244 NATHANIEL SOUTHGATE SHALER 



before salting it down. I have just finished the job." The pro- 

 fessor himself soon added his welcome to hers, and, shortly after, 

 we took our seats at the table, where, among other viands, 

 some nice-looking slices of cold pork were partaken of with a 

 degree of relish and confidence never before evoked by the 

 flesh of the swine. It was soon evident that the good hostess 

 was not only an excellent housewife but a most intelligent 

 woman ; and, later, when the daughters, who had served at 

 table, played and sang, Mr. Shaler was charmed with the happy 

 combination of the useful and the aesthetic that this simple 

 German household represented. Before going, however, his 

 gravity was somewhat taxed when his wife was asked by one 

 of the ladies if she had ever seen a sewing-machine, and although 

 she answered in the affirmative, the strangers were conducted 

 by devious ways to a long gallery where a huge apparatus, ap- 

 parently intended to be run by horse-power, stood against the 

 wall. It had been constructed, as Frau Professorin proudly 

 announced, by a local craftsman, and when she further stated 

 that she and her daughters had much pleasure in using it, Mr. 

 Shaler's respect for her physical strength was only equalled 

 by his admiration of her other qualities. Truly the machine 

 was a wonder, if not a delight, to the natives of a land where 

 mechanical contrivances as a rule demonstrate the theory that 

 efficiency and beauty largely consist in the purgation of the 

 superfluous. 



The principal German cities and many out-of-the-way places 

 were journeyed to at this time among the latter the visit he 

 paid to Boll in Wiirttemberg lingered vividly in his mind. It was 

 here that he afterwards affirmed that he saw the progress of 

 miracles from the simple origin to the inexplicable mystery. It 

 was not, however, the search for the supernatural that brought 

 him to this neighborhood ; he came for the purpose of collecting 

 fossils in a region famous for ichthyosauri and ammonites. 

 On the day of arrival at the hotel to which he was directed, 

 while registering his name, he was asked his profession. " Geo- 



