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is a poor little fat fool who knows no better. I pity and forgive him.
But you, Mr. Gliddon--and you, Silk--who have travelled and resided in
Egypt until one might imagine you to the manner born--you, I say who
have been so much among us that you speak Egyptian fully as well, I
think, as you write your mother tongue--you, whom I have always been
led to regard as the firm friend of the mummies--I really did anticipate
more gentlemanly conduct from you. What am I to think of your standing
quietly by and seeing me thus unhandsomely used? What am I to suppose by
your permitting Tom, Dick, and Harry to strip me of my coffins, and my
clothes, in this wretchedly cold climate? In what light (to come to the
point) am I to regard your aiding and abetting that miserable little
villain, Doctor Ponnonner, in pulling me by the nose?"
It will be taken for granted, no doubt, that upon hearing this speech
under the circumstances, we all either made for the door, or fell into
violent hysterics, or went off in a general swoon. One of these three
things was, I say, to be expected. Indeed each and all of these lines of
conduct might have been very plausibly pursued. And, upon my word, I am
at a loss to know how or why it was that we pursued neither the one nor
the other. But, perhaps, the true reason is to be sought in the spirit
of the age, which proceeds by the rule of contraries altogether, and
is now usually admitted as the solution of every thing in the way of
paradox and impossibility. Or, perhaps, after all, it was only the
Mummy's exceedingly natural and matter-of-course air that divested his
words of the terrible. However this may be, the facts are clear, and no
member of our party betrayed any very particular trepidation, or seemed
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