The Coltons and the Brooks contingent had smeared him with compliments.

There was a literary group, and the titles of a hundred books were mentioned; one writer was charming; another was horrid.

There was the group of household government, and the servant-girl question, which has never been found in repose, was tossed from one woman to another and caught as a bag of sweets.

In the library was a commercial and real-estate gathering, and the field of speculation was broken up, harrowed and seeded down.
The black-bearded muser put his pipe aside, and from this glowing scene his thoughts flew away into a dark night when he stood in Ulmata, knocking at the door of a deserted house.

He got up and stood at the window.