r person
at table. He now began to converse, and we shall open the
conversation at the precise point in the dinner, when it was in the
power of Aristabulus to make one of the interlocutors.

Unlike Mr. Dodge, he had betrayed no peculiar interest in the
baronet, being a man too shrewd and worldly to set his heart on
trifles of any sort; and Mr. Bragg no more hesitated about replying
to Sir George Templemore, or Mr. Effingham, than he would have
hesitated about answering one of his own nearest associates. With him
age and experience formed no particular claims to be heard, and, as
to rank, it is true he had some vague ideas about there being such a
thing in the militia, but as it was unsalaried rank, he attached no
great importance to it. Sir George Templemore was inquiring
concerning the recording of deeds, a regulation that had recently
attracted attention in England; and one of Mr. Effingham's replies
contained some immaterial inaccuracy, which Aristabulus took occasion
to correct, as his first appearance in the general discourse.

"I ask pardon, sir," he concluded his explanations by saying, "but I
ought to know these little niceties, having served a short part of a
term as a county clerk, to fill a vacancy occasioned by a death."

"You mean, Mr. Bragg, that you were employed to _write_ in a county
clerk's office," observed John Effingham, who so much disliked
untruth, that he did not hesitate much about refuting it; or what he
now fancied to be an untruth.

"As county clerk, sir. Major Pippin died a year before his time was
out, and I got the appointment. As regular a county clerk, sir, as
there is in the fifty-six counties of New-York."

"When I had the honour to engage you as Mr. Effingham's agent, sir,"
returned the other, a little sternly, for he felt his own character
for veracity involved in that of the subject of his selection, "I
believe, indeed, that you were writing in the office, but I did not
understand it was as _the_ clerk."

"Very true, Mr. John," returned Aristabulus, without discovering the
least concern, "I was _then_ engaged by my successor as _a_ clerk;
but a few months earlier, I filled the office myself."

"Had you gone on, in the regular line of promotion, my dear sir,"
pithily inquired Captain Truck, "to what preferment would you have
risen by this time?"

"I believe I understand you, gentlemen," returned the unmoved
Aristabulus, who perceived a general smile. "I know that some peopl