"Oh, I don't know so much about that," said the Doctor. "It is
nice, I admit, to be able to read and write. But naturalists are
not all alike, you know. For example: this young fellow Charles
Darwin that people are talking about so much now--he's a
Cambridge graduate--reads and writes very well. And then
Cuvier--he used to be a tutor. But listen, the greatest
naturalist of them all doesn't even know how to write his own
name nor to read the A B C."

"Who is he?" I asked.

"He is a mysterious person," said the Doctor--"a very mysterious
person. His name is Long Arrow, the son of Golden Arrow. He is a
Red Indian."

"Have you ever seen him?" I asked.

"No," said the Doctor, "I've never seen him. No white man has
ever met him. I fancy Mr. Darwin doesn't even know that he
exists. He lives almost entirely with the animals and with the
different tribes of Indians--usually somewhere among the
mountains of Peru. Never stays long in one place. Goes from
tribe to tribe, like a sort of Indian tramp."

"How do you know so much about him?" I asked--"if you've never
even seen him?"

"The Purple Bird-of-Paradise," said the Doctor--" she told me all
about him. She says he is a perfectly marvelous naturalist. I
got her to take a message to him for me last time she was here.