“Was there any reading-matter in the book?” queried the Idiot, blowing softly on a hot potato that was nicely balanced on the end of his fork.

[Illustration:  “Alarmed the cook”]

“Yes, a little; but it didn’t amount to much,” returned the Bibliomaniac.  “But, you know, it isn’t as reading-matter that men like myself care for books.  We have a higher notion than that.  It is as a specimen of book-making that we admire a chaste bit of literature like Through Africa by Daylight.  But, as I was saying, my friend had this book, and he’d extra-illustrated it.  He had pictures from all parts of the world in it, and the book had grown from a volume of one hundred pages to four volumes of two hundred pages each.”

“And it was stolen by a highly honorable friend, I suppose?” queried the Idiot.

“Yes, it was stolen—­and my friend never knew by whom,” said the Bibliomaniac.

“What?” asked the Idiot, in much surprise.  “Did you never confess?”

It was very fortunate for the Idiot that the buckwheat cakes were brought on at this moment.  Had there not been some diversion of that kind, it is certain that the Bibliomaniac would have assaulted him.

“It is very kind of Mrs. Smithers, I think,” said the School-master, “to provide us with such delightful cakes as these free of charge.”

“Yes,” said the Idiot, helping himself to six cakes.  “Very kind indeed, although I must say they are extremely economical from an architectural point of view—­which is to say, they are rather fuller of pores than of buckwheat.  I wonder why it is,” he continued, possibly to avert the landlady’s retaliatory comments—­“I wonder why it is that porous plasters and buckwheat cakes are so similar in appearance?”

“And so widely different in their respective effects on the system,” put in a genial old gentleman who occasionally imbibed, seated next to the Idiot.

“I fail to see the similarity between a buckwheat cake and a porous plaster,” said the School-master, resolved, if possible, to embarrass the Idiot.

“You don’t, eh?” replied the latter.  “Then it is very plain, sir, that you have never eaten a porous plaster.”

To this the School-master could find no reasonable reply, and he took refuge in silence.  Mr. Whitechoker tried to look severe; the gentleman who occasionally imbibed smiled all over; the Bibliomaniac ignored the remark entirely, not having as yet forgiven the Idiot for his gross insinuation regarding his friend’s edition de luxe of Through Africa by Daylight; Mary, the maid, who greatly admired the Idiot, not so much for his idiocy as for the aristocratic manner in which he carried himself, and the truly striking striped shirts he wore, left the room in a convulsion of laughter that so alarmed the cook below-stairs that the next platterful of cakes were more like tin plates than cakes; and as for Mrs. Smithers, that worthy woman was speechless with wrath.  But she was not paralyzed apparently, for reaching down into her pocket she brought forth a small piece of paper, on which was written in detail the “account due” of the Idiot.