“I believe, sir,” said Alice, “that the ancients watched the flight of birds and predicated their predictions or prophecies upon them.”

“Yes, the untutored of every age and country observe more closely the operations of nature than the educated.  It is their only means of learning.  They see certain movements in the beasts and the birds before certain atmospheric changes, and their superstitions influence a belief, that sentient and invisible beings cause this by communicating the changes going on.  The more sagacious and observant, and I may add the less scrupulous, lay hold upon this knowledge, to practice for their own pleasure or profit upon the credulity of the masses.  There are very many superstitions, miss, which are endowed with a character so holy, that he who would expose them is hunted down as a wretch, unworthy of life.  The older and the more ridiculous these, the more holy, and the more sacredly cherished.”

“Are you not afraid thus to speak—­is there nothing too holy to be profanely assaulted?”

“Nothing which contravenes man’s reason.  Truth courts investigation—­the more disrobed, the more beautiful.  Science reveals, that there is no mystery in truth.  Its simplicity is often disfigured with unnatural and ridiculous superstitions, and these sometimes are so prominent as to conceal it.  They certainly, with many, bring it into disrepute.  The more intellectual pluck these off and cast them away.  They see and know the truth.  Yonder birds obey an instinct:  the chill to their more sensitive natures warns them that the winter, or the tempest, or the rain-storm is upon them; they obey this instinct and fly from it.  Yet it in due time follows these—­the more observant know it, and predict it.  Those, with the ancients, were sooth-sayers or prophets; with us, they are the same with the ignorant negroes; with the whites, not quite so ignorant, they are—­but, miss, I will not say.  I must exercise a little prudence to avoid the wrath of the ignorant—­they are multitudinous and very powerful.”

“Kind sir, tell me, have you no superstitions?  Has nothing ever occurred to you, your reason could not account for?  Have no predictions, to be revealed in the coming future, come to you as foretold?”

“Do not press me on that point, if you please, I might astonish and offend you.”

“I am not in the least afraid of your offending me, sir.  I could not look in your face and feel its inspirations, and believe you capable of offending me.”

“Thank you for the generous confidence, thank you.  I am going and shall remember this so long as I live, and when in my native land, will think of it as too sacred for the keeping of any but myself.”

“Are you really going to leave us, and so soon?  I—­I—­would—­but—­”

“Miss Alice, I have trespassed too long already upon your brother’s hospitality; beside, Miss Alice, I begin to feel that his welcome is worn out.  Your brother, for some days, has seemed less cordial than was his wont during the first weeks of my stay here.”