ecessarily painful to a man
of such evident sensibility as yours." The red nose bowed. "What is
your name?"

He pronounced it--apparently MacMurtagh.

"In future, among us, you are named Meurtrier."

"MacMeurtrier," muttered the Scotchman in a tone of abstraction.

"No! Meurtrier unadulterated. Your business?"

"I am a homoeopathic doctor."

"Are you a believer in homoeopathy? Be careful: remember that the
Ancient of the Mountain hears what you say."

The Scot held up his hand: "I believe in the learned Hahnemann, and
in Mrs. Hahnemann, no less learned than himself; but," he added,
"homoeopathy is a science still in its baby-clothes. I have invented
a system perfectly novel. In mingling homoeopathy with vegetable
magnetism the most encouraging results are obtained, as may be
observed daily in the villa of Dr. Van Murtagh, near Edinburgh--"

"Enough!" cried the Ancient: "circulars are not allowed here. Forget
nothing, Meurtrier! And how were you inspired with the pious ambition
of becoming our brother?"

"At the hotel table: it was the young clerks from the wine-houses.
I mentioned that I wished to be a Free Mason, and the lodge of
Epernay--"

"Silence! The words you use, _lodge_ and _Free Mason_, are most
improper in this temple, which is that of the Pure Illumination, and
nothing less. Will you remember, Meurtrier?"

"MacMeurtrier," muttered the novice again. The last proofs were now
tried upon him, called the "five senses." For that of hearing he was
made to listen to a jewsharp, which he calmly proclaimed to be the
bagpipe; for that of touch, he was made to feel by turns a live fish,
a hot iron and a little stuffed hedgehog. The last he took for a pack
of toothpicks, and announced gravely, "It sticks me." The laughs broke
out from all sides, even from behind the bottle-shelves.

Alas! on this occasion the laugh was not altogether on my side of that
fatal honeycomb!

[Illustration: THE TRAVELER'S REST.]

They had made him swallow, in a glass, some fearful mixture or other,
and he had imperturbably declared that it was in his opinion the
wine of Moet: after this evidence of taste the proof of sight was to
follow, and the semicircle of purple faces was quite blackening with
bottled laughter, when Grandstone touched me on the shoulder. My hour
for departure was come, and I had not a minute to spare.

[Illustration: PALACE AT STRASBURG.]

Apparently, the last test of the red nose resulted in a triumph