I have myself written a treatise to prove that Puss in Boots is an allegory upon the progress of the human understanding, having its origin in the mystical schools of the Egyptian priests, and evidently an illustration of the worship rendered at Thebes and Memphis to those feline quadrupeds of which they make both religious symbols and elaborate mummies." "My dear Austin," said my mother, opening her blue eyes, "you don't think that Sisty will discover all those fine things in Puss in Boots!" "My dear Kitty," answered my father, "you don't think, when you were good enough to take up with me, that you found in me all the fine things I have learned from books.

You knew me only as a harmless creature who was happy enough to please your fancy.

By and by you discovered that I was no worse for all the quartos that have transmigrated into ideas within me,--ideas that are mysteries even to myself.

If Sisty, as you call the child (plague on that unlucky anachronism! which you do well to abbreviate into a dissyllable),--if Sisty can't discover all the wisdom of Egypt in Puss in Boots, what then?
Puss in Boots is harmless, and it pleases his fancy.

All that wakes curiosity is wisdom, if innocent; all that pleases the fancy now, turns hereafter to love or to knowledge.