"Then I am all in the dark again," rejoined Aunt Judy.

"By the spirit and essence of things I mean things in the abstract."

"And what becomes of a thing when it gets into the abstract?" asked Uncle Tim.

"Why, it becomes an abstraction."

"There we are again," said Uncle Tim; "but what the deuce is an abstraction ?"

"It's a thing that has no matter; that is, it cannot be felt, seen, heard, smelt or tasted; it has no substance or solidity; it is neither large nor small, hot nor cold, long nor short."

"Then what is the long and short of it ?" asked the schoolmaster.

"Abstraction," replied the Doctor.

"Suppose, for instance," said Malachi, "that I had a pitchfork-"

"Ay," said the Doctor, "consider a pitchfork in general; that is, neither this one nor that one, nor any particular one, but a pitchfork or pitchforks divested of their materiality-these are things in the abstract."

"They are things in the hay-mow," said Malachi.

"Pray," said Uncle Tim, "have there been many such things discovered ?"

"Discovered!" returned the Doctor, "why all things, whether in heaven or upon the earth, or in the waters under the earth, whether small or great, visible or invisible, animate or inanimate; whatever the eye can see, or the ear can hear, or the nose can smell, or the fingers touch; finally, whatever exists or is imaginable in rerum natura, past, present or to come, all may be abstractions."

"Indeed!" said Uncle Tim, "pray what do make of the abstraction of a red cow ?"

you

"A red cow," said the Doctor, "considered metaphysically, or as an abstraction, is an animal possessing neither hide nor horns, bones nor flesh, but is the mere type, eidolon, and fantastical semblance of these parts of a quadruped. It has a shape without any substance, and no colour at all, for its redness is the mere counterfeit or imagination of such. As it lacks the positive, so is it also deficient in the accidental properties of all the animals of its tribe, for it has no locomotion, stability, or endurance, neither goes to pasture, gives milk, chews the cud, nor performs any other function of a horned beast, but is a mere creature of the brain, begotten

by a freak of the fancy, and nourished by a conceit of the imagination."

"A dog's foot!" exclaimed Aunt Judy. "All the metaphysics under the sun wouldn't make a pound of butter."

"That's a fact !" said Uncle Tim.

XVI.

A TIGHT RACE CONSIDERIN'.

DURING my medical studies, passed in a small village in Mississippi, I became acquainted with a family named Hibbs, residing a few miles in the country. The family consisted of Mr. and Mrs. Hibbs and son. They were plain, unlettered people, honest in intent and deed, but overflowing with that which amply made up for all their deficiences of education, namely, warm-hearted hospitality, the distinguishing trait of southern character. They were originally from Virginia, from whence they had emigrated in quest of a clime more genial, and a soil more productive than that in which their fathers toiled.

Their search had been rewarded, their expectations realized, and now, in their old age, though not wealthy in the "Astorian" sense, still they had sufficient to keep the "wolf from the door," and drop something more substantial than condolence and tears, in the hat that poverty hands round for the kind offerings of humanity.

The old man was like the generality of old planters, men whose ambition is embraced by the family or social circle, and whose thoughts turn more on the relative value of "Sea Island" and "Mastodon," and the improvement of their plantations, than the "glorious victories of Whiggery in Kentucky," or the "triumphs of democracy in Arkansas."

The old lady was a shrewd, active dame, kindhearted and long-tongued, benevolent and impartial, making her coffee as strong for the poor pedestrian, with his all upon his back, as the broadcloth sojourner, with his "up-country pacer."

She was a member of the church, as well as the daughter of a man who had once owned a racehorse and these circumstances gave her an indisputable right, she thought, to "let on all she knew," when religion or horse-flesh was the theme.