What is his initiatory glass of 'Chablis' that he throws down with his oysters but the budding expectancy of boyhood,--the appetizing sense of pleasure to come; then follows the sherry with his soup, that warming glow which strength and vigor in all their consciousness impart, as a glimpse of life is opening before him.

Then youth succeeds--buoyant, wild, tempestuous youth--foaming and sparkling like the bright champagne whose stormy surface subsides into a myriad of bright stars." "_Oeil de perdrix_." "Not a bit of it; woman's own eye, brilliant, sparkling, life-giving--" "Devil take the fellow, he's getting poetical!" "Ah, Fred! if that could only last; but one must come to the burgundies with his maturer years.

Your first glass of hermitage is the algebraic sign for five-and-thirty,--the glorious burst is over; the pace is still good, to be sure, but the great enthusiasm is past.

You can afford to look forward, but confound it, you've along way to look back also." "I say, Charley, our friend has contrived to finish the bishop during his disquisition; the bowl's quite empty." "You don't say so, Fred.

To be sure, how a man does forget himself in abstract speculations; but let us have a little more, I've not concluded my homily." "Not a glass, Maurice; it's already past nine.