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I cannot repeat too often that I am not dealing with prodigies. Emile is no prodigy, neither is Sophy. He is a man and she is a woman; this is all they have to boast of. In the present confusion between the sexes it is almost a miracle to belong to one's own sex.
As this could scarcely be credited, on persons being sent to inquire into the prodigy, a thick shower of stones fell from heaven in their sight, just as when hail collected into balls is pelted down to the earth by the winds.
After the first emotions of astonishment and wonder which the spectacle awakened had somewhat subsided, there followed a consultation in respect to the disposal which was to be made of the prodigy. The opinions on this point were very various.
"When they told Charles of it," Comyn wrote, "said he, coolly: 'My brother Ste's son is a second Messiah, born for the destruction of the Jews." I saw no definite signs, as yet, of the conversion of this prodigy, which I so earnestly hoped for.
The violet silk dressing-gown of Monsieur Bernard, the flowers, his remarks to Cartier, had already roused some suspicion of this in Godefroid's mind. The young man stood still where he was, bewildered by this prodigy of paternal love. The contrast, such as he imagined it, between the invalid's room and the rest of that squalid place, yes, it was bewildering!
He therefore absolutely refused to publish the bull, or to admit the young Italian to the benefice. Innocent flew into a passion on reading the letter. "What meaneth this old dotard, surd and absurd, thus to control our actions? Did not our innate generosity restrain us, I would confound him, and make him a prodigy to all the world!"
There stood one, in physical proportion and stature commanding and exact in intellect richly endowed in natural eloquence a prodigy in soul manifestly "created but a little lower than the angels" yet a slave, ay, a fugitive slave, trembling for his safety, hardly daring to believe that on the American soil, a single white person could be found who would befriend him at all hazards, for the love of God and humanity!
As Abraham before the angels, I bowed myself; the white thing was so white, its wings so wide, and in those for ever exiled waters, I had lost the miserable warping memories of traditions and of towns. Long I gazed at that prodigy of plumage. I cannot tell, can only hint, the things that darted through me then. But at last I awoke; and turning, asked a sailor what bird was this.
Here is one who in common delivers words too big for a humble mouth to hold, so much beside himself, that his voice is as shrill as the whistle of the whip-poor-will! Courage! what is it, man? what is it?" "A prodigy! a lusus naturae! a monster, that nature has delighted to form, in order to exhibit her power!
When he went to Delphi he took with him a hollow staff of horn, which he had filled with gold, and offered this staff to the oracle as a likeness of himself, perhaps as one empty of wit and whose whole merit lay in his gold. When the three young men had performed the bidding of the king, and asked the oracle the meaning of the prodigy, they were told that it portended the fall of Tarquin.
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