and as an editor has added a unique reputation as the presiding officer of the most famous of dining-clubs, has made it one of the aims of his life to bring good fellows together without regard to differences in vocation, politics, or religion. A Southern soldier, he has made the North his home and there won success and hosts of friends.
General Lewis Merrill, of Philadelphia, also brings the soldierly element into the group. He fought through the late war on the Union side, distinguishing himself on many a field, and winning wounds and honors with his victories.
Judge Carey, who comes to the national capital from the Territory and soon-to-be State of Wyoming, has one of the strongest faces at the board. A Delawarean by birth, he early sought a home in the West, and has grown up with the Territory of whose Supreme Court he has been an honored member, and of which he is to-day the most prominent and influential citizen. There is something about Judge Carey which stimulates all about him to mental activity.
Dr. Rush Shippen Huidekoper is notable as national guardsman, veterinarian, littérateur, and club-man. Huidekoper was born under conditions making luxurious life available, but preferred to be of some use in the world, and marked out for himself a career in a new sphere. He found the study and treatment of the diseases of horses, cattle, and other animals a trade, and elevated it to the dignity of a science and an art.
Were the figure less stale, one might liken Colonel James M. Scovel to sauce piquante. There is always an agreeable sense of good living about his portly and pleasing presence, so familiar to all New Jersey.
With these men of many minds sat Hawthorne and Philips; but, as they have been introduced to the readers of Lippincott's at a former session of the club, it is only necessary now to note their presence at the Washington reunion.
It was thus the current of talk set in:
Stoddart.—What makes a dinner a success?
Ochiltree.—The food.
Handy.—The diners.
Ochiltree.—Both. But it's easier to feast on food that is bad than to dine with people who are dull.
Huidekoper.—Colonel, are you a gourmet?
Ochiltree—Why, sir, I can't say. I like good eating, I confess. Who doesn't? It's wrong to live only to eat, and it's asinine, or worse, to eat only to live. I don't hold a cook above a minister of the gospel; but I respect his art profoundly.
Squire—What constitutes good eating?
Huidekoper.—Horse-flesh,
Stoddart.—No, but seriously.
Huidekoper.—I was never more serious in my life. The flesh of the horse is the best of animal meats. Let me tell you how I proved it on my friends. Some time ago I killed my old steeple-chaser, and cut from its loins some choice steaks. I took these to the Philadelphia Club and had them nicely cooked, inviting several of the club men to dine with me. They enjoyed the meat so much, without knowing
