“You will, I hope, join me at breakfast?”
“I breakfasted two hours ago,—if I dare to dignify by the name my meal of bread and milk. But, pray, let me not keep you from yours,—that is, if you will permit me to speak to you while so occupied.”
“I am at your orders, sir,” said the old Judge, as he seated himself and requested his visitor to sit beside him.
“His Excellency tells me, my Lord, that there is just now vacant a situation of which some doubt exists as to the patron,—a Registrarship, I think he called it, in your Court?”
“There is no doubt whatever, sir. The patronage is mine.”
“I merely quote the Viceroy, my Lord,—I assert nothing of myself.”
“It may not impossibly save time, sir, when I repeat that his Excellency has misinformed you. The office is in my gift.”
“May I finish the communication with which he charged me?”
“Sir, there is no case before the court,” said the Judge. “I can hear you, as a matter of courtesy; but it cannot be your object to be listened to on such terms?”
“I will accept even so little. If it should prove that the view taken by his Excellency is the correct one—pray, sir, let me proceed—”