THE PHRENOLOGIST. 55 



cut short the learned Doctor's intended dissertation, and he led the 

 way to the dining-room, exclaiming 



" There is no true happiness in this world !" so said Quin, when 

 he had procured some delicious fish, and the sauce was made with 

 bad butter. " Something or other," added the dwarfish craniologist, 

 " is ever impertinently intervening to mar our happiest moments." 



The dinner was discussed after the fashion of most other dinners, 

 save that the os frontis of an unhappy whiting served as the theme 

 for a quarter of an hour's harangue, wherein it was clearly shewn the 

 fish was predestined to be caught and devoured. 



Immediately after the repast, and with a little circumlocution, 

 Kopfstirn, who was not to be put off, said (t You have not seen my 

 sanctum yet, young gentleman : after our wine, I shall have much 

 pleasure in shewing you a few curiosities which I have had the hap- 

 piness to collect/' 



The stranger acquiesced, and almost immediately followed his 

 impatient host through sundry dark and narrow passages, until they 

 arrived at a massive oaken door, studded with immense nails. This 

 door was secured by a couple of patent locks, of intricate machinery, 

 to guard the treasures within. When opened, the visiter beheld a 

 small triangular apartment, furnished with an octagon table, two arm- 

 chairs, covered with dog-skin, and a number of shelves stuck against 

 the bare walls. The back of each chair was ornamented with the 

 representation of a skull, carved with much cunning. The arms of 

 the same were similarly decorated. On the shelves were displayed a 

 vast number of skulls, large and small, round and oval, some human, 

 some animal, some under glass cases, some not so distinguished; it 

 was indeed a Golgotha a place of skulls ! On the table were scat- 

 tered a miscellaneous assemblage of books, pamphlets, and manu- 

 scripts, with materials for writing. 



The stranger could not but admire the contrivance for holding ink 

 a china skull contained the immortalizing fluid. It had all the 

 various organs distinctly marked, not according to either Spurzheim 

 or Gall, but after a new system which boasted the Doctor as its 

 inventor, and which he took infinite pains to reduce to the stranger's 

 capacity ; but like many others, he had the art of amplifying to such 

 an extent, and involving illustration within illustration, that what 

 might have been previously comprehensible was so effectually ob- 

 scured by his method of explanation, that not a glimpse of meaning 

 remained. 



Having glanced at the characteristic appendages of the craniolo- 

 gist's triangular study, the countenance of the stranger suddenly 

 assumed an extraordinary appearance of emotion. The Doctor be- 

 came alarmed. The stranger endeavoured to control it, but in vain. 

 He sunk on a chair, and gave way to an uncontrollable burst of 

 laughter. Two cats and a pug-dog were lying on the rug before the 

 fire with shaven crowns ! 



" Experiments for the advancement of science," said the Doctor, 

 as both cause and effect manifested themselves, C( are not legitimate 

 subjects for laughter;'' and he looked displeased. " I have operated 

 on these animals myself, to the temporary destruction of their crinose 

 honors, for the sake of a more minute examination/' 



