lly speaking,
I would much rather not have gone into court; but I considered that my
duty to society in general, and to my brother merchants in particular,
absolutely compelled me to prosecute for the sake of example. I acted
on that principle, and I don't regret that I did so. The circumstances
under which the man robbed me were particularly disgraceful. He was a
hardened reprobate, sir, if ever there was one yet; and I believe, in my
conscience, that he wanted nothing but the opportunity to be as great a
villain as Fauntleroy himself."

At the moment when Mr. Wendell personified his idea of consummate
villainy by quoting the example of Fauntleroy, I saw the other
middle-aged gentleman--Mr. Trowbridge--color up on a sudden, and begin
to fidget in his chair.

"The next time you want to produce an instance of a villain, sir," said
Mr. Trowbridge, "I wish you could contrive to quote some other example
than Fauntleroy."

Mr. Wendell naturally enough looked excessively astonished when he heard
these words, which were very firmly and, at the same time, very politely
addressed to him.

"May I inquire why you object to my example?" he asked.

"I object to it, sir," said Mr. Trowbridge, "because it makes me very
uncomfortable to hear Fauntleroy called a villain."

"Good heavens above!" exclaimed Mr. Wendell, utterly bewildered.
"Uncomfortable!--you, a mercantile man like myself--you, whose character
stands so high everywhere--you uncomfortable when you hear a man who was
hanged for forgery called a villain! In the name of wonder, why?"

"Because," answered Mr. Trowbridge, with perfect composure, "Fauntleroy
was a friend of mine."

"Excuse me, my dear sir," retorted Mr. Wendell, in as polished a tone of
sarcasm as he could command; "but of all the friends whom you have made
in the course of your useful and honorable career, I should have thought
the friend you have just mentioned would have been the very last to whom
you were likely to refer in respectable society, at least by name."

"Fauntleroy committed an unpardonable crime, and died a disgraceful
death," said Mr. Trowbridge. "But, for all that, Fauntleroy was a friend
of mine, and in that character I shall always acknowledge him boldly to
my dying day. I have a tenderness for his memory, though he violated a
sacred trust, and die d for it on the gallows. Don't look shocked, Mr.
Wendell. I will tell you, and our other friends here, if they will
let me, why I feel