lose touch with none of them. He had written a number of books himself;
among them a "History of Dancing," a "History of Costume," a "Key to
Shakespeare's Sonnets," a study of "The Poetry of Ernest Dowson," etc.
Although Mainhall's enthusiasm was often tiresome, and although he was
often unable to distinguish between facts and vivid figments of his
imagination, his imperturbable good nature overcame even the people whom
he bored most, so that they ended by becoming, in a reluctant manner,
his friends. In appearance, Mainhall was astonishingly like the
conventional stage-Englishman of American drama: tall and thin, with
high, hitching shoulders and a small head glistening with closely
brushed yellow hair. He spoke with an extreme Oxford accent, and when he
was talking well, his face sometimes wore the rapt expression of a very
emotional man listening to music. Mainhall liked Alexander because he
was an engineer. He had preconceived ideas about everything, and his
idea about Americans was that they should be engineers or mechanics. He
hated them when they presumed to be anything else.

While they sat at dinner Mainhall acquainted Bartley with the fortunes
of his old friends in London, and as they left the table he proposed
that they should go to see Hugh MacConnell's new comedy, "Bog Lights."

"It's really quite the best thing MacConnell's done," he explained as
they got into a hansom. "It's tremendously well put on, too. Florence
Merrill and Cyril Henderson. But Hilda Burgoyne's the hit of the piece.
Hugh's written a delightful part for her, and she's quite inexpressible.
It's been on only two weeks, and I've been half a dozen times already.
I happen to have MacConnell's box for tonight or there'd be no chance of
our getting places. There's everything in seeing Hilda while she's fresh
in a part. She's apt to grow a bit stale after a time. The ones who have
any imagination do."