_cacoethes_; word of cabalistic look, unknown to Dr. Dilworth.
Truly, my masters, though disciple I be of venerable Martinus the
Scribbler; though, for aught I know, himself in progress of
transmigration; still, I submit, my cornucopia is not crammed with
leaves and chopped straw; and if, in utter carelessness, the fruit is
poured out pell-mell after this desultory fashion, yet, I wot, it _is_
fruit, though whether ripe or crude, or rotten, my husbandry takes
little thought: the mixture serves for my cider-press, and, fermentation
over, the product will be clarified. Judge me too, am I not consecutive?
I've shown man to be a writing animal; and writing, what it is and is
not; and meanwhile have been routing recreatively at pen's point whims,
and fancies, and ideas, and images, pulled in manfully by head and
shoulders: and now--after an episode, quite relevant and quite
Herodotean, concerning the consequences of a bit of successful
authorship on a man's scheme of life, to illustrate yet more the
"author's mind"--I shall proceed to tell all men how many books I might,
could, should, or would have written, but for reiterated and legitimated
_buts_, and how near of kin I must esteem myself to the illustrious J.
of nursery rhymes, being, as he is or was, "Mister Joe Jenkins, who
played on the fiddle, and began twenty tunes, but left off in the
middle." Moreover, no one can be ignorant of the close consanguinity
recognised in every age and every dictionary between I and J. But now
for the episode:

If ever a toy were symbolical of life, that toy was a kaleidoscope: the
showy bits of tinsel, coloured glass, silk, beads, and feathers, with
here and there perchance a stray piece of iridescent ore or a pin, each,
in its turn of ideal multiplication, filling successively the field of
vision; the trifling touch that will disenchant the fairest patterns;
the slightest change, as in chemical arithmetic, that will make the
whole mixture a poison or a cordial. A man is vexed, the nerve of his
equanimity thrillingly touched at the tender elbow, and forthwith his
whole wholesome body writhes in pain; while, to speak morally, those
useful reminders of life's frailty, the habitual side-thorns--spurs of
diligence, incentives to better things--are exaggerated into sixfold
spears, and terribly stop the way, like long-lanced Achaeans: a careless
fit succeeds to one of spleen, and vanity well spangled, pretty baubles,
stars and trinkets and tri