esses seem to arrive at nothing else. Men will not be talked out
of the convictions of their lives. No living orator would convince a
grocer that coffee should be sold without chicory; and no amount of
eloquence will make an English lawyer think that loyalty to truth
should come before loyalty to his client. And therefore our own
pundits, though on this occasion they went to Birmingham, summoned by
the greatness of the occasion, by the dignity of foreign names, by
interest in the question, and by the influence of such men as Lord
Boanerges, went there without any doubt on their minds as to the
rectitude of their own practice, and fortified with strong resolves
to resist all idea of change.

And indeed one cannot understand how the bent of any man's mind
should be altered by the sayings and doings of such a congress.

"Well, Johnson, what have you all been doing to-day?" asked Mr.
Furnival of a special friend whom he chanced to meet at the club
which had been extemporized at Birmingham.

"We have had a paper read by Von Bauhr. It lasted three hours."

"Three hours! heavens! Von Bauhr is, I think, from Berlin."

"Yes; he and Dr. Slotacher. Slotacher is to read his paper the day
after to-morrow."

"Then I think I shall go to London again. But what did Von Bauhr say
to you during those three hours?"

"Of course it was all in German, and I don't suppose that any one
understood him,--unless it was Boanerges. But I believe it was the
old story, going to show that the same man might be judge, advocate,
and jury."

"No doubt;--if men were machines, and if you could find such machines
perfect at all points in their machinery."

"And if the machines had no hearts?"

"Machines don't have hearts," said Mr. Furnival; "especially those in
Germany. And what did Boanerges say? His answer did not take three
hours more, I hope."

"About twenty minutes; but what he did say was lost on Von Bauhr, who
understands as much English as I do German. He said that the practice
of the Prussian courts had always been to him a subject of intense
interest, and that the general justice of their verdicts could not be
impugned."

"Nor ought it, seeing that a single trial for murder will occupy a
court for three weeks. He should have asked Von Bauhr how much work
he usually got through in the course of a sessions. I don't seem
to have lost much by being away. By-the-by, do you happen to know
whether Round is here?"

"What, old Round? I sa