ket-day; and numbers of the townspeople, who
all knew my father, and were not sorry to see him "up." Cregan versus
Cregan stood third on the list of cases; and very little interest
attached to the two that preceded it. At last it was called; and there I
stood before the Bench, with five hundred pair of eyes all bent upon me;
and two of them actually looking through my very brain,--for they were
my father's, as he stood at the opposite side of the table below the
Bench.

The case was called an assault, and very soon terminated; for, by my own
admission, it was clear that I deserved punishment; though probably
not so severely as it had been inflicted. The judge delivered a very
impressive lesson to my father and myself, about our respective duties,
and dismissed the case with a reproof, the greater share of which fell
to me. "You may go now, sir," said he, winding up a line peroration;
"fear God and honor the king; respect your parents, and make your
capitals smaller."

"Before your worship dismisses the witness," said Morissy, "I wish to
put a few questions to him."

"The case is disposed of: call the next," said the judge, angrily.

"I have a most important fact to disclose to your worship,--one which
is of the highest importance to the due administration of justice,--one
which, if suffered to lie in obscurity, will be a disgrace to the law,
and a reproach to the learned Bench."

"Call the next case, crier," said the judge. "Sit down, Mr. Morissy."

"Your worshipwmay commit me; but I will be heard--"

"Tipstaff! take that man into--" "When you hear of a mandamus from the
King's Bench--when you know that a case of compounding a felony--"

"Come away, Mr. Morissy; come quiet, sir!" said the police-sergeant.

"What were ye saying of a mandamus?" said the judge, getting frightened
at the dreaded word.

"I was saying this, sir," said Morissy, turning fiercely round; "that
I am possessed of information which you refused to hear, and which
will make the voice of the Chief Justice heard in this court, which now
denies its ear to truth."

"Conduct yourself more becomingly, sir," said one of the county
magistrates, "and open your case."

Morissy, who was far more submissive to the gentry than to the chairman,
at once replied in his blandest tone:--

"Your worship, it is now more than a month since I appeared before you
in the case of Noonan versus M'Quade and others,--an aggravated case of
homicide; I might go fur