I take those metal shanks, slide the backs of them in glue and make them lie down on the shoe-bottoms, […] Last week they ran a contest to see which shankers shanked fastest. I'm not embarrassed to say I beat them all.

The only question was, whether such an unexpected accession of company, to an already crowded house, would not put the housekeeper to her trumps to accommodate them.

Sassafras officinale, the Laurus sassafras, was introduced into Europe through France, and both wood and bark supply a volatile oil. […] The infusion of it was formerly much sold about the streets of London, at daybreak, modified with milk and sugar, under the name of Saloop, and chiefly made from this wood, though the true Saloop or Salep is an Orchis.

“But,” he adds, “finding Tacitus, Eumenius, Ammianus Marcellinus, and Beda, in full and direct opposition to this idea, [certainly false with respect to the first and two last, if not to the second;] and not choosing to imitate our Scotish antiquitists in fighting against authorities,[which is nevertheless his constant practice,] I was forced to abandon this ground. … For ancient authorities,” he concludes, “are the sole guides to real truth in historic antiquities; conjectures and arguments are only ingenious lies:” which made him abandon the former, and have recourse only to the latter (I. 106).