Even I, who have known her for years, don't pretend to understand her." A few months later, Sebastian began his great researches on his new anaesthetic.

It was a wonderful set of researches.

It promised so well.
All Nat's (as we familiarly and affectionately styled St.Nathaniel's) was in a fever of excitement over the drug for a twelvemonth.
The Professor obtained his first hint of the new body by a mere accident.

His friend, the Deputy Prosector of the Zoological Society, had mixed a draught for a sick raccoon at the Gardens, and, by some mistake in a bottle, had mixed it wrongly.

(I purposely refrain from mentioning the ingredients, as they are drugs which can be easily obtained in isolation at any chemist's, though when compounded they form one of the most dangerous and difficult to detect of organic poisons.
I do not desire to play into the hands of would-be criminals.) The compound on which the Deputy Prosector had thus accidentally lighted sent the raccoon to sleep in the most extraordinary manner.