th any one present by any device whatsoever.

IX.

Professor Cutter and I walked to the village that afternoon. He is a
great pedestrian, and is never satisfied unless he can walk four or five
miles a day. His robust and somewhat heavy frame was planned rather for
bodily labor than for the housing of so active a mind, and he often
complains that the exercise of his body has robbed him of years of
intellectual labor. He grumbles at the necessity of wasting time in that
way, but he never omits his daily walk.

"I should like to possess your temperament, Mr. Griggs," he remarked, as
we walked briskly through the park. "You might renounce exercise and
open air for the rest of your life, and never be the worse for it."

"I hardly know," I answered. "I have never tried any regular method of
life, and I have never been ill. I do not believe in regular methods."

"That is the ideal constitution. By the by, I had hoped to induce Patoff
to come with us, but he said he would stay with the ladies."

"You will never induce him to do anything he does not want to do," I
replied. "However, I dare say you know that as well as I do."

"What makes you say that?"

"I can see it,--it is plain enough. Carvel wanted him to go and shoot
something after lunch, you wanted him to come for a walk, Macaulay
wanted him to bury himself up-stairs and talk out the Egyptian question,
I wanted to get him into the smoking-room to ask him questions about
some friends of mine in the East, Miss Dabstreak had plans to waylay him
with her pottery. Not a bit of it! He smiled at us all, and serenely
sat by Mrs. Carvel, talking to her and Miss Hermione. He has a will of
his own."

"Indeed he has," assented the professor. "He is a moderately clever
fellow, with a smooth tongue and a despotic character, a much better
combination than a weak will and the mind of a genius. You are right, he
is not to be turned by trifles."

"I see that he must be a good diplomatist in these days."

"Diplomacy has got past the stage of being intellectual," said the
professor. "There was a time when a fine intellect was thought important
in an ambassador; nowadays it is enough if his excellency can hold his
tongue and show his teeth. The question is, whether the low estimate of
intellect in our day is due to the exigency of modern affairs, or to the
exiguity of modern intelligence."

"Men are stronger in our time," I answered, "and consequently have less
need to b