DEFORMITIES. 127 



backs ; others have their bodies twisted round 

 their umbilical vesicle, corkscrew-fashion : 

 and when they see the spoon or the brush 

 coming, or are otherwise alarmed, it is cu- 

 rious to witness their attempts to make 

 a start. They are terrible bad goers, and 

 remind one of the clumsy individuals de- 

 scribed by the sailors as " a chap with 

 a kink in his leg." Instead of going for- 

 ward, they spin round and round, like a 

 " merry-go-round " in a horse-pond. If our 

 crippled friends had been wild fish, they 

 would soon have been snapped up by their 

 kind friends their brother fish, or by some 

 hungry water-beast or other. 



My friend Mr. Ponder, thinking, I suppose, 

 that I must be a fish as well as a human 

 doctor, kindly sent me up a bottle full of 



