y. Sir Isaac!" The dog bounded towards him, put his
paws on his shoulder, and licked his face. "Just cut out those figures
carefully, my dear, and see if we can get him to tell us how much twice
ten are--I mean by addressing him as Sir Isaac."

Sophy cut the figures from the multiplication table, and arranged them,
at Waife's instruction, in a circle on the floor. "Now, Sir Isaac."
Mop lifted a paw, and walked deliberately round the letters. "Now, Sir
Isaac, how much are ten times two?" Mop deliberately made his survey and
calculation, and, pausing at twenty, stooped, and took the letters in
his mouth.

"It is not natural," cried Sophy, much alarmed. "It must be wicked, and
I'd rather have nothing to do with it, please."

"Silly child! He was but obeying my sign. He had been taught that trick
already under the name of Mop. The only strange thing is, that he should
do it also under the name of Sir Isaac, and much more cheerfully too.
However, whether he has been the great Newton or not, a live dog is
better than a dead lion. But it is clear that, in acknowledging the name
of Sir Isaac, he does not encourage us to take that of Newton; and he is
right: for it might be thought unbecoming to apply to an animal, however
extraordinary, who by the severity of fortune is compelled to exhibit
his talents for a small pecuniary reward, the family name of so great a
philosopher. Sir Isaac, after all, is a vague appellation; any dog has a
right to be Sir Isaac--Newton may be left conjectural. Let us see if
we can add to our arithmetical information. Look at me, Sir Isaac." Sir
Isaac looked and grinned affectionately; and under that title learned a
new combination with a facility that might have relieved Sophy's mind
of all superstitious belief that the philosopher was resuscitated in the
dog, had she known that in life that great master of calculations the
most abstruse could not accurately cast up a simple sum in addition.
Nothing brought him to the end of his majestic tether like dot and carry
one. Notable type of our human incompleteness, where men might deem our
studies had made us most complete! Notable type, too, of that grandest
order of all human genius which seems to arrive at results by intuition,
which a child might pose by a row of figures on a slate, while it is
solving the laws that link the stars to infinity! But _revenons a nos
moutons_, what was the astral attraction that incontestably bound the
reminiscences of Mo