“I don’t doubt it,” said my father, ruefully; “only those doves, when they are small, are a very noisy sort of birds—non talium avium cantos somnum reducent. However, it might have been worse. Leda had twins.”
“So had Mrs. Barnabas last week,” rejoined the accoucheur. “Who knows what may be in store for you yet? Here’s a health to Master Caxton, and lots of brothers and sisters to him.”
“Brothers and sisters! I am sure Mrs. Caxton will never think of such a thing, sir,” said my father, almost indignantly; “she’s much too good a wife to behave so. Once in a way it is all very well; but twice—and as it is, not a paper in its place, nor a pen mended the last three days: I, too, who can only write cuspide duriuscula,—and the baker coming twice to me for his bill, too! The Ilithyiae, are troublesome deities, Mr. Squills.”
“Who are the Ilithyiae?” asked the accoucheur.
“You ought to know,” answered my father, smiling,—“the female daemons who presided over the Neogilos, or New-born. They take the name from Juno. See Homer, Book XI. By the by, will my Neogilos be brought up like Hector, or Astyanax—videlicet, nourished by its mother, or by a nurse?”
“Which do you prefer, Mr. Caxton?” asked Mr. Squills, breaking the sugar in his tumbler. “In this I always deem it my duty to consult the wishes of the gentleman.”
“A nurse by all means, then,” said my father. “And let her carry him upo kolpo, next to her bosom. I know all that has been said about mothers nursing their own infants, Mr. Squills; but poor Kitty is so sensitive that I think a stout, healthy peasant woman will be the best for the boy’s future nerves, and his mother’s nerves, present and future too. Heigh-ho! I shall miss the dear woman very much. When will she be up, Mr. Squills?”
“Oh, in less than a fortnight!”
“And then the Neogilos shall go to school,—upo kolpo,—the nurse with him, and all will be right again,” said my father, with a look of sly, mysterious humor which was peculiar to him.
“School! when he’s just born?”