describing a pretty woman.

_Author._ On my word, I believe I am. I must invest my elementary
spirits with a little human flesh and blood--they are too fine-drawn
for the present taste of the public.

_Captain._ They object, too, that the object of your Nixie ought to
have been more uniformly noble--Her ducking the priest was no Naiad-
like amusement.

_Author._ Ah! they ought to allow for the capriccios of what is, after
all, but a better sort of goblin. The bath into which Ariel, the most
delicate creation of Shakspeare's imagination, seduces our jolly
friend Trinculo, was not of amber or rose-water. But no one shall find
me rowing against the stream. I care not who knows it--I write for
general amusement; and, though I never will aim at popularity by what
I think unworthy means, I will not, on the other hand, be pertinacious
in the defence of my own errors against the voice of the public.

_Captain._ You abandon, then, in the present work--(looking, in my
turn, towards the proof-sheet)--the mystic, and the magical, and the
whole system of signs, wonders, and omens? There are no dreams, or
presages, or obscure allusions to future events?

_Author._ Not a Cock-lane scratch, my son--not one bounce on the drum
of Tedworth--not so much as the poor tick of a solitary death-watch in
the wainscot. All is clear and above board--a Scots metaphysician
might believe every word of it.

_Captain._ And the story is, I hope, natural and probable; commencing