"You can grub if you like on what we have. As to the great O, he was here on Saturday-Och Murther-as usual, full of his diskivery-but it is all bosh.

"The true thing is this. Originally, man spoke by signs, and no wonder-Adam and Eve spoke by signs only, until one day Adam refused to go round the corner for some hardbake, which put Eve into a passion, and in her rage she broke Adam's head with the bedpost, which made him cry 'O' and Eve, alarmed at opening his head and mouth at one blow, cried 'O' too. That's the origin of Language!

"Some think Adam said 'O Crikey,' but as he was Crackey at the time it is uncertain.

"Thine,

"Naso."

The last I have was an anecdote of animal sagacity, a subject then being discussed in the papers, and of which he had given me some examples. I give a print of it, as it is a good example of his caricature drawing and of one of his fantastic signatures.

Our pleasant intimacy came to an end in a most absurd manner. Dr. Purland was, as I have said, a powerful and enthusiastic mesmerist, and had given his services for many surgical operations. Just as the opposition of the chiefs of the medical profession was dying away, and they were beginning to acknowledge the great value of the mesmeric sleep in alleviating pain and greatly facilitating serious operations, the discovery of anæsthetics offered a rival, which, though much more dangerous, was more certain and more easily applied in emergencies, and this led to the discontinuance of the use of mesmerism as a remedial agent. This naturally disgusted Dr. Purland, who, with the whole energy of his character, hated chloroform, ether, and nitrous-oxide gas, and would have nothing to do with them in his profession. Besides, he despised any one who could not bear the pain of toothdrawing, and would turn away any patient who required the gas to be administered. A year or two after the date of his last letter my teeth were in a very bad state, and I had a

number of broken stumps which required to be extracted preparatory to having a complete set of artificials. Entirely forgetting his objections, which, in fact, I had hardly believed to be real, after making an appointment I asked him to get a doctor to administer nitrous-oxide, as I could not stand the pain of three or four extractions of stumps of molars in succession. This thoroughly enraged him. He wrote me a most violent letter, saying he could not continue to be the friend of a man who could ask him to do such a thing, and gave me the name of an acquaintance of his who had no such scruples and whose work was thoroughly good. And that was the last communication I ever had from Dr. Purland.

The dentist to whom he recommended me was really a good workman, and made me a set of teeth which I wore almost constantly for thirty years, and which I have never had equalled since. While going about lecturing, and especially when going to America in 1886, I had new sets made, and I think I have had altogether four complete sets besides the first, but not one of them has been comfortable or even wearable without great pain; with none could I eat satisfactorily or speak distinctly, and though I pointed out to each new dentist how well these old ones fitted me, and how comfortable they were, and begged each of them to make the new ones as nearly as possible the same shape, yet each one made them differently, and some were so totally unlike that, when placed side by side, no one would believe they could have been made for the same mouth. My experience of modern dentists is that they all want to improve upon nature, and care nothing for the comfort of those who are to use the teeth.

I will occupy the remainder of this chapter with a few particulars of my relations with persons of some eminence, but with whom I had very few opportunities of personal intercourse.

I made the acquaintance of Mr. Samuel Butler, the author of "Erewhon," through my friend Miss Buckley, at whose