Mr. Wopsle hesitated, and we all began to conceive rather a poor opinion of him.

     "Come!" said the stranger, "I'll help you. You don't deserve help, but I'll help you. Look at that paper you hold in your hand. What is it?"

     "What is it?" repeated Mr. Wopsle, eyeing it, much at a loss.

     "Is it," pursued the stranger in his most sarcastic and suspicious manner, "the printed paper you have just been reading from?"

     "Undoubtedly."

     "Undoubtedly. Now, turn to that paper, and tell me whether it distinctly states that the prisoner expressly said that his legal advisers instructed him altogether to reserve his defence?"

     "I read that just now," Mr. Wopsle pleaded.

     "Never mind what you read just now, sir; I don't ask you what you read just now. You may read the Lord's Prayer backwards, if you like,--and, perhaps, have done it before to-day. Turn to the paper. No, no, no my friend; not to the top of the column; you know better than that; to the bottom, to the bottom." (We all began to think Mr. Wopsle full of subterfuge.) "Well? Have you found it?"