"What was the society called, Mr. Maundrell?" asked a new member with
unusual intrepidity.

"Its name," replied the white-headed actor simply, "I shall not
divulge. It was not, however, altogether unconnected with the Pink Men
of the Blue Mountains. We used to sit, we who were initiated, in a
circle. We met to discuss the business of the society. Oh, we were the
observed of all observers, I can assure you. Our society was extensive.
It had its offshoots in foreign lands. Well, we at these meetings used
to sit round a barrel--a great big barrel, which had a hole in the top.
The barrel was not merely an ornament, for through the hole in the top
we threw any scraps and odds and ends we did not want. Bits of tobacco,
bread, marrow bones, the dregs of our glasses--anything and everything
went into the barrel. And so it happened, as the barrel became fuller
and fuller, strange animals made their appearance--animals of peculiar
shape and form crawled out of the barrel and would attempt to escape
across the floor. But we were on their tracks. We saw them. We headed
them off with our sticks, and we chased them back again to the place
where they had been born and bred. We poked them in, sir, with our
sticks."

Mr. Maundrell emitted a placid chuckle at this reminiscence.

"A good many members of this club," whispered Malim to me, "would have
gone back into that barrel."

A bell sounded. "That's for the second part to begin," said Malim.

We herded back along the passage. A voice cried, "Be seated, please,
gentlemen."