He thinks how they would grace a larger house, a more splendid table.
Sligo Moultrie remembers a spacious country mansion, surrounded by a silent plantation, somewhat fallen from its state, whom such a mistress would superbly restore.

He looks a man too refined to wed for money, perhaps too indolently luxurious to love without it.
Half hidden under the muslin drapery by the window hangs a cage with a canary.

The bird sits silent; but as the feast proceeds he pours a shrill strain into the murmur of the guests.

For the noise of the golden-breasted bird Sligo Moultrie can not hear something that is said to him by the ripe mouth between the solitaires.

He asks pardon, and it is repeated.
Then, still smiling and looking toward the window, he says, and, as he says it, his eyes--at which he knows his companion is looking--wander over the room, "A very pretty cage!" The eyes drop upon hers as they finish the circuit of the room.