noon
No matter -- as an appendage to seamstressy , the thread-paper might be of some consequence to my mother -- of none to my father , as a mark in _ Slawkenbergius _ . _ Slawkenbergius _ in every page of him was a rich treasure of inexhaustible knowledge to my father -- he could not open him amiss ; and he would often say in closing the book , that if all the arts and sciences in the world , with the books which treated of them , were lost -- should the wisdom and policies of governments , he would say , through disuse , ever happen to be forgot , and all that statesmen had wrote or caused to be written , upon the strong or the weak sides of courts and kingdoms , should they be forgot also -- and _ Slawkenbergius _ only left -- there would be enough in him in all conscience , he would say , to set the world a-going again . A treasure therefore was he indeed ! an institute of all that was necessary to be known of noses , and everything else -- at _ matin _ , noon , and vespers was _ Hafen Slawkenbergius _ his recreation and delight : ' twas for ever in his hands -- you would have sworn , Sir , it had been a canon 's prayer-book -- so worn , so glazed , so contrited and attrited was it with fingers and with thumbs in all its parts , from one end even unto the other . I am not such a bigot to _ Slawkenbergius _ as my father ; -- there is a fund in him , no doubt : but in my opinion , the best , I do n't say the most profitable , but the most amusing part of _ Hafen Slawkenbergius _ , is his tales ------ and , considering he was a _ German _ , many of them told not without fancy : ------ these take up his second book , containing nearly one half of his folio , and are comprehended in ten decads , each decad containing ten tales ------ Philosophy is not built upon tales ; and therefore ' twas certainly wrong in _ Slawkenbergius _ to send them into the world by that name ! -- there are a few of them in his eighth , ninth , and tenth decads , which I own seem rather playful and sportive , than speculative -- but in general they are to be looked upon by the learned as a detail of so many independent facts , all of them turning round somehow or other upon the main hinges of his subject , and collected by him with great fidelity , and added to his work as so many illustrations upon the doctrines of noses . As we have leisure enough upon our hands -- if you give me leave , madam , I 'll tell you the ninth tale of his tenth decad .