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Rh afterwards, a game of billiards, the band on the Mall, dinner, and over all, incessant chatter, chatter, old scandal, old jokes, and old stories. Everyone likes the old Colonel, of course. Everyone says, "Here comes poor old Smith; what an infernal bore he is!"—"Hulloa, Colonel, how are you? glad to see you! what's the news? how's exchange?" The old Colonel is not avaricious, but he saves money. He cannot help it. He has no tastes and he draws very large pay. His mind, therefore, broods over questions relating to the investment of money, the depreciation of silver, and the saving effected by purchasing things at co-operative stores. He never really solves any problem suggested by these topics. His mind is not prehensile like the tail of the Apollo Bundar; everything eludes its grasp; so its pursuits are interminable. The old Colonel's cerebral caloric burns with a feeble flicker, like that of the Madras secretariats. It never consumes a subject. The same theme is always fresh fuel. You might say the same thing to him every morning at the same hour till the crack of doom, and he