They were two men made to understand each other thoroughly, but they did not, for both were of extreme violence of character.

Uncle Prudent was furiously hot; Phil Evans was abnormally cool.
And why had not Phil Evans been elected president of the club?
The votes were exactly divided between Uncle Prudent and him.

Twenty times there had been a scrutiny, and twenty times the majority had not declared for either one or the other.

The position was embarrassing, and it might have lasted for the lifetime of the candidates.
One of the members of the club then proposed a way out of the difficulty.

This was Jem Chip, the treasurer of the Weldon Institute.
Chip was a confirmed vegetarian, a proscriber of all animal nourishment, of all fermented liquors, half a Mussulman, half a Brahman.