my impious friend scoffed the incongruity later,
in a particularly withering allusion, as the "blank-
blanked fallacy, don't you know, of staying the
hunger of a howling mob by feeding 'em on spring
poetry!"

The tumult of the audience did not cease even
with the retirement of Sweeney, and cries of "Hedrick!
Hedrick!" only subsided with the Professor's
high-keyed announcement that the subject was even
then endeavoring to make himself heard, but
could not until utter quiet was restored, adding
the further appeal that the young man had already
been a long time under the mesmeric spell, and
ought not be so detained for an unnecessary period.
"See," he concluded, with an assuring wave of the
hand toward the subject, "see; he is about to address
you. Now, quiet!--utter quiet, if you please!"

"Great heavens!" exclaimed my friend stiflingly;
"just look at the boy! Get on to that position for a
poet! Even Sweeney has fled from the sight of
him!"

And truly, too, it was a grotesque pose the young
man had assumed; not wholly ridiculous either,
since the dwarfed position he had settled into
seemed more a genuine physical condition than an
affected one. The head, back-tilted, and sunk between
the shoulders, looked abnormally large, while