idea, I
betook myself punctually to my engagement. Would you believe it? When
the cover was removed, the sacrilegious dog of an Amphitryon had put
into the dish Cicero's 'De Finibus.' 'There is a work all fins!' said
he. "Atrocious jest!" exclaimed Brandon, solemnly.

"Was it not? Whenever the gastronomists set up a religious inquisition,
I trust they will roast every impious rascal who treats the divine
mystery with levity. Pun upon cooking, indeed! A propos of Dareville, he
is to come into the administration."

"You astonish me!" said Brandon. "I never heard that; I don't know him.
He has very little power; has he any talent?"

"Yes, a very great one,--acquired, though."

"What is it?"

"A pretty wife!"

"My lord!" exclaimed Brandon, abruptly, and half rising from his seat.

Mauleverer looked up hastily, and on seeing the expression of his
companion's face coloured deeply; there was a silence for some moments.

"Tell me," said Brandon, indifferently, helping himself to vegetables,
for he seldom touched meat; and a more amusing contrast can scarcely be
conceived than that between the earnest epicurism of Mauleverer and the
careless contempt of the sublime art manifested by his guest,--"tell me,
you who necessarily know everything, whether the government really
is settled,--whether you are to have the garter, and I (mark the
difference!) the judgeship."

"Why so, I imagine, it will be arranged; namely, if you will consent to
hang up the rogues instead of living by the fools!"

"One may unite both!" returned Brandon. "But I believe, in general, it
is vice versa; for we live by the rogues, and it is only the fools we
are able to hang up. You ask me if I will take the judgeship. I would
not--no, I would rather cut my hand off," and the lawyer spoke with
great bitterness, "forsake my present career, despite all the obstacles
that now encumber it, did I think that this miserable body would suffer
me for two years longer to pursue it."

"You shock me!" said Mauleverer, a little affected, but nevertheless
applying the cayenne to his cucumber with his usual unerring nicety of
tact,--"you shock me; but you are considerably better than you were."

"It is not," continued Brandon, who was rather speaking to himself than
to his friend,--"it is not that I am unable to conquer the pain and to
master the recreant nerves; but I feel myself growing weaker and weaker
beneath the continual exertion of my remaining powers, and