anklin?" said Israel.

"Ah! I smell Indian corn," said the Doctor, turning round quickly on his
chair. "A countryman; sit down, my good sir. Well, what news? Special?"

"Wait a minute, sir," said Israel, stepping across the room towards a
chair.

Now there was no carpet on the floor, which was of dark-colored wood,
set in lozenges, and slippery with wax, after the usual French style.
As Israel walked this slippery floor, his unaccustomed feet slid about
very strangely as if walking on ice, so that he came very near falling.

"'Pears to me you have rather high heels to your boots," said the grave
man of utility, looking sharply down through his spectacles; "don't you
know that it's both wasting leather and endangering your limbs, to wear
such high heels? I have thought, at my first leisure, to write a little
pamphlet against that very abuse. But pray, what are you doing now? Do
your boots pinch you, my friend, that you lift one foot from the floor
that way?"

At this moment, Israel having seated himself, was just putting his right
foot across his left knee.

"How foolish," continued the wise man, "for a rational creature to wear
tight boots. Had nature intended rational creatures should do so, she
would have made the foot of solid bone, or perhaps of solid iron,
instead of bone, muscle, and flesh,--But,--I see. Hold!"

And springing to his own slippered feet, the venerable sage hurried to
the door and shot-to the bolt. Then drawing the curtain carefully across
the window looking out across the court to various windows on the
opposite side, bade Israel proceed with his operations.

"I was mistaken this time," added the Doctor, smiling, as Israel
produced his documents from their curious recesses--"your high heels,
instead of being idle vanities, seem to be full of meaning."

"Pretty full, Doctor," said Israel, now handing over the papers. "I had
a narrow escape with them just now."

"How? How's that?" said the sage, fumbling the papers eagerly.

"Why, crossing the stone bridge there over the _Seen_"--

"_Seine_"--interrupted the Doctor, giving the French
pronunciation.--"Always get a new word right in the first place,
my friend, and you will never get it wrong afterwards."

"Well, I was crossing the bridge there, and who should hail me, but
a suspicious-looking man, who, under pretence of seeking to polish my
boots, wanted slyly to unscrew their heels, and so steal all these
precious papers I've brought you