"Pray, Sir," said Mr. Minshull, "will you give me leave to ask whether you were ever confined?"
The General—"Confined! for what would I be confined?"
Mr. Minshull—"If you do not understand the nature of my question, I am sorry I put it; but it certainly appeared to me possible that——"
The General—"Sir, you appear to me to be after taalking in a very queer kind of a way to a jontleman! You ought to know what is due to a respectable and graat man, even though he is in distress."
Mr. Minshull—"Well, Sir, I will speak as plainly to you as you do to me. It is my opinion, and the opinion, I believe, of every person present, that you are out of your mind; and that if you have never been confined, it is high time you were so."
The General angrily declared he was altogether mens sana in corpore sano; and professed himself astonished that any body should entertain a contrary opinion; then taking from his side-pocket a round tin case, nearly as large as a demi-culverin, he offered to produce from it documents to show that he was really the important personage he professed himself to be.
The magistrates, however, had no faith in the matter; they told him it might be all very true, but they had no funds to assist him with; and, as he appeared very incredulous on this subject, they at length ordered him to withdraw upon pain of being committed to prison under the Vagrant Act.
This was an awful alternative, which the gallant "General" did not think proper to risk; so gathering up his patents and papers, he put his feather-fringed chapeau upon his head, and taking an ample pinch of snuff—so ample, indeed, that it rushed through his olfactory labyrinth with the noise of a mighty cataract—he stalked majestically out of the office, muttering anathemas as he went.