and what they said of their wonderful voyages I was far more interested than in the young, keen-faced man with a tie, that came up in ruffles to his ears,[Pg 13] and with an imperial decoration on his breast, which told me he was Lord Selkirk. [Pg 12] [Pg 13] I remember when the huge salvers and platters were cleared away, I was placed on the table to execute the sword dance. I must have acquitted myself with some credit; for the gentlemen set up a prodigious clapping, though I recall nothing but a snapping of my fingers, a wave of my cap and a whirl of lights and faces around my dizzy head. Then my uncle took me between his knees, promising to let me sit up to the end if I were good, and more wine was passed. "That's enough for you, you young cub," says my kinsman, promptly inverting the wine-glass before me. "O Uncle MacKenzie," said I with a wry face, "do you measure your own wine so?" Whereat, the noble Earl shouted, "Bravo! here's for you, Mr. MacKenzie." And all the gentlemen set up a laugh and my uncle smiled and called to the butler, "Here, Johnson, toddy for one, glass of hot water, pure, for other." But when Johnson brought back the glasses, I observed Uncle MacKenzie kept the toddy. "There, my boy, there's Adam's ale for you," said he, and into the glass of hot water he popped a peppermint lozenge. "Fie!" laughed Sir Alexander to my uncle's right, "Fie to cheat the little man!" "His is the best wine of the cellar," vowed His Lordship; and I drank my peppermint with as[Pg 14] much gusto and self-importance as any man of them. [Pg 14] Then followed toasts, such a list of toasts as only men inured to tests of strength could take. Ironical toasts to the North-West Passage, whose myth Sir Alexander had dispelled; toasts to the discoverer of the MacKenzie River, which brought storms of applause that shook the house; toasts to "our distinguished guest," whose suave response disarmed all suspicion; toasts to the "Northern winterers," poor devils, who were serving the cause by undergoing a life-long term of Arctic exile; toasts to "the merry lads of the north," who only served in the ranks without attaining to the honor of partnership; toasts enough, in all conscience, to drown the memory of every man present. Thanks to my Uncle
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