cruise so near
the monikin region; I tried to convince the judges that Noah meant no
harm in imputing moral properties to the king, and that so long as he
did not impute immoral properties to his royal consort, she might very
well afford to pardon him. I then quoted Shakspeare's celebrated lines
on mercy, which seemed to be well enough received, and committed the
whole affair to their better judgment.

I should have got along very creditably, and most probably obtained
the immediate discharge of my friend, had not the attorney-general of
Leaphigh been drawn by curiosity into the room. Although he had nothing
to say to the merits of my arguments, he objected to every one of them,
on the ground of formality. This was too long, and that was too short;
one was too high, and another too low; a fifth was too broad, and a
sixth too narrow; in short, there was no figure of speech of this nature
to which he did not resort, in order to prove their worthlessness, with
the exception that I do not remember he charged any of my reasons with
being too deep.

Matters were now beginning to look serious for poor Noah, when a page
came skipping in to say that the wedding was about to take place,
and that if his comrades wished to witness it, they must sentence the
prisoner without delay. Many a man, it is said, has been hanged, in
order that the judge might dine; but, in the present instance, I do
believe Captain Poke was spared, in order that his judges might not
miss a fine spectacle. I entered into recognizance, in fifty thousand
promises, for the due appearance of the criminal on the following
morning; and we all returned, in a body, to the presence-chamber,
treading on each other's tails, in the eagerness to be foremost.

Any one who has ever been at a human court, must very well know that,
while it is the easiest thing in the world to throw it into commotion by
a violation of etiquette, matters of mere life and death are not at all
of a nature to disturb its tranquillity. There, everything is a matter
of routine and propriety; and, to judge from experience, nothing is so
unseemly as to appear to possess human sympathies. The fact is not very
different at Leaphigh, for the monikin sympathies, apparently, are quite
as obtuse as those of men; although justice compels me to allow, that in
the case of Captain Poke, the appeal was made in behalf of a creature
of a different species. It is also a settled principle of Leaphigh
jurisprud