us boots, apparently some
mason's discarded ones, cracked with drouth, half eaten by lime, and
curled up about the toe like a bassoon. "Look--ha, ha, ha!"

"I see," said the other, with what seemed quiet appreciation, but of a
kind expressing an eye to the grotesque, without blindness to what in
this case accompanied it, "I see; and the way in which it moves you,
Charlie, comes in very apropos to point the proverb I was speaking of.
Indeed, had you intended this effect, it could not have been more so.
For who that heard that laugh, but would as naturally argue from it a
sound heart as sound lungs? True, it is said that a man may smile, and
smile, and smile, and be a villain; but it is not said that a man may
laugh, and laugh, and laugh, and be one, is it, Charlie?"

"Ha, ha, ha!--no no, no no."

"Why Charlie, your explosions illustrate my remarks almost as aptly as
the chemist's imitation volcano did his lectures. But even if experience
did not sanction the proverb, that a good laugher cannot be a bad man, I
should yet feel bound in confidence to believe it, since it is a saying
current among the people, and I doubt not originated among them, and
hence _must_ be true; for the voice of the people is the voice of truth.
Don't you think so?"

"Of course I do. If Truth don't speak through the people, it never
speaks at all; so I heard one say."

"A true saying. But we stray. The popular notion of humor, considered as
index to the heart, would seem curiously confirmed by Aristotle--I
think, in his 'Politics,' (a work, by-the-by, which, however it may be
viewed upon the whole, yet, from the tenor of certain sections, should
not, without precaution, be placed in the hands of youth)--who remarks
that the least lovable men in history seem to have had for humor not
only a disrelish, but a hatred; and this, in some cases, along with an
extraordinary dry taste for practical punning. I remember it is related
of Phalaris, the capricious tyrant of Sicily, that he once caused a poor
fellow to be beheaded on a horse-block, for no other cause than having a
horse-laugh."

"Funny Phalaris!"

"Cruel Phalaris!"

As after fire-crackers, there was a pause, both looking downward on the
table as if mutually struck by the contrast of exclamations, and
pondering upon its significance, if any. So, at least, it seemed; but on
one side it might have been otherwise: for presently glancing up, the
cosmopolitan said: "In the instance of the mo