"Nearly dinner time, sir," he said in a rolling deep tone like mellow thunder. "The Captain will be in soon for that good and sufficient reason. You will dine with us, I hope. Give you some capital wine, sir, out of Monsieur Soulé's own _cave_. Take this oaken arm-chair, sir, and allow me to relieve you of your chapeau. What name, may I ask?--Ah! Doctor Ravenel.--My God, sir! the Captain has a letter for you. I saw it on his table a moment ago."
He commenced rummaging among papers and writing materials with an exhilaration of haste which caused Ravenel to suspect that he had taken a bottle or so of the Soulé sherry.
"Here it is," he exclaimed with a smile of triumph and friendliness. "You had better take it while you see it. If you are a lawyer, sir, you are aware that possession is nine tenths of a title. I beg pardon; of course you are not a lawyer. Or have I the honor to address an L. L. D.?"
"Merely an M. D.," observed Ravenel, and took his letter.
"A magnificent profession!" rejoined the sonorous lieutenant. "Most ancient and honorable profession. The profession of Esculapius and Hippocrates. The physician is older than the lawyer, and more useful to humanity."
Ravenel looked at his letter and observed that it was not post-marked nor sealed; he opened it, and found that it was from Colburne to himself--intended to go, no doubt, by the next steamer.
"I hope it gives you good news from home, sir," observed the lieutenant in the most amicable manner.
The Doctor bowed and smiled assent as he put the letter in his pocket, not thinking it worth while to explain matters to a gentleman who was so evidently muddled by the Soulé vintages. As his interlocutor rattled on he looked about the room and admired the costly furniture and tasteful ornaments. There were two choice paintings on the paneled walls, and a dozen or so of choice engravings. The damask curtains edged with lace were superb, and so were the damask coverings of the elaborately carved oaken chairs and lounges. The marble mantels and table, and the extravagant tortoise-shell _tiroir_, were loaded with Italian cameos, Parisian bronzes, Bohemian glass-ware, Swiss wood-sculpture, and other varieties of European gimcracks. Against the wall in one corner leaned four huge albums of photographs and engravings. The Doctor thought that he had never before seen a house in America decorated with such exquisite taste and lavish expenditure. He had not been in it before, and did not know who was its proprietor.