effort to open the door and step into the room.

"If I am sanctified, Sophronia," said the voice of Malkiel, "I cannot
help it, indeed I can't. We are as we are."

"Did Bottom say so in his epics?" cried the contralto, contemptuously.
"Did Shakespeare imply that when he invented his immortal Bacon, or
Carlyle, the great Cumberland sage, when he penned his world-famed
'Sartus'?"

"P'r'aps not, my dear. You know best. Still, ordinary men--not that I,
of course, can claim to be one--must remain, to a certain extent, what
they are."

"Then why was Samuel Smiles born?"

"What, my love?"

"Why, I say? Where is the use of effort? Of what benefit was Plato's
existence to the republic? Of what assistance has the great Tracy Tupper
been if men must still, despite all his proverbs, remain what they are?
_O curum hominibus! O imitatori! Servus pecum!_"

At this point the voice of Mr. Ferdinand remarked in the small of the
Prophet's back,--

"Shall I set down the tea on the mat, sir, or--"

The Prophet bounded into the library, tingling in every vein. His
panther-like entrance evidently took the two conversationalists aback,
for Malkiel the Second, who had been plaintively promenading about the
room, still on his toes according to the behest of Mr. Ferdinand,
sat down violently on a small table as if he had been shot, while the
contralto voice, which had been sitting on a saddle-back chair by the
hearth, simultaneously bounced up; both these proceedings being
carried out with the frantic promptitude characteristic of complete and
unhesitating terror.

"I beg your pardon!" said the Prophet. "I hope I haven't disturbed you."

Malkiel the Second leaned back, the contralto voice leaned forward, and
both breathed convulsively.

"I really must apologise," continued the Prophet. "I fear I have
startled you."

His guests swallowed nothing simultaneously and mechanically drew out
their handkerchiefs. Then Malkiel feebly got up and the contralto voice
feebly sank down again.

"I--I thought I said sharp, sir," remarked Malkiel, at length, with a
great effort recovering himself.

"Wasn't I sharp?" returned the Prophet. "Will you present me?"

"Are you equal to it, my love?" inquired Malkiel, tenderly, to the
contralto voice.

The contralto voice nodded hysterically.

"Madame Sagittarius, sir," said Malkiel, turning proudly to the Prophet,
"my wife, the mother of Corona and Capricornus."

The Prophet bowed and the lady