"Well, that might have done, to be sure; but they happened to miss it. So for the last month Strype has been studying the works of numerous ingenious commentators to see whether some of their happy emendations to the text might not meet the difficulty."
"But it must require the insertion of some entire speech or paragraph to make Shakspeare give his testimony in favor of savage pharmacy," said I, innocently.
"Not in the least necessary; it merely requires the slightest possible change in a single letter,—aided, of course, by a little intelligent commentary."
As we all looked rather doubtful, Colonel Prowley sent for the last number of Strype's valuable publication, and read as follows:—
"Important Literary Discovery. We learn by the last steamer from England that a certain distinguished Shakspearian Editor and Critic, who has already proved that the Mighty Bard was perfectly acquainted with the circulation of the blood, and distinctly prophesied iron-plated steamers and the potato-rot, has now discovered that the Swan of Avon fully comprehended the Indian System of Medicine, and urged its universal adoption. Our readers have doubtless puzzled over that exclamation in Macbeth which reads, in common editions of the poet, 'Throw physic to the dogs!' The slightest consideration of the circumstances shows the absurdity of this vulgar interpretation. Macbeth was deservedly disgusted with the practice of the regular family physician who confessed himself unable to relieve the case in hand. He would therefore request him to abandon his pretensions, not to the dogs, which is simply ridiculous, but in favor of some class of men more skilled in the potencies of medicine. The line, as it came from the pen of Shakspeare, undoubtedly read, 'Throw Physicke to the Powwows'; in other words, resign the healing art to the Indians, who alone are able to practise it with success. And now mark the perfectly simple method of accounting for the blunder. We have only to suppose that a careless copyist or tipsy type-setter managed to get one loop too many upon the 'P,'—thus transforming the passage into, 'Throw Physicke to the Bowwows.' The proof-reader, naturally taking this for an infantile expression for the canine race, changed the last word to 'dogs,' as it has ever since stood."
Mr. Clifton smiled, and said, "Even if the emendation and inference could be accepted, the testimony of any man off the speciality he studied would only imply, not that the new school was perfect, but that he realized some imperfection in the old one. And this conviction I have had occasion to act upon, when my church has been shaken by spiritualism, abolitionism, and the like; for I knew that what was truly effective in a rival ministry must show what was defective in my own."
"If you speak of modern spiritualism," said Professor Owlsdarck, "you must allow it to be lamentably inferior to the same mystery of old. For how compare the best ghostly doings of these days, those at Stratford in Connecticut, for example, I will not say to the famous doings at Delphi and Dodona, but even to the Moodus Noises once heard at East Haddam in that State? The ancestors of some of these nervous media testify to roarings in the air, rumblings in the bowels of the mountain, explosions like volleys of musketry, the moving of heavy stones, and the violent shaking of houses. Ah, Sir, you should use effort to have put to type your reverend brother Bradley's memoir on this subject, whereof the sole copy is held by the Historical Society at Hartford."
"Every recent quackery is so overlaid with a veneering of science," said the clergyman, "that those who have not had sufficient training to know that they lack scientific methods of thought are often unable to draw the distinction between a fact and an inference. There is much practical shrewdness and intelligence here in Foxden; yet I am constantly surprised to see how few, in relation to any circumstance out of the daily routine of business-life, recognize the difference between possibility, probability, and demonstration. And, indeed, it is no easy matter to impart a sense of their deficiency to those who have only been accustomed to deal with the loose forms of ordinary language."
"If we may believe the Padre Clavigero," observed the Professor, "it will not be easy to find a language so fit for metaphysical subjects, and so abounding in abstract terms, as the ancient Mexican."
This remark seemed hardly to the purpose; for whatever the excellences of that tongue might have been, there were insuperable objections to its adoption as a vehicle of communication between Mr. Clifton and his parishioners. But the last-named gentleman, with generous tact, allowed the conversation to wander back to those primitive solidities whither it naturally tended. It did not take long to get to the Pharaohs, of whose domestic arrangements the Professor talked with the familiar air of a man who dined with them once a week. From these venerable potentates we soon came upon their irrepressible mummies, and here Owlsdarck was as thoroughly at home as if he had been brought up in a catacomb. Indeed, this singular person appeared fairly alive only when he surrounded himself with the deadest antiquities of the dimmest past. His remarks, as I have before admitted, had that interest which must belong to the careful investigation of anything; but I could not help thinking into how much worthier channels his powers of accurate investigation and indefatigable research might have been directed.