e substances
will best suit the measure and the rhyme, and has the most soft-sounding
name. If the colour be yellow, then there are substances of all shades of
this hue, from saffron and pickled salmon to brimstone and straw. I have
sixty-two red substances, twenty-seven green ones, and others in the same
proportion. It is astonishing what labour this box has saved me, and how
much it has added to the beauty and melody of my verse.

"You perceive," he added, "the drawer missing. That contained substances
offensive to the sight or smell, which my maid, conducted to it by her
nose, conceived to be some animal curiosities I had been collecting, in a
state of putrefaction and decay, and did not hesitate to throw them into
the fire. I afterwards found myself very much at a loss, whenever my
subject led me to the mention of objects of this character, and I therefore
spoke of them as seldom as possible." After bestowing that tribute of
admiration and praise which every great author or inventor expects, in his
own house, and not omitting his customary medical fee, we took our leave.

We had not long left Vindar's house, before we saw a short fat man in the
suburbs, preparing to climb to the top of a plane tree, on which there was
one of the tail feathers of a sort of flamingo. He was surrounded by
attendants and servants, to whom he issued his commands with great rapidity
and decision, occasionally intermingling with his orders the most
threatening language and furious gesticulations. Some offered to get a
ladder, and ascend, and others to cut down the tree; all of which he
obstinately rejected. He swore he would get the feather--he would get it by
climbing--and he would climb but one way, which way was on the shoulders of
his men. His plan was to make a number of them form a solid square, and
interlock their arms; then a smaller number to mount upon their shoulders,
on whom others were in like manner placed, and so on till the pyramid was
sufficiently high, when he himself was to mount, and from the shoulders of
the highest pluck the darling object of his wishes. He had in this way, I
afterwards learnt, gathered some of the richest flowers of the bignonia
scarlatina, as well as such fruits as had tempted him by their luscious
appearance, and at the same time frightening all the birds from their
nests, which he commonly destroyed: and although some of his attendants
were occasionally much hurt and bruised in this singular amusem