and he stopped the full heft of the hardest kick I could let loose. It
put him out of action for half a day, and remains one of my pleasantest
memories.

His companions had to gather him up and help him pulley-hauley fashion
into the car ahead, while an officious ticket-taker demanded my name and
address. I found in my wallet the card of a U.S. senator and gave him
that, whereat he apologized profoundly and addressed me as "Colonel"--a
title with which he continued to flatter me all the rest of the journey
except once, when he changed it to "Admiral" by mistake.

Grim went back into our compartment and laughed; and none of the essays
I have read on laughter--not even the famous dissertation by Josh
Billings--throw light on how to describe the tantalizing manner of it.
He laughs several different ways: heartily at times, as men of my
temperament mostly do; boisterously on occasion, after Jeremy's
fashion; now and then cryptically, using laughter as a mask; then he
owns a smile that suggests nothing more nor less than kindness based on
understanding of human nature.

But that other is a devil of a laugh, mostly made of chuckles that seem
to bubble off a Bell-brew of disillusionment, and you get the impression
that he is laughing at himself--cynically laying bare the vanity and
fallibility of his own mental processes--and forecasting
self-discipline.

There is no mirth in it, although there is amusement; no anger,
although immeasurable scorn. I should say it's a good safe laugh to
indulge in, for I think it is based on ability to see himself and his
own mistakes more clearly than anybody else can, and there is no note of