The cook and the waiter were accustomed to receive acceptable compliments from him monthly.

His precise words, his regular ancient jokes, his pint of Madeira and after-pint of Port, his antique bow to the landlady, passing out and in, his method of spreading his table-napkin on his lap and looking up at the ceiling ere he fell to, and how he talked to himself during the repast, and indulged in short chuckles, and the one look of perfect felicity that played over his features when he had taken his first sip of Port--these were matters it pained them at the Aurora to have to remember.
For three weeks the resolution not to regard him as of the past was general.

The Aurora was the old gentleman's home.

Men do not play truant from home at sixty years of age.

He must, therefore, be seriously indisposed.