a pleasure?"
I could not deny that it would often be preferable to do so, "but then," I observed, "custom has reconciled us even to the infliction of stupid dinner parties, and we often partake of these feasts more as a matter of duty and to give pleasure to our entertainer, than from any real enjoyment we derive from them."
"In short," she archly rejoined, "whereas your ancient saints did penance by starving themselves in solitude, your modern sinners do penance by stuffing themselves in company. But, after all," she continued, "you must allow that our mode of being convivial is a great improvement on yours, for our festivities are never interrupted by the necessity of sitting for hours in one spot, by the side of some possibly disagreeable and uncongenial person, in order to eat without appetite more food than is good for us, with the prospect of an indigestion or at least a headache the next morning as a consequence of our excess."
Of course I pretended to be quite converted to her way of thinking, and indeed, there is in the entertainments of the Colymbians an amount of ease, refinement and grace that can seldom be found in the grosser sensual indulgences of our European festivities.
The beauty of Lily's face and form, the exquisite grace of her movements, and the charm of her sprightly conversation (which I fear I have failed to convey in the specimens I have given from memory) ere long began to make a very decided impression on
