"Piety is a thing to be had for praying, fasting, and unlimited devotion. Anybody can have it who grapples the horn of the altar in deadly earnest. In short, if there is anything that everybody on earth has a right to, it's religion. The only aristocracy there is about it, comes when one reaches the high point of perfect sanctification--a state that some people do reach, though it is sometimes so difficult to point out the particular person." "Ah, indeed!" said he. "But I have penetration, madam, great penetration. Do not torture your sensitive modesty by an attempt to conceal extraordinary perfection from one who can so fully appreciate it, and who grieves to say how uncommon it is." I said nothing, but dropped my eyes, and sat up straighter than ever. "Permit me," says my polite fellow-traveller, gently laying his hand on my satchel; "this is too heavy for the lap of a delicate female. Supposing we place it side by side with mine under the seat?" I held on to the satchel, afraid that he might mash one of the turn-over pies. "Do allow me. I really tremble to see a person so formed by nature borne down by such a weight," says my fellow-traveller, with great impressiveness. "It isn't to be thought of." "But--but I don't feel the weight so very much," says I, loosening my grip a trifle. "But, my dear madam, remember that the life and health of a person like you is of consequence to the whole universe. Remember the siotic nerve." "The what nerve?" says I. "Siotic," says he. "That nerve which is so tender in very pious people. They say that the Pope has been suffering agonies with it." "Dear me," says I, "is it anything mixed up with a heart disease?" "Not at all; it is a strain upon the great sensitive nerve that runs like a whip-cord from I don't know where down the back of the le--" Oh! sisters, he almost had that terrible word out, but I gave such a start and blushed so that he turned it right round on his tongue, and says he with great emphasis, "limb." "Oh!" says I, with a gasp of relief, "now you speak so that a modest New England woman can understand. So there is a nerve!" "Peculiarly susceptible in religious and intellectual persons," says he. "Running down the limb!" says I. "Both limbs," says he, "which a weight carried on the lap is sure to exasperate if it does not end in kinking up the siotic and crippling the l--limbs." "Are you a doctor?" says I. He smiled. "A sort of one," says he, and, without more words, he took my satchel and sat it down by his, under the seat, as sociable as could be. After that, he took hold of my hand, as if he was a-going to feel my pulse, looking sweetly anxious. "Is there a siotic there?" says I. He gave my hand a hard squeeze, and seemed to ruminate. "It takes a little time to discover," says he, half closing his eyes. "Be tranquil; there is no danger now. The arm has been in one position rather too long; change was necessary. But this is a change."