Mr. Hardie asked Maxley sullenly what he
wanted of them.

"Well, sir," said Maxley, despondently, "I
have been to all the other magistrates in the
borough; for what with losing my money, and
what with losing my missus, I think I bain't
quite right in my head; I do see such curious
things, enough to make a body's skin creep, at
times." And down went his head on his chest.

"Well?" said Mr. Hardie, peevishly: "go
on: you went to the magistrates, and what
then?"

Maxley looked up, and seemed to recover the
thread: "Why they said 'no,' they couldn't
send me to the 'sylum, not from home: I must
be a pauper first. So then my neighbours they said
I had better come to you." And down went his
head again.

"Well but," said Mr. Hardie, "you cannot
expect me to go against the other magistrates."

"Why not, sir? You have had a hatful o'
money of me: the other gentlemen han't had a
farthing. They owes me no service, but you
does: nine hundred pounds' worth if ye come to
that."

There was no malice in this; it was a plain,
brokenhearted man's notion of give and take;
but it was a home-thrust all the same; and Mr.
Hardie was visibly discountenanced, and Alfred
more so.

Mr. Osmond, to relieve a situation so painful,
asked Maxley rather hastily what were the
curious things he saw.

Maxley shuddered. "The unreasonablest
beasts, sir, you ever saw or heard tell on:
mostly snakes and dragons. Can't stoop my
head to do no work, for them, sir. Bless your
heart, if I was to leave you gentlemen now, and
go and dig for five minutes in my garden, they
would come about me as thick as slugs on
cabbage: why 'twas but yestere'en I tried to hoe a
bit, and up come the fearfullest great fiery
sarpint: scared me so I heaved my hoe and laid on
'un properly: presently I seemed to come out of a
sort of a kind of a red mist into the clear; and
there laid my poor missus's favourite hen; I had
been and killed her for a sarpint." He sighed:
then, after a moment's pause, lowered his voice
to a whisper, "Now suppose! was to go and take
some poor Christian for one of these gre—at
bloody dragons I do see at odd times, I might do
him a mischief you know, and not mean him no
harm, neither. Oh dooee take and have me locked
up, gentlemen, dooee now: tellee I ain't fit to be
about, my poor head is so mazed."

"Well, well," said Mr. Hardie, "I'll give you
an order for the Union."

"What, make a pauper ot me?"

"I cannot help it," said the magistrate: "it
is the routine; and it was settled at a meeting of
the bench last month that we must adhere to
the rule as strictly as possible; the asylum is so
full: and you know, Maxley, it is not as if you
were dangerous."

"That I be, sir: I don't know what I'm a
looking at, or a doing. Would I ha' gone and
killed my poor Susan's hen if I hadn't a been
beside myself? and she in her grave, poor dear;
no, not for untold gold: and I be fond of that
too; used to be however: but now I don't
seem to care for money nor nothing else."
And his head dropped.

"Look here, Maxley, old fellow," said Alfred,
sarcastically, "you must go to the workhouse;
and stay there till you hoe a pauper; take him for
a crocodile, and kill him; then you will get into an
asylum whether the Barkington magistrates
like it or not: that is the routine, I believe;
and as reasonable as most routine."

Dr. Wycherley admired Alfred for this, and
whispered Mr. Osmond, "How subtly they
reason."

Mr. Hardie did not deign to answer his son,
who indeed had spoken at him, and not to
him.

As for poor Maxley, he was in sad and sober
earnest, and could not relish nor even take in
Alfred's irony: he lifted his head and looked
Mr. Hardie in the face.

"You be a hard man," said he, trembling with
emotion. "You robbed me and my missus of
our all, you ha' broke her heart, and turned my
head, and if I was to come and kill you 'twould
only be clearing scores. 'Stead of that I comes
to you like a lamb, and says give me your name
on a bit of paper, and put me out of harm's way.
'No,' says you, 'go to the workhouse!' Be you
in the workhouse? You that owes me nine
hundred pounds and my dead missus?" With
this he went into a rage, took a packet out of
his pocket, and flung it at Mr. Hardie's head
before any one could stop him.

But Alfred saw his game, stepped forward, and
caught it with one hand, and with the dexterity
of a wicket keeper, within a foot of his father's
nose. "How's that, Umpire?" said he: then,
a little sternly, "Don't do that again, Mr.
Maxley, or I shall have to give you a hiding—
to keep up appearances." He then put the
notes in his pocket, and said quietly, "/ shall
give you your money for these, before the year
ends."

"You won't be quite so mad as that, I hope,"
remonstrated his father. But he made no reply:
they very seldom answered one another now.

"Oh," said Dr. Wycherley, inspecting him
like a human curiosity, "nullum magnum
ingenium sine mixturâ dementiæ."

"Nec parvum sine mixturâ stultitiæ," retorted
Alfred in a moment: and met his offensive
gaze with a point-blank look of supercilious
disdain.

Then, having shut him up, he turned to
Osmond: "Come," said he, "prescribe for this
poor fellow, who asks for a hospital, so Routine
gives him a workhouse: come, you know there
is no limit to your skill and good nature: you
cured Spot of the worms, cure poor old Maxley
of his snakes; oblige me."

"That I will, Mr. Alfred," said Osmond,