aving been declined with
contumeliousness, the affair was now on its end.

Here JESSIMINA said that she had of course refused to marry a man who
declared that he was already the owner of a dusky spouse, but that, on
inquiries from Mr CHUCKERBUTTY RAM, she had made the discovery that my
said infant wife had popped off with some juvenile complaint or other
three or four years ago.

At this I was rendered completely flabaghast--for, although the
allegation was undeniably correct, I had confidently hoped that my
friend RAM was unaware of the fact, or would at least have the
ordinary mother-wit to refrain from blurting it out! "_Et tu, Brute!_"
But I must make the dismal confession that my friends are mostly a very
fat-witted sort of fellows.

_Que faire?_--except to explain that my melancholy bereavement must have
entirely slipped off my memory, and that in any case it had no logical
connection with the matter in hand.

Then Mrs MANKLETOW inquired, would I, or would I not, marry her illused
child? and stated that all she wished for was a plain answer.

I replied that it was a very natural and moderate desire, and I was
prepared to gratify it at once by the plain answer of--_Not on any
account._

Whereupon Mr SOLOMONS stepped forward and politely handed me a folded
paper, and, observing that he thought there was no need to protract the
interview, he lifted his hat and went off with the ladies, leaving
myself upon a bench endeavouring to get the sense of the official
document into my baffled and bewildered nob.

[Illustration: "A ROYAL COMMAND FROM THE QUEEN-EMPRESS."]

Eventually, I gathered that it was a Royal command from the
Queen-Empress, backed by the Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, that
I was to enter my appearance in an action at the suit of JEMIMA
MANKLETOW for a claim of damages for having breached my promise to
marry!

* * * * *

No matter! Pugh! Fiddle-de-dee! Never mind! Who cares?

Having successfully passed Exam, and been called to the Bar, I am now an
_amicus curiae_, and the friend in Court.

I shall enter my appearance in the forensic costume of wig and gown.

What will be the price of the plaintiff's pleadings _then_, Madams?

XXII

_Mr Jabberjee places himself in the hands of a solicitor--with certain
reservations._

I concluded my foregoing instalment, narrating my service of a writ for
breaching a promise of marriage, with a spirited outburst