Mr. Bintrey?"

"Well, you left off--but I wouldn't excite myself, if I was you, by
taking it up again just yet."

"I'll take care. I'll take care. The singing in my head came on at
where, Mr. Bintrey?"

"At roast, and boiled, and beer," answered the lawyer,--"prompting
lodging under the same roof--and one and all--"

"Ah! And one and all singing in the head together--"

"Do you know, I really _would not_ let my good feelings excite me, if I
was you," hinted the lawyer again, anxiously. "Try some more pump."

"No occasion, no occasion. All right, Mr. Bintrey. And one and all
forming a kind of family! You see, Mr. Bintrey, I was not used in my
childhood to that sort of individual existence which most individuals
have led, more or less, in their childhood. After that time I became
absorbed in my late dear mother. Having lost her, I find that I am more
fit for being one of a body than one by myself one. To be that, and at
the same time to do my duty to those dependent on me, and attach them to
me, has a patriarchal and pleasant air about it. I don't know how it may
appear to you, Mr Bintrey, but so it appears to me."

"It is not I who am all-important in the case, but you," returned
Bintrey. "Consequently, how it may appear to me is of very small
importance."

"It appears to me," said Mr. Wilding, in a glow, "hopeful, useful,
delightful!"

"Do you know," hinted the lawyer again, "I really would not ex--"

"I am not going to. Then there's Handel."

"There's who?" asked Bintrey.

"Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Kent, Purcell, Doctor Arne, Greene, Mendelssohn.
I know the choruses to those anthems by heart. Foundling Chapel
Collection. Why shouldn't we learn them together?"

"Who learn them together?" asked the lawyer, rather shortly.

"Employer and employed."

"Ay, ay," returned Bintrey, mollified; as if he had half expected the
answer to be, Lawyer and client. "That's another thing."

"Not another thing, Mr. Bintrey! The same thing. A part of the bond
among us. We will form a Choir in some quiet church near the Corner
here, and, having sung together of a Sunday with a relish, we will come
home and take an early dinner together with a relish. The object that I
have at heart now is, to get this system well in action without delay, so
that my new partner may find it founded when he enters on his
partnership."

"All good be with it!" exclaimed Bintrey, rising. "May it prosper! Is
Joey Ladle to