wine into the green and gold and twisted bauble and set it before me, then filled a silver goblet for himself. “Drink, gentlemen,” he said.

“Faith, I have drunken already,” quoth the Secretary, and proceeded to fill for himself a second time. “Here’s to you, gentlemen!” and he emptied half the measure.

“Captain Percy does not drink,” remarked my lord.

I leaned my elbow upon the table, and, holding up the glass against the light, began to admire its beauty. “The tint is wonderful,” I said, “as lucent a green as the top of the comber that is to break and overwhelm you. And these knobs of gold, within and without, and the strange shape the tortured glass has been made to take. I find it of a quite sinister beauty, my lord.”