“Pretty well, Sir; barbarous, but amusing,--pray continue it. The triumphal entry of Paulus Emilius is not ill told. I confess, that I think novels might be made much higher works than they have been yet. Doubtless, you remember what Aristotle says concerning Painters and Sculptors, ‘that they teach and recommend virtue in a more efficacious and powerful manner, than Philosophers by their dry precepts, and are more capable of amending the vicious, than the best moral lessons without such aid.’ But how much more, Sir, can a good novelist do this, than the best sculptor or painter in the world! Every one can be charmed by a fine novel, few by a fine painting. ‘Indocti rationem artis intelligunt, indocti voluptatem.’ A happy sentence that in Quinctilian, Sir, is it not? But, bless me, I am forgetting the letter of my good friend Dr. Hebraist. The charms of your conversation carry me away. And indeed I have seldom the happiness to meet a gentleman so well-informed as yourself. I confess, Sir, I confess that I still retain the tastes of my boyhood; the Muses cradled my childhood, they now smooth the pillow of my footstool--Quem tu, Melpomene, are not yet subject to gout, dira podagra: By the way, how is the worthy Doctor since his attack?--Ah, see now, if you have not still, by your delightful converse, kept me from his letter--yet, positively I need no introduction to you, Apollo has already presented you to me. And as for the Doctor’s letter, I will read it after dinner; for as Seneca--” “I beg your pardon a thousand times, Sir,” said Walter, who began to despair of ever coming to the matter which seemed lost sight of beneath this battery of erudition, “but you will find by Dr. Hebraist’s letter, that it is only on business of the utmost importance that I have presumed to break in upon the learned leisure of Mr. Jonas Elmore.” “Business!” replied Mr. Elmore, producing his spectacles, and deliberately placing them athwart his nose, “‘His mane edictum, post prandia Callirhoen, etc. “Business in the morning, and the ladies after dinner. Well, Sir, I will yield to you in the one, and you must yield to me in the other: I will open the letter, and you shall dine here, and be introduced to Mrs. Elmore;--What is your opinion of the modern method of folding letters? I--but I see you are impatient.” Here Mr. Elmore at length broke the seal; and to Walter’s great joy fairly read the contents within.