that name."

"Nay, Ellen, you confer with a friend. Of the genus, homo, child?"

"Whatever else I may have had in view, I have not seen the vespertilio
horribi--"

"Hush, Nelly, thy vivacity will betray us! Tell me, girl, have you not
seen certain bipeds, called men, wandering about the prairies?"

"Surely. My uncle and his sons have been hunting the buffaloe, since the
sun began to fall."

"I must speak in the vernacular, to be comprehended. Ellen, I would say
of the species, Kentucky."

Though Ellen reddened like the rose, her blushes were concealed by the
darkness. She hesitated an instant, and then summoned sufficient spirit
to say, decidedly--

"If you wish to speak in parables, Doctor Battius, you must find another
listener. Put your questions plainly in English, and I will answer them
honestly in the same tongue."

"I have been journeying in this desert, as thou knowest, Nelly, in quest
of animals that have been hidden from the eyes of science, until now.
Among others, I have discovered a primates, of the genus, homo; species,
Kentucky; which I term, Paul--"

"Hist, for the sake of mercy!" said Ellen; "speak lower, Doctor, or we
shall be ruined."

"Hover; by profession a collector of the apes, or bee," continued the
other. "Do I use the vernacular now,--am I understood?"

"Perfectly, perfectly," returned the girl, breathing with difficulty, in
her surprise. "But what of him? did he tell you to mount this rock?--he
knows nothing, himself; for the oath I gave my uncle has shut my mouth."

"Ay, but there is one that has taken no oath, who has revealed all. I
would that the mantle which is wrapped around the mysteries of nature,
were as effectually withdrawn from its hidden treasures! Ellen! Ellen!
the man with whom I have unwittingly formed a compactum, or agreement,
is sadly forgetful of the obligations of honesty! Thy uncle, child."

"You mean Ishmael Bush, my father's brother's widow's husband," returned
the offended girl, a little proudly.--"Indeed, indeed, it is cruel to
reproach me with a tie that chance has formed, and which I would rejoice
so much to break for ever!"

The humbled Ellen could utter no more, but sinking on a projection of
the rock, she began to sob in a manner that rendered their situation
doubly critical. The Doctor muttered a few words, which he intended
as an apologetic explanation, but before he had time to complete his
laboured vindication, she arose and said with decisio