e endured."

He felt that if he had not rushed incontinently from the presence
of that underground star-gazer Dr. Wilson, he must either have
punched that respected person's venerated head, or have laughed
in his honored face. In either case he would, of course, have
roused the extensive ire of that potent worthy, and have been at
once exposed to a fire of supernatural influences that would have
been probably unpleasant, to say the least.

The unmusical Johannes looks upon accordeons as cruel instruments
of refined torture, and detests them as the vilest of all created
or invented things, and he had been very careful to offend none
of the magic community, lest he should, by some high-pressure
power of their enchanted spells, be transformed into an
accordeon, and be condemned to eternally have shrieking music
pulled out of his bowels by unrelenting boys.

Having this terrible possible doom continually before his mind's
optics, he felt that it would be only the part of prudence to
avoid the company of those black art professors in whose presence
he could not keep all his feelings well in hand. So, no more
wizards would he visit, but the witches should henceforth have
his entire attention.

It is a fortunate circumstance that there are no other men than
the aforesaid Doctor Wilson, in the witch business in New York,
so that there would be no temptation to break this resolve, and
he probably would not be troubled to keep it.

There is one breed of the modern witch that pretends to a sort of
superiority in blood and manners, and those who practise this
peculiar branch of the business put on certain aristocratic airs
and utterly refuse to consort with those of another stamp. They
disdain the title of "Astrologers," or "Astrologists," as most of
them phrase it, and in their advertisements utterly repudiate the
idea that they are "Fortune Tellers."

These are the "Clairvoyants," who do business by means of certain
select mummeries of their own, and who make a great deal of money
in their trade. There are a great number of these in the city, so
many indeed that the business is over-done, and the price of
retail clairvoyance has come materially down. The same dose of
this article that formerly cost five dollars, may now be had for
fifty cents, and the quality is not deteriorated, but is quite as
good now as it ever was.

To one of these supernatural women did the hero resolve to pay
his next visit, and he selected the