hich he heard with great joy.

Polly was skipping round the room, I guess, gay as a lark. Auchmuty came
to her "in pity for poor Ingham," who was so bored by the stupid
pundit,--and Auchmuty could not understand why I stood it so long. But
when Dennis took Mrs. Jeffries down, Polly could not resist standing
near them. He was a little flustered, till the sight of the eatables and
drinkables gave him the same Mercian courage which it gave Diggory. A
little excited then, he attempted one or two of his speeches to the
Judge's lady. But little he knew how hard it was to get in even a
_promptu_ there edgewise. "Very well, I thank you," said he, after the
eating elements were adjusted; "and you?" And then did not he have to
hear about the mumps, and the measles, and arnica, and belladonna, and
chamomile-flower, and dodecathem, till she changed oysters for
salad,--and then about the old practice and the new, and what her sister
said, and what her sister's friend said, and what the physician to her
sister's friend said, and then what was said by the brother of the
sister of the physician of the friend of her sister, exactly as if it
had been in Ollendorff? There was a moment's pause, as she declined
Champagne. "I am very glad you liked it," said Dennis again, which he
never should have said, but to one who complimented a sermon. "Oh! you
are so sharp, Mr. Ingham! No! I never drink any wine at all,--except
sometimes in summer a little currant spirits,--from our own currants,
you know. My own mother,--that is, I call her my own mother, because,
you know, I do not remember," etc., etc., etc.; till they came to the
candied orange at the end of the feast,--when Dennis, rather confused,
thought he must say something, and tried No. 4,--"I agree, in general,
with my friend the other side of the room,"--which he never should have
said but at a public meeting. But Mrs. Jeffries, who never listens
expecting to understand, caught him up instantly with, "Well, I'm sure
my husband returns the compliment; he always agrees with you,--though we
do worship with the Methodists;--but you know, Mr. Ingham," etc., etc.,
etc., till the move was made up-stairs;--and as Dennis led her through
the hall, he was scarcely understood by any but Polly, as he said,
"There has been so much said, and, on the whole, so well said, that I
will not occupy the time."

His great resource the rest of the evening was, standing in the library,
carrying on animated conve