CHAPTER XIV.
THE HONORABLE SOCIETY OF LES CHICARDS.
"When a set of men find themselves agree in any particular, though never so trivial, they establish themselves into a kind of fraternity, and meet once or twice a week."-- _Spectator_.
It was a long, low room lighted by gas, with a table reaching from end to end.

Round about this table, in various stages of conviviality and conversation, were seated some thirty or forty men, capped, bearded, and eccentric-looking, with all kinds of queer blouses and wonderful heads of hair.

Dropping into a couple of vacant chairs at the lower end of this table, we called for a bottle of Chablis, lit our cigars, and fell in with the general business of the evening.

At the top, dimly visible through a dense fog of tobacco smoke, sat a stout man in a green coat fastened by a belt round the waist.

He was evidently the President, and, instead of a hammer, had a small bugle lying by his side, which he blew from time to time to enforce silence.
Somewhat perplexed by the general aspect of the club, I turned to my companion for an explanation.
"Is it possible," I asked, "that these amazing individuals are all artists and gentlemen ?" "Artists, every one," replied Dalrymple; "but as to their claim to be gentlemen, I won't undertake to establish it.