distinctions. Receiving his map he asked, as he looked along a shelf or
two: "Have you that book that tells of you--as a slave? your master
letting you educate yourself; your once refusing your freedom, and your
being private secretary to two or three black lieutenant-governors?"

"I had a copy," Landry said, "but I've sold it. Where did you hear of
it? From Réné Ducatel, in his antique-shop, whose folks 'tis mostly
about?"

"Yes. An antique himself, in spirit, eh? Yet modern enough to praise
you highly."

"H'mm! but only for the virtues of a slave."

Chester smiled round from the shelves: "I noticed that! I'm afraid we
white folks, the world over, are prone to do that--with you-all."

"Yes, when you speak of us at all."

"Ducatel's opposite neighbor," Chester remarked, "is an antique even more
interesting."

"Ah, yes! Castanado is antique only in that art spirit which the tourist
trade is every day killing even in Royal Street."

"That's the worst decay in this whole decaying quarter," the young man
said.

"And in all this deluge of trade spirit," Ovide continued, "the best dry
land left of it--of that spirit of art--is----"