The Monikins

by James Fenimore Cooper

I was delighted to find that this worthy class of beings have the same propensities in all countries.

“Here, take a hundred,” answered Noah, snapping his fingers, “and make no bones of it. And harkee, my worthy—lay out every farthing of them in the fare. Let there be good cheer, and no one will grumble at the bill. I am ready to buy the inn, and all it holds, at need.”

The waiter departed well satisfied with these assurances, and apparently in the anticipation of good vails for his own trouble.

We soon got into the current that was setting towards our place of destination. On reaching the gate, we found that we were anxiously expected; for there was an attendant in waiting, who instantly conducted us to the seats that were provided for our special reception. It is always agreeable to be among the privileged, and I must own that we were all not a little flattered, on finding that an elevated tribune had been prepared for us, in the centre of the rotunda in which the academy held its sittings, so that we could see, and be seen by, every individual of the crowded assembly. The whole crew, even to the negro cook, had preceded us; an additional compliment, that I did not fail to acknowledge by suitable salutations to all the members present. After the first feelings of pleasure and surprise were a little abated, I had leisure to look about me and to survey the company.

The academicians occupied the whole of the body of the rotunda, the space taken up by the erection of our temporary tribune alone excepted, while there were sofas, chairs, tribunes, and benches arranged for the spectators, in the outer circles, and along the side-walls of the hall. As the edifice itself was very large, and mind had so essentially reduced matter in the monikin species, there could not have been less than fifty thousand tails present. Just before the ceremonies commenced, Dr. Reasono approached our tribbune, passing from one to another of the party, saying a pleasant and encouraging word to each, in a way to create high expectations in us all as to what was to follow. We were so very evidently honored and distinguished, that I struggled hard to subdue any unworthy feeling of pride, as unbecoming human meekness, and in order to maintain a philosophical equanimity under the manifestations of respect and gratitude that I knew were about to be lavished upon even the meanest of our party. The Doctor was yet in the midst of his pointed attentions, when the king’s eldest first cousin of the masculine gender entered, and the business of the meeting immediately began. I profited by a short pause, however, to say a few words to my companions. I told them that there would soon be a serious demand on their modesty. We had performed a great and generous exploit, and it did not become us to lessen its merit by betraying a vainglorious self-esteem. I implored them all to take pattern by me; promising, in the end, that their new friends would trebly prize their hardihood, self-denial, and skill.

There was a new member of the academy of Latent Sympathies to be received and installed. A long discourse was read by one of this department of the monikin learning, which pointed out and enlarged on the rare merits of the new academician. He was followed by the latter; who in a very elaborate production, that consumed just fifty-five minutes in the reading, tried all he could to persuade the audience that the defunct was a loss to the world, that no accident or application would ever repair, and that he himself was precisely the worst person who could have been selected to be his successor. I was a little surprised at the perfect coolness with which the learned body listened to a reproach that was so very distinctly and perseveringly thrown, as it were, into their very teeth. But a more intimate acquaintance with monikin society satisfied me, that any one might say just what he pleased, so long as he allowed that every one else was an excellent fellow, and he himself the poorest devil going. When the new member had triumphantly established his position, and just as I thought the colleagues were bound, in common honesty, to reconsider their vote, he concluded, and took his seat among them with quite as much assurance as the best philosopher of them all.

After a short pause, and an abundance of felicitations on his excellent and self-abasing discourse, the newly admitted member again rose, and began to read an essay on some discoveries he had made in the science of Latent Sympathies. According to his account of the matter, every monikin possessed a fluid which was invisible, like the animalcula which pervade nature, and which required only to be brought into command, and to be reduced into more rigid laws, to become the substitute for the senses of sight, touch, taste, hearing, and smelling. This fluid was communicable; and had already been so far rendered subject to the will, as to make it of service in seeing in the dark, in smelling when the operator had a bad cold, in tasting when the palate was down, and in touching by proxy. Ideas had been transmitted, through its agency, sixty-two leagues in one minute and a half. Two monikins, who were afflicted with diseased tails, had during the last two years, been insulated and saturated, and had then lost those embellishments, by operations; a quantity of the fluid having been substituted in their places so happily, that the patients fancied themselves more than ever conspicuous for the length and finesse of their caudce. An experiment had also been successfully tried on a member of the lower house of parliament, who, being married to a monikina of unusual mind, had for a long time been supplied with ideas from this source, although his partner was compelled to remain at home, in order to superintend the management of their estate, forty-two miles from town, during the whole session. He particularly recommended to government the promotion of this science, as it might be useful in obtaining evidence for the purposes of justice, in detecting conspiracies, in collecting the taxes, and selecting candidates for trusts of a responsible nature. The suggestion was well received by the king’s cousin, more especially those parts that alluded to sedition and the revenue.

This essay was also perfectly well received by the savans, for I afterwards found very little came amiss to the academy; and the members named a committee forthwith, to examine into “the facts concerning invisible and unknown fluids, their agency, importance, and relations to monikin happiness.”

We were next favored with a discussion on the different significations of the word gorstchwzyb; which, rendered into English, means “eh!” The celebrated philologist who treated the subject, discovered amazing ingenuity in expatiating on its ramifications and deductions. First he tried the letters by transpositions, by which he triumphantly proved that it was derived from all the languages of the ancients; the same process showed that it possessed four thousand and two different significations; he next reasoned most ably and comprehensively for ten minutes, backwards and forwards, using no other word but this, applied in its various senses; after which, he incontrovertibly established that this important part of speech was so useful as to be useless, and he concluded by a proposition, in which the academy coincided by acclamation, that it should be forever and incontinently expunged from the Leaphigh vocabulary. As the vote was carried by acclamation, the king’s cousin arose, and declared that the writer who should so far offend against good taste, as hereafter to make use of the condemned word, should have two inches cut off the extremity of his tail. A shudder among the ladies, who, I afterwards ascertained, loved to carry their caudae as high as our women like to carry their heads, proved the severity of the decree.

An experienced and seemingly much respected member now arose to make the following proposal. He said it was known that the monikin species were fast approaching perfection; that the increase of mind and the decrease of matter were so very apparent as to admit of no denial; that, in his own case, he found his physical powers diminish daily, while his mental acquired new distinctness and force; that he could no longer see without spectacles, hear without a tube, or taste without high seasoning; from all this he inferred that they were drawing near to some important change, and he wished that portion of the science of Latent Sympathies which was connected with the unknown fluid just treated on, might be referred to a committee on the whole, in order to make some provision for the wants of a time when monikins should finally lose their senses. There was nothing to say against a proposition so plausible, and it was accepted nemine contradicente, with the exception of a few in the minority.