ttack of the card of
VAN DIEMEN SMITH, and its pencilled line: "An old chum of yours, eh,
matey?" Even the communication of Phippun & Co. concerning the
chiwal-glass, failed to divert him from his particular task. It was
indeed a public duty; and the chiwal-glass, though pertaining to it, was
a private business. He that has broken the glass, let that man pay for
it, he pronounced--no doubt in simpler fashion, being at his ease in his
home, but with the serenity of one uplifted. As to the name VAN DIEMEN
SMITH, he knew it not, and so he said to himself while accurately
recollecting the identity of the old chum who alone of men would have
thought of writing eh, matey?

Mr. Van Diemen Smith did not present the card in person. "At
Crickledon's," he wrote, apparently expecting the bailiff of the town to
rush over to him before knowing who he was.

Tinman was far too busy. Anybody can read plain penmanship or print, but
ask anybody not a Cabinet Minister or a Lord-in-Waiting to read out loud
and clear in a Palace, before a Throne. Oh! the nature of reading is
distorted in a trice, and as Tinman said to his worthy sister: "I can do
it, but I must lose no time in preparing myself." Again, at a reperusal,
he informed her: "I must habituate myself." For this purpose he had put
on the suit overnight.

The articulation of faultless English was his object. His sister Martha
sat vice-regally to receive his loyal congratulations on the illustrious
marriage, and she was pensive, less nervous than her brother from not
having to speak continuously, yet somewhat perturbed. She also had her
task, and it was to avoid thinking herself the Person addressed by her
suppliant brother, while at the same time she took possession of the
scholarly training and perfect knowledge of diction and rules of
pronunciation which would infallibly be brought to bear on him in the
terrible hour of the delivery of the Address. It was no small task
moreover to be compelled to listen right through to the end of the
Address, before the very gentlest word of criticism was allowed. She did
not exactly complain of the renewal of the rehearsal: a fatigue can be
endured when it is a joy. What vexed her was her failing memory for the
points of objection, as in her imagined High Seat she conceived them;
for, in painful truth, the instant her brother had finished she entirely
lost her acuteness of ear, and with that her recollection: so there was
nothing to do but to s