this witness should be called at once."

"I should like to say something in the first place," said the Curate.
Mr Morgan made an abrupt nod indicative of his consent, and, instead
of looking at the defendant, shaded his eyes with his hand, and made
figures with his pen upon the blotting-paper. A conviction, against
which it was impossible to strive, had taken possession of the
Rector's soul. He listened to Frank Wentworth's address with a kind of
impatient annoyance and resistance. "What is the good of saying any
more about it?" Mr Morgan was saying in his soul. "For heaven's sake
let us bury it and be done with it, and forget that we ever made such
asses of ourselves." But at the same time the Rector knew this was
quite impossible; and as he sat leaning over his blotting-book,
writing down millions after millions with his unconscious pen, he
looked a very model of an unwilling listener--a prejudiced judge--a
man whom no arguments could convince; which was the aspect under which
he appeared to the Curate of St Roque's.

"I should like to say something first," said the Perpetual Curate. "I
could not believe it possible that I, being tolerably well known in
Carlingford as I have always supposed, could be suspected by any
rational being of such an insane piece of wickedness as has been laid
to my charge; and consequently it did not occur to me to vindicate
myself, as I perhaps ought to have done, at the beginning. I have been
careless all along of vindicating myself. I had an idea," said the
young man, with involuntary disdain, "that I might trust, if not to
the regard, at least to the common-sense of my friends--"

Here John Brown, who was near his unwary client, plucked at the
Curate's coat, and brought him to a momentary half-angry pause.
"Softly, softly," said Dr Marjoribanks; "common-sense has nothing to
do with facts; we're inquiring into facts at this moment; and,
besides, it's a very foolish and unjustifiable confidence to trust to
any man's common-sense," said the old Doctor, with a humorous glance
from under his shaggy eyebrows at his fellow-judges; upon which there
ensued a laugh, not very agreeable in its tone, which brought the
Rector to a white heat of impatience and secret rage.

"It appears to me that the witness ought to be called at once," said
Mr Morgan, "if this is not a mere expedient to gain time, and if it is
intended to make any progress to-night."

"My explanations shall be very brief," said