ll have a companion,' resumed Mr. Pickwick, 'a lively
one, who'll teach him, I'll be bound, more tricks in a week than he
would ever learn in a year.' And Mr. Pickwick smiled placidly.

'Oh, you dear--' said Mrs. Bardell.

Mr. Pickwick started.

'Oh, you kind, good, playful dear,' said Mrs. Bardell; and without
more ado, she rose from her chair, and flung her arms round Mr.
Pickwick's neck, with a cataract of tears, and a chorus of sobs.

'Bless my soul,' cried the astonished Mr. Pickwick;--'Mrs. Bardell,
my good woman--dear me, what a situation--pray--consider, Mrs.
Bardell, if anybody should come.'

'O, let them come,' exclaimed Mrs. Bardell, frantically.

'I'll never leave you, dear, kind, good soul.' And with these words
Mrs. Bardell clung the tighter.

Every utterance of the little Judge is in character, from his first
directions "go on." His suspicious question, "what were you doing in the
back room, ma'am?"--and on Serjeant Buzfuz's sudden pause for breath,
when "the _silence_ awoke Mr. Justice Stareleigh, who immediately wrote
down something, with a pen without any ink in it, and looked unusually
profound, to impress his jury with the belief that he always thought most
deeply with his eyes shut." Also when at the "on the jar" incident--he
"looked doubtful, but said he'd make a note of it." So when Sam made one
of his free and easy speeches, the Judge looked sternly at Sam for fully
two minutes, but Sam's features were so perfectly calm that he said
nothing. When Sam, too, made his witty _reposte_ to Buzfuz as to his
"wision being limited," we are told that there was a great laugh--that
even "the little Judge smiled:" a good touch, for he enjoyed, like other
judges, seeing his learned brother get a fall--'tis human nature.

It must be said the impression of a listener, who had heard all this
could have been anything but favourable to Mr. Pickwick. No doubt there
was his paternally benevolent character to correct it: but even this
might go against him as it would suggest a sort of hypocrisy. Even the
firmest friends, in their surprise, do not pause to debate or reason;
they are astonished and wonder exceedingly.

WINKLE'S EVIDENCE.

Skimpin may have been intended for Wilkin, a later Serjeant and
well-known in the 'fifties, and whose style and manner is reproduced. We
could not ask a better junior in a "touch and go" case. He was as rea