having borrowed certain materials for additional splendor which
she briefly described as "aunt's diamonds."

Toward eight o'clock we assembled in the sitting-room, and a
strangely assorted company we were. At the head of the table,
radiant in silk and jewelry, flowers and furbelows, sat The Queen
of Hearts, looking so handsome and so happy that I secretly
congratulated my absent son on the excellent taste he had shown
in falling in love with her. Round this bright young creature
(Owen, at the foot of the table, and Morgan and I on either side)
sat her three wrinkled, gray-headed, dingily-attired hosts, and
just behind her, in still more inappropriate companionship,
towered the spectral figure of the man in armor, which had so
unaccountably attracted her on her arrival. This strange scene
was lighted up by candles in high and heavy brass sconces. Before
Jessie stood a mighty china punch-bowl of the olden time,
containing the folded pieces of card, inside which were written
the numbers to be drawn, and before Owen reposed the Purple
Volume from which one of us was to read. The walls of the room
were hung all round with faded tapestry; the clumsy furniture was
black with age; and, in spite of the light from the sconces, the
lofty ceiling was almost lost in gloom. If Rembrandt could have
painted our background, Reynolds our guest, and Hogarth
ourselves, the picture of the scene would have been complete.

When the old clock over the tower gateway had chimed eight, I
rose to inaugurate the proceedings by requesting Jessie to take
one of the pieces of card out of the punch-bowl, and to declare
the number.