Not many minutes after Mrs. Mainwaring's interview with the baronet, Gibson entered the library, and handed him a letter on which was stamped the Ballytrain postmark. On looking at it, he paused for a moment:
“Who the d——— can this come from?” he said. “I am not aware of having any particular correspondence at present, in or about Ballytrain. Here, however, is a seal; let me see what it is. What the d———, again? are these a pair of asses' ears or wings? Certainly, if the impression be correct, the former; and what is here? A fox. Very good, perfectly intelligible; a fox, with a pair of asses' ears upon him! intimating a combination of knavery and folly. 'Gad, this must be from Crackenfudge, of whom it is the type and exponent. For a thousand, it contains a list of his qualifications for the magisterial honors for which he is so ambitious. Well, well; I believe every man has an ambition for something. Mine is to see my daughter a countess, that she may trample with velvet slippers on the necks of those who would trample on hers if she were beneath them. This fellow, now, who is both slave and tyrant, will play all sorts of oppressive pranks upon the poor, by whom he knows that he is despised; and for that very reason, along with others, will he punish them. That, however, is, after all, but natural; and on this very account, curse me, but I shall try and shove the beggarly scoundrel up to the point of his paltry ambition. I like ambition. The man who has no object of ambition of any kind is unfit for life. Come, then, wax, deliver up thy trust.'”
With a dark grin of contempt, and a kind of sarcastic gratification, he perused the document, which ran as follows:
“My dear Sir Tomas,—In a letter, which a' had the honer of receiving from you, in consequence of your very great kindness in condescending to kick me out of your house, on the occasion of my last visit to Red Hall, you were pleased to express a wish that a' would send you up as arthentic a list as a' could conveniently make up of my qualifications for the magistracey. Deed, a'm sore yet, Sir Tomas, and wouldn't it be a good joke, as my friend Dr. Twig says, if the soreness should remain until it is cured by the Komission, which he thinks would wipe out all recollection of the pain and the punishment. And he says, too, that this application of it would be putting it to a most proper and legutimate use; the only use, he insists, to which it ought to be put. But a' don't go that far, because a' think it would be an honerable dockiment, not only to my posterity, meaning my legutimate progenitors, if a' should happen to have any; but, also and moreover, to the good taste and judgment, and respect for the honer and integrity of the Bench, manifested by those who attributed to place me on it.
“A' now come to Klaim No. I, for the magistracey: In the first place a'm not without expeyrience, having been in the habit of acting as a magistrate in a private way, and upon my own responsibility, for several years. A' established a kourt in a little vilage, which—and this is a strong point in my feavor now-a-days—which a' meself have depopilated; and a' trust that the depopilation won't be ovelueked. To this kourt a' com-peled all me taunts to atend. They were obliged to summon one another as often as they kould, and much oftener than they wished, and for the slightest kauses. A' presided in it purseondlly; and a'll tell you why. My system was a fine system, indeed. That is to say, a' fined them ether on the one side or the tother, but most generally on both, and then a' put the fines into my own pocet. My tenints a' know didn't like this kind of law very much—but if they didn't a' did; and a' made them feel that a' was their landlord. No man was a faverite with me that didn't frequent my kourt, and for this resin, in order to stand well with me, they fought like kat and dog. Now, you know, it was my bisness to enkorage this, for the more they fought and disputed, the more a' fined them.
“In fact, a' done everything in my power, to enlitin my tenints. For instance, a' taught them the doktrine of trespiss. If a' found that a stranger tuck the sheltry side of my hedge, to blow his nose, I fined him half-a-crown, as can be proved by proper and undeniable testomony. A' mention all these matters to satisfy you that a' have practis as a magistrate, and won't have my duties to lern when a'm called upon to discharge them.
“Klaim No. II. is as follows: A'm very unpopilar with the people, which is a great thing in itself, as a' think no man ought to be risen to the bench that's not unpopilar; because, when popilar, he's likely to feavor them, and symperthize with them—wherein his first duty is always to konsider them in the rong. Nether am a' popilar with the gentry and magistrates of the kountry, because they despise me, and say that a'm this, that and tother; that a'm mean and tyrannical; that a' changed my name from pride, and that a'm overbearing and ignorant. Now this last charge of ignorance brings me to Klaim No. III.
“Be it nown to you, then, Sir Tomas, that a' received a chollege eddycation, which is an anser in full to the play of ignorance. In fact, a' devoted meself to eddycation till my very brain began to go round like a whurli-gig; and many people say, that a' never rekovered the proper use of it since. Hundres will tell you that they would shed their blood upon the truth of it; but let any one that thinks so transact bisness with me, or bekome a tenint of mine, and he'll find that a' can make him bleed in proving the reverse.
“A' could prove many other klaims equally strong, but a' hope it's not necessary to seduce any more. A' do think, if the Lord Chanceseller knew of my qualifications, a' wouldn't be long off the bench. If, then, Sir Tomas, you, who have so much influence, would write on my behalf, and rekomend me to the custus rascalorum as a proper kandi-date, I could not fail to sukceed in reaching the great point of my ambition, which is, to be accommodated with a seat—anything would satisfy me—even a close-stool—upon the magisterial bench. Amen, Sir Tomas.
“And have the honer to be,