“And so the monk has,” said Lathom.
“What, the old Greek’s parasol-footed people, of whom Mandeville says with such gravity, ‘There be in Ethiope such men as have but one foot, and they go so fast that it is a great marvel; and that is a large foot, for the shadow thereof covereth the body from sun or rain, when they lie upon their back’?”
“Both Aristophanes and his follower would doubtless be as surprised in learning that their sciapodes were allegorical of the charitable of this world, as Homer would in discovering in his crane-fighting pigmies those mortals who begin well but cease to do well before they attain perfection; or in their neighbors who boast of six hands, and despise clothes in favor of long hair, and live in rivers, the hardworking and laborious among men.”
“The last is decidedly the most intelligible,” remarked Herbert.
“The reason of the explanation is not always clear,” replied Lathom; “it is not very easy to decide why those who have six fingers and six toes are the unpolluted, and why virtuous men are represented by a race of women with bald heads and beards flowing to their breast; nor is it very clear that virtue is well represented by a double allowance of eyes. But one curiosity remains—the beautiful men of Europe who boast a crane’s head, neck, and beak. These, says the author of the Gesta, represent judges, who should have long necks and beaks, that what the heart thinks, may be long before it reach the mouth.”
“That reminds me of long Jack Bannister,” said Thompson, “who was always five minutes after every one else in laughing at a joke, as it took that extra time for it to travel from his ears to his midriff, and then back again to his mouth.”
And so the evening ended with a laugh.
