80 



Third Plate. These are plentiful and cheap, but 

 they are a hard, tiresome, and most insidious rehsh. Let 

 me offer you the crackers. Well, what are contracted 

 heels ? Heels where the wings of the coffin bone 

 from being squeezed for want of room behind, have 

 fluttered forward and settled down towards the toe. 

 (No professional writing will ever convey the mean- 

 ing so clear as that.) The foot in consequence has 

 lengthened out, and turned into a bell shape. When 

 tenderness first comes on freshmen are fond of send- 

 ing these feet into a salt marsh, but it will take a 

 great deal more salt than there is in the sea to bring 

 back the wings of the coffin bone from this abnormal 

 shape to their original form. If people would only 

 habituate themselves to keep the feet moist with a 

 daily two hours fresh water bath before contraction has 

 commenced, they would have no need to go searching 

 for salt marshes. 



It is difficut to decide positively what is inside of 

 a nut-shell until it is cracked ; and it is equally diffi- 

 cult to decide positively as to the inside of a horse's 

 foot ; but as hard nuts make the teeth ache, so hard 

 roads make the feet ache, and without constant sur- 

 veillance this will rapidly lead to the pocket ache, for 

 as the heels diminish in width, so the homy frog 

 diminishes. As the horny frog diminishes so the sen- 



