and there was
now wanting only an idle hand to fire it off.

CHAPTER IV. The Magistrate in the Luggage Van

The city of Winchester is famed for a cathedral, a bishop--but he was
unfortunately killed some years ago while riding--a public school, a
considerable assortment of the military, and the deliberate passage of
the trains of the London and South-Western line. These and many
similar associations would have doubtless crowded on the mind of Joseph
Finsbury; but his spirit had at that time flitted from the railway
compartment to a heaven of populous lecture-halls and endless oratory.
His body, in the meanwhile, lay doubled on the cushions, the forage-cap
rakishly tilted back after the fashion of those that lie in wait for
nursery-maids, the poor old face quiescent, one arm clutching to his
heart Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper.

To him, thus unconscious, enter and exeunt again a pair of voyagers.
These two had saved the train and no more. A tandem urged to its last
speed, an act of something closely bordering on brigandage at the ticket
office, and a spasm of running, had brought them on the platform just
as the engine uttered its departing snort. There was but one carriage
easily within their reach; and they had sprung into it, and the leader
and elder already had his feet upon the floor, when he observed Mr
Finsbury.

'Good God!' he cried. 'Uncle Joseph! This'll never do.'

And he backed out, almost upsetting his companion, and once more closed
the door upon the sleeping patriarch.

The next moment the pair had jumped into the baggage van.

'What's the row about your Uncle Joseph?' enquired the younger
traveller, mopping his brow. 'Does he object to smoking?'

'I don't know that there's anything the row with him,' returned the
other. 'He's by no means the first comer, my Uncle Joseph, I can tell
you! Very respectable old gentleman; interested in leather; been to Asia
Minor; no family, no assets--and a tongue, my dear Wickham, sharper than
a serpent's tooth.'

'Cantankerous old party, eh?' suggested Wickham.

'Not in the least,' cried the other; 'only a man with a solid talent
for being a bore; rather cheery I dare say, on a desert island, but on
a railway journey insupportable. You should hear him on Tonti, the ass
that started tontines. He's incredible on Tonti.'

'By Jove!' cried Wickham, 'then you're one of these Finsbury tontine
fellows. I hadn't a guess of that.'

'Ah!' said the other, 'do you know t