materials; and here--a cork with quills stuck into it, and with a kind
of drill-bow--was the little flying model of Sir George Cayley. The
whole place, dusty and musty, with a faded smell of the oil in birds'
feathers, was almost more noisome than curious. When Barton left it, his
mind was made up as to the nature of Winter's secret, or delusion; and
when he visited that queer patient in hospital, he was not surprised
either by his smattered learning or by his golden dreams.

"Yes, sir; Eusebius is against me, no doubt," Winter went on with his
eager talk. "An acute man--rather _too_ acute, don't you think, for a
Father of the Church? That habit he got into of smashing the arguments
of the heathen, gave him a kind of flippancy in talking of high
matters."

"Such as flying?" put in Barton.

"Yes; such as our great aim--the aim of all the ages, I may call it.
What does Bishop Wilkins say, sir? Why, he says, (I doubt not but that
flying in the air may be easily effected by a diligent and ingenious
artificer.) 'Diligent,' I may say, I have been; as to 'ingenious,' I
leave the verdict to others."

"Was that Peter Wilkins you were quoting?" asked Barton, to humor his
man.

"Why, no sir; the Bishop was not Peter. Peter Wilkins is the hero of
a mere romance, in which, it is true, we meet with women--_Goories_ he
calls them--endowed with the power of flight. But _they_ were born so.
We get no help from Peter Wilkins: a mere dreamer."

"It doesn't seem to be so easy as the Bishop fancies?" remarked Barton,
leading him on.

"No, sir," cried Winter, all his aches and pains forgotten, and his pale
face flushed with the delight of finding a listener who did not laugh
at him. "No, sir; the Bishop, though ingenious, was not a practical man.
But look at what he says about the _weight_ of your flying machine!
Can anything be more sensible? Borne out, too, by the most recent
researches, and the authority of Professor Pettigrew Bell himself. You
remember the iron fly made by Begimontanus of Nuremberg?"

"The iron fly!" murmured Barton. "I can't say I do."

"You will find a history of it in Bamus. This fly would leap from the
hands of the great Begimontanus, flutter and buzz round the heads of his
guests assembled at supper, and then, as if wearied, return and repose
on the finger of its maker."

"You don't mean to say you believe _that_?" asked Barton.

"Why not, sir; why not? Did not Archytas of Tarenturn, one of Plato's
ac