"
Lezard and Fooss nodded assent. Then, in the silence, we all strained our
ears to listen. And presently we detected the scarcely heard sound of
cautiously retreating footsteps down the corridor.
When it was safe to do so I arose and closed my door.
"I think," said I, with a sort of infernal cheerfulness in my tones,
"that we are about to do something jocose to Jane Bottomly."
"A few," said Professor Lezard. He rose and silently executed a
complicated ballet-step.
"I shall laff," said Dr. Fooss, earnestly, "und I shall laff, und I shall
laff--ach Gott how I shall laff my pally head off!"
I folded my arms and turned romanesquely toward the direction in which
Professor Bottomly had retreated.
"Viper!" I said. "The Bronx shall nourish you in its bosom no more! Fade
away, Ophidian!"
The sentiment was applauded by all. There chanced to be in my desk a
bottle marked: "That's all!" On the label somebody had written: "Do it
now!" We did.
III
It was given out at the Bronx that our field expedition to Baffin
Land was to be undertaken solely for the purpose of bringing back
living specimens of the five-spotted Arctic woodcock--_Philohela
quinquemaculata_--in order to add to our onomatology and our glossary
of onomatopoeia an ontogenesis of this important but hitherto unstudied
sub-species.
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