Finally, he rose erect, and surveyed the sheet, which he had been
writing upon, with great interest.

Just beneath the words, "messuages, tenements, water courses, and all
that doth thereunto pertain," Verty had made a charming sketch of a
wild-fowl, with expanded wings, falling from the empyrean, with an
arrow through his breast.

For some moments, the drawing afforded Verty much gratification: it
finally, however, lost its interest, and the boy leaned his head upon
his hand, and gazed through the window upon the waving trees which
overshadowed the rear of the building.

Then his eyes slowly drooped--the dusky lashes moved tremulously--the
head declined--and in five minutes Verty was asleep, resting his
forehead on his folded arms.

The office was disturbed, for the next quarter of an hour, by no sound
but the rapid scratching of Mr. Roundjacket's pen, which glided over
the paper at a tremendous rate, and did terrible execution among
plaintiffs, executors, administrators, and assigns.

At the end of that time, Mr. Roundjacket raised his head, uttered a
prolonged whistle, and, wiping his pen upon the sleeve of his old
office coat, which bore a striking resemblance to the gaberdine of a
beggar, addressed himself to speech--

"Now, that was not wanted till to-morrow evening," he observed,
confidentially, to the pigeon-holes; "but, to-morrow evening, I may be
paying my addresses to some angelic lady, or be engaged upon my epic.