court."

"Why, my good fellow! what on earth is the meaning of this?"

"I am not going down to court, that's all. I say, Fred, how do I look in
this sort of thing?"

"Uncommonly like a cock-pheasant in full plumage. But tell me what you
mean?"

"Why, since you must needs know, I am going up stairs to breakfast with
Miss Percy."

So saying, Mr Strachan made me a polite bow, and left the apartment. I
took my solitary way to the courthouse, marvelling at the extreme
rapidity of the effect which is produced by the envenomed darts of
Cupid.

CHAPTER II.

On entering the court, I found that the business had commenced. An
enormous raw-boned fellow, with a shock of the fieriest hair, and hands
of such dimensions that a mere glimpse of them excited unpleasant
sensations at your windpipe, was stationed at the bar, to which, from
previous practice, he had acquired a sort of prescriptive right.

"James M'Wilkin, or Wilkinson, or Wilson," said the presiding judge, in
a tone of disgust which heightened with each successive alias, "attend
to the indictment which is about to be preferred against you."

And certainly, if the indictment contained a true statement of the
facts, James M'Wilkin, or Wilkinson, or Wilson was about as
thoroughpaced a marauder as ever perambulated a common. He was charged
with sheep-stealing and assault; inasmuch as, on a certain night
subsequent to the Kelso fair, he, the said individual with the plural
denominations, did wickedly and feloniously steal, uplift, and away
take from a field adjoining to the Northumberland road, six wethers, the
property, or in the lawful possession of, Jacob Gubbins, grazier, then
and now or lately residing in Morpeth; and moreover, on being followed
by the said Gubbins, who demanded restitution of his property, he, the
said M'Wilkin, &c., had, in the most brutal manner, struck, knocked
down, and lavished divers kicks upon the corporality of the Northumbrian
bumpkin, to the fracture of three of his ribs, and otherwise, to the
injury of his person.

During the perusal of this formidable document by the clerk, M'Wilkin
stood scratching his poll, and leering about him as though he considered
the whole ceremony as a sort of solemn joke. I never in the course of my
life cast eyes on a more nonchalant or unmitigated ruffian.

"How do you say, M'Wilkin," asked the judge; "are you guilty or not
guilty?"

"Not guilty, aff course. D'ye tak me for a fule?" and M'Wilkin flo