ly diminished. He intended to buy something
very big and sensible: a knight's sword or a cross-bow; perhaps
even--but this thought seemed like an evil temptation--the ginger-cake
covered with almonds, which was exhibited in the booth of a Delft
confectioner. He and Bessie could surely nibble for weeks upon this
giant cake, if they were economical, and economy is an admirable virtue.
Something must at any rate be spared for "little brothers,"--[A kind
of griddle or pancake.]--the nice spiced cakes which were baked in many
booths before the eyes of the passers-by.

On Tuesday afternoon his way led him past the famous Rotterdam
cake-shop. Before the door of the building, made of boards lightly
joined together and decked with mirrors and gay pictures, a stout,
pretty woman, in the bloom of youth, sat in a high arm-chair, pouring
rapidly, with remarkable skill, liquid dough into the hot iron plate,
provided with numerous indentations, that stood just on a level with her
comfortably outspread lap. Her assistant hastily turned with a fork
the little cakes, browning rapidly in the hollows of the iron, and when
baked, laid them neatly on small plates. The waiter prepared them for
purchasers by putting a large piece of yellow butter on the smoking
pile. A tempting odor, that only too vividly recalled former enjoyment,
rose from the fireplace, and Adrian's fingers were already examining the
contents of his purse, when the negro's trumpet sounded and the quack
doctor's cart stopped directly in front of the booth.

The famous Doctor Morpurgo was a fine-looking man, dressed in bright
scarlet, who had a thin, coalblack beard hanging over his breast. His
movements were measured and haughty, the bows and gestures with which he
saluted the assembled crowd, patronizing and affable. After a sufficient
number of curious persons had gathered around his cart, which was
stocked with boxes and vials, he began to address them in broken Dutch,
spiced with numerous foreign words.

He praised the goodness of the Providence which had created the marvel
of human organism. Everything, he said, was arranged and formed wisely
and in the best possible manner, but in one respect nature fared badly
in the presence of adepts.

"Do you know where the error is, ladies and gentlemen?" he asked.

"In the purse," cried a merry barber's clerk, "it grows prematurely thin
every day."

"Right, my son," answered the quack graciously. "But nature also
provides