ther."

Therewith my father pointed to his heir sprawling on the grass and
plucking daisies on the lawn, while the young mother's voice rose
merrily, laughing at the child's glee.

"I shall make but a poor bill out of your nursery, I see," said Mr.
Squills.

Agreeably to these doctrines, strange in so learned a father, I thrived
and flourished, and learned to spell, and make pot-hooks, under the
joint care of my mother and Dame Primmins. This last was one of an old
race fast dying away,--the race of old, faithful servants; the race of
old, tale-telling nurses. She had reared my mother before me; but
her affection put out new flowers for the new generation. She was a
Devonshire woman; and Devonshire women, especially those who have passed
their youth near the sea-coast, are generally superstitious. She had a
wonderful budget of fables. Before I was six years old, I was erudite in
that primitive literature in which the legends of all nations are traced
to a common fountain,--Puss in Boots, Tom Thumb, Fortunio, Fortunatus,
Jack the Giant-Killer; tales, like proverbs, equally familiar, under
different versions, to the infant worshippers of Budh and the hardier
children of Thor. I may say, without vanity, that in an examination in
those venerable classics I could have taken honors!

My dear mother had some little misgivings as to the solid benefit to be
derived from such fantastic erudition, and timidly consulted my father
thereon.

"My love," answered my father, in that tone of voice which always
puzzled even my mother to be sure whether he was in jest or earnest,
"in all these fables certain philosophers could easily discover symbolic
significations of the highest morality. I have myself written a treatise
to prove that Puss in Boots is an allegory upon the progress of the
human understanding, having its origin in the mystical schools of the
Egyptian priests, and evidently an illustration of the worship rendered
at Thebes and Memphis to those feline quadrupeds of which they make both
religious symbols and elaborate mummies."

"My dear Austin," said my mother, opening her blue eyes, "you don't
think that Sisty will discover all those fine things in Puss in Boots!"

"My dear Kitty," answered my father, "you don't think, when you were
good enough to take up with me, that you found in me all the fine things
I have learned from books. You knew me only as a harmless creature who
was happy enough to please your fancy. By