signs of not belonging to the landed classes. One of these ventured to ask him a question which I innocently overheard. She said: "What do you think of the League of Nations?" And the heavy-built young man, with the puzzled, half-frightened eyes, replied: "I don't know—it seems mostly upon p-p-paper, doesn't it?"
Even after the other diners had departed, following, as they came, in the silent wake of the spare lady who was dieting, we stayed on, held despite our will by the strange mystic force that had reduced our voices to a whisper and dazzled our eyes. We ordered coffee, to provide ourselves with an excuse for lingering as long as possible; and when the coffee came, after long delay, we sipped the beverage, with its faint taste of burnt grains, with relish, forgetting utterly that a few hundred yards further on lay a thirteenth-century castle, while not many miles away we might penetrate, if we would, into the baptistery of a tenth-century priory. We lingered as long over our coffee as we reasonably could, but our stay was cut short by the watchful waitress, who feared possibly that we might light our cigarettes, and who therefore hurriedly slipped us our bill. So we bade her farewell, with a feeling as if we should like to incline our heads to the great silver candlestick in the shadows of the dark green wall with its slender Grecian colonnade. We left the hotel, and a few hours later found ourselves again, transported as by magic, back to the too familiar surroundings of the twentieth century.
But the sense of the hotel persisted, and that night I had a strange dream. I seemed to be sitting in the same dining-room, still more brilliant with candles, silver, glass, flowers, and flags. The waitresses were gone, and old men in mutton-chop whiskers, knee-breeches and blue tail-coats with brass buttons moved from table to table, noiselessly. Here was sitting a red-faced Marquess with one leg, the star of some unknown Russian order on his breast; over yonder was Castlereagh; at the centre table was the great Duke of Wellington himself. The glasses winked and bubbled with wine, and I watched the diners, rooted to my seat, unable to utter a sound. I knew that this banquet had been arranged somehow for my benefit, though I had not sought to take part in it. Suddenly Welling- ton rose to his feet. Glaring at me with intense hatred, he lifted his glass. "Drink," thundered his voice—"drink to the salvation of Europe, our Holy Alliance!" I rose—the dream faded away. Outside in the darkness I heard the shriek of the midnight train.
