t confusion might have been visible in the
faces of Mr. Eustace Fitzherbert and Mr. William Howard Russell, had not
the attention of the court been immediately directed to another case. A
poor woman had been committed for seven days to the House of Correction
on a charge of disrespectability. Her husband, the person most
interested in the matter, now came forward to disprove the charge; and
by help of his neighbours he succeeded.

"It is all very true," said Justice Burnflat; "but as your wife, my good
fellow, will be out in five days, it will be scarcely worth while to
release her now."

[A fact, occurring in the month of January, 1830. Vide
"The Morning Herald."]

So judicious a decision could not fail of satisfying the husband; and
the audience became from that moment enlightened as to a very remarkable
truth,--namely, that five days out of seven bear a peculiarly small
proportion to the remaining two; and that people in England have so
prodigious a love for punishment that though it is not worth while to
release an innocent woman from prison five days sooner than one would
otherwise have done, it is exceedingly well worth while to commit her to
prison for seven!

When the husband, passing his rough hand across his eyes, and muttering
some vulgar impertinence or another had withdrawn, Mr. Saunders said,--

"Here be Bill Troutling, your worship!"

"Oh, well," quoth the justice; "and now, Mr. Eustace Fitz---- Hallo,
how's this! Where are Mr. William Howard Russell and his friend Mr.
Eustace Fitzherbert?"

"Echo answered,--where?"

Those noble gentlemen, having a natural dislike to be confronted with so
low a person as Mr. Bill Troutling, had, the instant public interest was
directed from them, silently disappeared from a scene where their rank
in life seemed so little regarded. If, reader, you should be anxious
to learn from what part of the world the transitory visitants appeared,
know that they were spirits sent by that inimitable magician, Long Ned,
partly to report how matters fared in the court; for Mr. Pepper, in
pursuance of that old policy which teaches that the nearer the fox is
to the hunters, the more chance he has of being overlooked, had,
immediately on his abrupt departure from Paul, dived into a house in
the very street where his ingenuity had displayed itself, and in which
oysters and ale nightly allured and regaled an assembly that, to speak
impartially, was more numerous th