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Gradually his circle of acquaintance with young men of the gay class extended, and a freer participation with them in many of their pleasures came as a natural consequence.

“Come,” said one of them to him, as the two met in the street, by accident, one evening,–“I want you to go with me.”

“But why should I go with you? Or, rather, where are you going?” asked Armour.

“To meet some of our friends down at C–‘s,” replied the young man.

“What are you going to do there?” farther inquired Armour.

“Nothing more than to drink a glass of wine, and have some pleasant chit-chat. So come along.”

“Will I be welcome?”

“Certainly you will. I’ll guarantee that. Some half dozen of us have formed a little club, and each member has the privilege of inviting any one he pleases. To-night I invite you, and on the next evening I expect to see you present, not as a guest, but as a member. So come along, and see how you like us.”

Armour had no definite object in view. He had walked out, because he felt rather listless at home, Blanche having retired with a sick headache. It required, therefore, no persuasion to induce him to yield to the friend’s invitation. Arrived at C–‘s, a fashionable house of refreshment, the two young men passed up stairs and entered one of the private apartments of the house, which they found handsomely furnished and brilliantly lighted. In this, gathered around a circular, or rather oblong table, were five or six young men, nearly all of them well known to Armour. On the table were bottles of wine and glasses–the latter filled.

“Just in time!” cried the president of the club. “Henry Armour, I bid you welcome! Here’s a place waiting for you,” placing his hand upon a chair by his side as he spoke. “And now,” as Armour seated himself, “let me fill your glass. We were waiting for a sentiment to find its way out of some brain as you came in, and our brimming glasses had stood untasted for more than a minute. Can’t you help us to a toast?”

“Here’s to good fellowship!” said Armour, promptly lifting his glass, and touching it to that of the president.

“To be drunk standing,” added the president.

All rose on the instant, and drank with mock solemnity to the sentiment of their guest.

Then followed brilliant flashes of wit, or what was thought to be wit. To these succeeded the song, the jest, the story,–and to these again the sparkling wine-cup. Gayly thus passed the hours, until midnight stole quietly upon the thoughtless revellers. Surprised, on reference to his watch, to find that it was one o’clock, Armour arose and begged to be excused.

“I move that our guest be excused on one condition,” said the friend who had brought him to the company. “And that is, on his promise to meet with us again, on this evening next week.”

“What do you think of the condition?” asked the president, who, like nearly all of the rest, was rather the worse for the wine he had taken, looking at Armour as he spoke.

“I agree to it with pleasure,” was the prompt reply.

“Another drink before you go, then,” said the president, “and I will give the toast. Fill up your glasses.”

The bottle again passed round the table.

“Here’s to a good fellow!” was the sentiment announced. It was received standing. Armour then retired with bewildered senses. The gay scene that had floated before his eyes, and in which himself had been an actor, and the freedom with which he had taken wine, left him confused, almost in regard to his own identity. He did not seem to himself the same person he had been a few hours before. A new world had opened before him, and he had, almost involuntarily, entered into, and become a citizen of that world. Long after he had reached his home, and retired to his bed, did his imagination revel amid the scenes he had just left. In sleep, too, fancy was busy. But here came a change. Serpents would too often glide across the table around which the gay company, himself a member, were assembled; or some other sudden and more appalling change scatter into fragments the bright phantasma of his dreams.