It was the School-master’s suggestion to put their tormentor into the pit he had heretofore digged for them.  The worthy instructor of youth had of late come to see that while he was still a prime favorite with his landlady, he had, nevertheless, suffered somewhat in her estimation because of the apparent ease with which the Idiot had got the better of him on all points.  It was necessary, he thought, to rehabilitate himself, and a deep-laid plot, to which the Bibliomaniac readily lent ear, was the result of his reflections.  They twain were to indulge in a discussion of the great story of Robert Elsmere, which both were confident the Idiot had not read, and concerning which they felt assured he could not have an intelligent opinion if he had read it.

So it happened upon this bright Sunday morning that as the boarders sat them down to partake of the usual “restful breakfast,” as the Idiot termed it, the Bibliomaniac observed: 

“I have just finished reading Robert Elsmere.”

“Have you, indeed?” returned the School-master, with apparent interest.  “I trust you profited by it?”

“On the contrary,” observed the Bibliomaniac.  “My views are much unsettled by it.”

“I prefer the breast of the chicken, Mrs. Smithers,” observed the Idiot, sending his plate back to the presiding genius of the table.  “The neck of a chicken is graceful, but not too full of sustenance.”

“He fights shy,” whispered the Bibliomaniac, gleefully.

“Never mind,” returned the School-master, confidently; “we’ll land him yet.”  Then he added, aloud:  “Unsettled by it?  I fail to see how any man with beliefs that are at all the result of mature convictions can be unsettled by the story of Elsmere.  For my part I believe, and I have always said—­”

“I never could understand why the neck of a chicken should be allowed on a respectable table anyhow,” continued the Idiot, ignoring the controversy in which his neighbors were engaged, “unless for the purpose of showing that the deceased fowl met with an accidental rather than a natural death.”

“In what way does the neck demonstrate that point?” queried the Bibliomaniac, forgetting the conspiracy for a moment.

“By its twist or by its length, of course,” returned the Idiot.  “A chicken that dies a natural death does not have its neck wrung; nor when the head is removed by the use of a hatchet, is it likely that it will be cut off so close behind the ears that those who eat the chicken are confronted with four inches of neck.”

[Illustration:  “‘I STUCK TO THE PIGS’”]

“Very entertaining indeed,” interposed the School-master; “but we are wandering from the point the Bibliomaniac and I were discussing.  Is or is not the story of Robert Elsmere unsettling to one’s beliefs?  Perhaps you can help us to decide that question.”

“Perhaps I can,” returned the Idiot; “and perhaps not.  It did not unsettle my beliefs.”