“I think if I had the naming of the animals over again, this morning, I shouldn't call snakes 'snakes'; should you, Eve?” laughed Basil in intricate acknowledgment of his happiness.
“O no, Adam; we'd look out all the most graceful euphemisms in the newspapers, and we wouldn't hurt the feelings of a spider.”
II. MIDSUMMER-DAY'S DREAM.
They had waited to see Leonard, in order that they might learn better how to find his house in the country; and now, when they came in upon him at nine o'clock, he welcomed them with all his friendly heart. He rose from the pile of morning's letters to which he had but just sat down; he placed them the easiest chairs; he made a feint of its not being a busy hour with him, and would have had them look upon his office, which was still damp and odorous from the porter's broom, as a kind of down-town parlor; but after they had briefly accounted to his amazement for their appearance then and there, and Isabel had boasted of the original fashion in which they had that morning seen New York, they took pity on him, and bade him adieu till evening.
They crossed from Broadway to the noisome street by the ferry, and in a little while had taken their places in the train on the other side of the water.
“Don't tell me, Basil,” said Isabel, “that Leonard travels fifty miles every day by rail going to and from his work!”
“I must, dearest, if I would be truthful.”