raus and the baldness of Caesar. There must be a
limit, even to rebuses. Est modus in rebus.

"There must be a limit, even to dinners. You are fond of apple
turnovers, ladies; do not indulge in them to excess. Even in the matter
of turnovers, good sense and art are requisite. Gluttony chastises the
glutton, Gula punit Gulax. Indigestion is charged by the good God with
preaching morality to stomachs. And remember this: each one of our
passions, even love, has a stomach which must not be filled too full. In
all things the word finis must be written in good season; self-control
must be exercised when the matter becomes urgent; the bolt must be drawn
on appetite; one must set one's own fantasy to the violin, and carry
one's self to the post. The sage is the man who knows how, at a given
moment, to effect his own arrest. Have some confidence in me, for I
have succeeded to some extent in my study of the law, according to
the verdict of my examinations, for I know the difference between the
question put and the question pending, for I have sustained a thesis in
Latin upon the manner in which torture was administered at Rome at the
epoch when Munatius Demens was quaestor of the Parricide; because I
am going to be a doctor, apparently it does not follow that it is
absolutely necessary that I should be an imbecile. I recommend you to
moderation in your desires. It is true that my name is Felix Tholomyes;
I speak well. Happy is he who, when the hour strikes, takes a heroic
resolve, and abdicates like Sylla or Origenes."

Favourite listened with profound attention.

"Felix," said she, "what a pretty word! I love that name. It is Latin;
it means prosper."

Tholomyes went on:--

"Quirites, gentlemen, caballeros, my friends. Do you wish never to feel
the prick, to do without the nuptial bed, and to brave love? Nothing
more simple. Here is the receipt: lemonade, excessive exercise, hard
labor; work yourself to death, drag blocks, sleep not, hold vigil,
gorge yourself with nitrous beverages, and potions of nymphaeas; drink
emulsions of poppies and agnus castus; season this with a strict diet,
starve yourself, and add thereto cold baths, girdles of herbs, the
application of a plate of lead, lotions made with the subacetate of
lead, and fomentations of oxycrat."

"I prefer a woman," said Listolier.

"Woman," resumed Tholomyes; "distrust her. Woe to him who yields himself
to the unstable heart of woman! Woman is perfidious and disi