Honi soit qui mal y pense; ora pro nobis,
Erin-go-Bragh. Present company being present, and impossible to except on
that account, we will omit the three cheers and choke down the tiger."
They all drank, and the dinner having by this time dwindled down to coffee
grounds and cheese crumbs a vote was taken as to where they should go
next.
Aunt Mary suggested home, but she was over-ruled, and they all went
elsewhere. She never could recollect where she went or what she saw; but,
as everyone else has been and seen over and over again, I won't fuss with
detailing it.
The visitor from the country reached home in a carriage in the small hours
in the morning, and Janice received her, looking somewhat nervous.
"This is pretty late," she ventured to remind the bearers; but as they
didn't seem to think so, and she was a maiden, wise beyond her years, she
spoke no further word, but went to work and undressed the aged reveller,
got her comfortably established in bed, and then left her to get a good
sleep, an occupation which occupied the weary one fully until two that
afternoon.
When she did at last open her eyes it was several minutes before she knew
where she was. Her brain seemed dazed, her intellect more than clouded. It
is a state of mind to which those who habitually go about in hansoms at
the hour of dawn are well accustomed, but to Aunt Mary it was painfully
new. She struggled to remember, and felt helplessly inadequate to the
task. Janice finally came in with a glass of something that foamed and
fizzed, and the victim of late hours drank that and came to her senses
again.
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