sir," said the old man, speaking English
with a singularly pure accent for a foreigner. "That absurd book plunged
me so deep down in the quagmires of sophistry and error, Mr. Kerby, that
I really could not get to the surface at once when you came into the
room. So you are willing to draw my likeness for such a small sum as
five pounds?" he continued, rising, and showing me that he wore a long
black velvet gown, instead of the paltry and senseless costume of modern
times.

I informed him that five pounds was as much as I generally got for a
drawing.

"It seems little," said the professor; "but if you want fame, I can make
it up to you in that way. There is my great work" (he pointed to the
piles of manuscript), "the portrait of my mind and the mirror of my
learning; put a likeness of my face on the first page, and posterity
will then be thoroughly acquainted with me, outside and in. Your
portrait will be engraved, Mr. Kerby, and your name shall be inscribed
under the print. You shall be associated, sir, in that way, with a work
which will form an epoch in the history of human science. The Vital
Principle--or, in other words, the essence of that mysterious Something
which we call Life, and which extends down from Man to the feeblest
insect and the smallest plant--has been an unguessed riddle from the
beginning of the world to the present time. I alone have found the
answer; and here it is!" He fixed his dazzling eyes on me in triumph,
and smacked the piles of manuscript fiercely with both his sallow hands.

I saw that he was waiting for me to say something; so I asked if his
great work had not cost a vast expenditure of time and pains.

"I am seventy, sir," said the Professor; "and I began preparing myself
for that book at twenty. After mature consideration, I have written it
in English (having three other foreign languages at my fingers' ends),
as a substantial proof of my gratitude to the nation that has given
me an asylum. Perhaps you think the work looks rather long in its
manuscript state? It will occupy twelve volumes, sir, and it is not half
long enough, even then, for the subject. I take two volumes (and no man
could do it in less) to examine the theories of all the philosophers in
the world, ancient and modern, on the Vital Principle. I take two more
(and little enough) to scatter every one of the theories, _seriatim_,
to the winds. I take two more (at the risk, for brevity's sake, of doing
things by halves)