insolent bantering raillery, which he mistook for a witty condescension. Although it was morning he had been plying his pipe with such diligence that the room in which he sat was clouded with smoke, from the midst of which his fierce and inflamed countenance emerged, like an angry and lurid sun out of a fog; a lamp was by his side, apparently for the purpose of reluming his pipe, although from the atmosphere of the apartment it did not seem to have been often extinguished: it was now in his mouth, and he was occupied in reading and turning over a large roll of papers. Goldberry, or Mr. Goldbeater, I believe,” he exclaimed as his visitor entered, "sit ye down, Sir; sit ye down;" and he returned his eyes to

the paper.

66

"Mr.

'My name is Goldingham, my Lord," said Isaac, taking a chair.

Ay, ay, I recollect it now," said his Lordship, after finishing the page he was reading ; "I stuck to your gold, you see, which I dare say you consider the best part about you, eh, ah? Methinks I can guess at your errand,

Mr. Goldberry; you need not open your brief, for I know the whole case. Lord! Lord! to see how the judgment of Heaven falls upon all these rebels and traitors! We have got your nephew I find; I forget his name; the young boute-feu, the juvenile advocate of sedition and rebellion; and I take it, Mr. Goldberry, that you will not have wit enough to prevent his swinging."

"I, my Lord; I do not pretend to be a man of wit."

"Nay, Sir, you do yourself injustice, for you are rich, I hear, passing rich; and to get more money than your neighbours is to outwit them—is it not, eh, ha? It's many years since I read Sir John Suckling's "Session of the Poets," but I remember that Apollo gives the prize of wit to a rich alderman :

'Apollo declared that the very best sign

Of good store of wit's to have good store of coin,
And without a syllable more or less said,

He put the laurel on the Alderman's head.'

You see I have not been always among the
law-books, eh ?"

Considering all this to be merely thrown out as a lure for a handsome offer, proportionate to his reputed fortune, Goldingham observed, “If your Lordship thinks that wealth is wit, I am very willing to part with some of mine to save my nephew's life; and I am ready to hold myself responsible for his future good conduct. I beseech you to remember, my Lord, that he is very young; he must have been misled by others, for naturally

́ ́ “Oh, ay, naturally—I dare say he is a very simple, witless, harmless innocent. I don't deny his being a fool; but a goose, though it may have no sting, can hiss as well as a snake: we must silence the preachers of sedition, for a tongue is sometimes sharper than a sword, though your nephew, I am told, plied both weapons equally well. As to his future good conduct I will take no security but his own." "And that he shall give, my Lord, to any

amount."

"Twopence, Mr. Goldberry, twopence will suffice, for he shall not be called upon to enter into any other security than that of a hempen

halter, and he must have a longer head than I suspect if he can then manage to forfeit his recognizance. Nay, Sir, nay, you need not appeal to me; I told you that he should swing if we caught him, and in these matters I seldom break my word. His life is not worth an old Harry groat."

"With submission, my Lord, it is worth much more to me, and I am willing to make it worth much more to His Majesty," said Goldingham, who knew that any bribe to Jeffreys was to be passed off as ransom-money to the King.

"Eh, ha! how to His Majesty ?" inquired the Judge. Goldingham had come with the full intention of higgling and huckstering, and showing his skill in driving a good bargain, but the bare mention of his nephew's swinging had banished all these mercenary thoughts from his head; and deeming it better to mention a good round sum at once, so as to close the discussion, he replied—“ Lookye, my Lord; I consider the young man's fortune to be about five thousand pounds, and I am willing, as his guardian,

for he is not yet of age, to give every farthing of that sum for his life, hard as it may be that he should live as a beggar."

"We will spare him that hardship by letting him die as one. Lord! Lord! Mr. Goldberry, • he that is born under a threepenny planet will never be worth a groat.' You remind me of the spendthrift that made up to an heiress, and offered, if she would marry him, to settle her whole fortune upon her. Thank ye, wench, but it is so settled already. Know you not, Sir, that the fortune of traitors is already forfeited to the King?"

said the

"True, my Lord, true," said Goldingham, mortified at the palpable oversight of which he had been guilty; "but before trial and convic tion I believe it may always be conveyed away; hem! And I would lodge that sum in your hands inmediately.”

Jeffreys had already very handsomely feathered his nest; his present lucrative office

placed him above the temptation to any very flagrant corruption; perhaps it could not be any longer practised with safety; perhaps he