38 FOOTING IT IN FRANCONIA 



is now, but I remember an old one, and a 

 fright that I once had upon it. With a fel- 

 low itinerant — a learned man, whose life 

 was valuable — I stopped here to rest of a 

 summer noon, and my companion, with an 

 eye to shady comfort, clambered over the 

 edge of the bridge and out upon a joist 

 which projected over the stream. There he 

 sat down with his back against a pillar and 

 his legs stretched before him on the joist. 

 He has a theory, concerning which I have 

 heard him discourse more than once, — 

 something in his own attitude suggesting 

 the theme, — that when a man, after walk- 

 ing, " puts his feet up," he is acting not 

 merely upon a natural impulse, but in ac- 

 cordance with a sound physiological princi- 

 ple ; and in accordance with that principle 

 he was acting now, as well as the circum- 

 stances of the case would permit. We 

 chatted awhile ; then he fell silent ; and 

 after a time I turned my head, and saw him 

 clean gone in a doze. The seat was barely 

 wide enough to hold him. What if he 

 should move in his sleep, or start up sud- 

 denly on being awakened ? I looked at the 



