"What do you think was the matter with him, doctor?"

"Why, your husband says he mesmerized the child," replied the doctor,
incautiously letting the secret drop.

Then Mrs. Fogg looked at the culprit as if she wished to assassinate
him; but she merely ejaculated, "Monster!" and flew from the room; and
Mr. Fogg, as he went down with the physicians, put on an injured look
and said,

"If that baby wants to holloa now, I'm going to let him holloa, if he
holloas the top of his head off."

* * * * *

It was this offence, according to popular rumor, that brought things
to a crisis in Mr. Fogg's family and induced Mrs. Fogg to seek to
remove the heavy burden of woe imposed upon her by her husband. Only
a few days later Mr. and Mrs. Fogg knocked at the door of Colonel
Coffin's law office, and then filed in, Mrs. Fogg in advance. Mr.
Fogg, the reader may care to know, was a subdued, weak-eyed and timid
person. He had the air of a victim of perpetual tyranny--of a man who
had been ruthlessly and remorselessly sat upon until his spirit was
wholly gone. And Mrs. Fogg looked as if she might have been his
despot. She opened the conversation by addressing the lawyer:

"Colonel, I have called to engage you as my counsel in a divorce suit
against Mr. Fogg. I have resolved to separate from him--to sunder our
ties and henceforth to live apart."