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therefore given that the witness was in attendance, and Tom was ushered into the box and sworn.

During the performance of this solemn ceremony, the magistrate was relating, across the table, an anecdote, which caused the clerk, as a natural matter of duty, to roar; and when Tom had kissed the book, he looked well at the prisoner, who was dressed in the most fashionable style, but whom he didn't know from Adam.

"Well," said the clerk, addressing Tom, when he felt that he had laughed sufficiently long to satisfy the magistrate, "what's your name?"

"Thobas Delolbe."

"What d'you say?"

"Thobas Delolbe."

"Speak up, sir!"

"Thobas Delolbe!" repeated Tom, in a voice of thunder.

"I'm not deaf," said the clerk.

"Oh!" replied Tom, "I thought you were."

"Thobas Delolbe," said the clerk, as he proceeded to write it down.

"Thobas: how do you spell Thobas—with a b?"

"With a b?" said Tom. "You cad spell it with a b if you like: I always spell it with an eb!"

"Oh, an eb!" said the clerk, as he winked at the magistrate. "Very good: and do you spell Delolbe with an eb too?"

"Why, of course."

"I only ask for information.—Thobas Delolbe. Well, Mr. Thobas Delolbe, what are you?"

"A studedt of bed'cide!"

"A student of what, sir?" demanded the clerk, who could not resist laughing; nor could the magistrate—nor, indeed, could the doctor, although he felt vexed at the time—"A student of what?"

"Of bed'cide!" replied Tom indignantly, and thereby set the whole court in a roar.

"Of bed'cide!" said the clerk, when the laughter had in some degree subsided. "I see! A student of bed'cide—very good. How do you spell bed'cide?"

"How do I spell bed'cide?" cried Tom, who felt highly indignant; while the court was convulsed with laughter, in which even the prisoner joined: "what do you bead?"

"I mean," said the clerk, having recovered the power to speak, "I mean to ask how you spell bed'cide?"

"Add do you bead to say that you dod't kdow how to spell it? If so I should like to dose you with it till you do. I should feel great pleasure id thus curidg you of the igdoradce with which you are afflicted."

"Well," said the clerk, who didn't much like this, "but is bed'cide spelt with a w or a b?"

"A w or a b, you fool!" said Tom, looking contemptuously at the clerk, who really began to feel himself wounded.

"Like Thobas, it's spelt with an eb, no doubt!" observed the magistrate; and this—being the magistrate's joke—was on the instant hailed with