The champagne alone had any attraction for me; and, seduced by the icy coldness of the wine, I drank copiously.

This was all that was wanting to complete the maddening confusion of my brain, and the effect was instantaneous; the lights danced before my eyes; the lustres whirled round; and, as the scattered fragments of conversations, on either side met my ear, I was able to form some not very inaccurate conception of what insanity may be.

Politics and literature, Mexican bonds and Noblet's legs, Pates de perdreaux and the quarantine laws, the extreme gauche and the "Bains Chinois," Victor Hugo and rouge et noir, had formed a species of grand ballet d'action in my fevered brain, and I was perfectly beside myself; occasionally, too, I would revert to my own concerns, although I was scarcely able to follow up any train of thought for more than a few seconds together, and totally inadequate to distinguish the false from the true.

I continued to confound the counterfeit with my cousin, and wonder how my poor uncle, for whom I was about to put on the deepest mourning, could possibly think of driving me out of my lodgings.

Of my duel for the morning, I had the most shadowy recollection, and could not perfectly comprehend whether it was O'Leary or I was the principal, and indeed cared but little.