feræ. Venerable
hunter! the solitary animal confined in that wagon by day, and in the tent at
night, has occasioned me more perplexity of mind than the whole catalogue of
quadrupeds besides: and for this plain reason; I did not know how to class it.«
    »You think it a ravenous beast?«
    »I know it to be a quadruped: your own danger proves it to be carnivorous.«
    During this broken explanation, Paul Hover sat silent and thoughtful,
regarding each speaker with deep attention. But, suddenly moved by the manner of
the Doctor, the latter had scarcely time to utter his positive assertion, before
the young man bluntly demanded -
    »And pray, friend, what may you call a quadruped?«
    »A vagary of nature, wherein she has displayed less of her infinite wisdom
than is usual. Could rotary levers be substituted for two of the limbs,
agreeably to the improvement in my new order of phalangacrura, which might be
rendered into the vernacular as lever-legged, there would be a delightful
perfection and harmony in the construction. But, as the quadruped is now formed,
I call it a mere vagary of nature; no other than a vagary.«
    »Harkee, stranger! in Kentucky we are but small dealers in dictionaries.
Vagary is as hard a word to turn into English as quadruped.«
    »A quadruped is an animal with four legs - a beast.«
    »A beast! Do you then reckon that Ishmael Bush travels with a beast caged in
that wagon?«
    »I know it, and lend me your ear - not literally, friend,« observing Paul to
start and look surprised, »but figuratively, through its functions, and you
shall hear. I have already made known that, in virtue of a compactum I journey
with the aforesaid Ishmael Bush; but though I am bound to perform certain duties
while the journey lasts, there is no condition which says that the said journey
shall be sempiternum, or eternal. Now, though this region may scarcely be said
to be wedded to science, being to all intents a virgin territory as respects the
inquirer into natural history, still it is greatly destitute of the treasures of
the vegetable kingdom. I should therefore have tarried some hundreds of miles
more to the eastward, were it not for the inward propensity that I feel to have
the beast in question inspected and suitably described and classed. For that
matter,« he continued, dropping his voice, like one who imparts an important
secret, »I am not without hopes of persuading Ishmael to let me dissect it