street--"

Mr. Bellingham's well-shaped brows arched themselves a trifle higher.

"Indeed?" he murmured, at a loss.

"A young girl who--as I understand--was suffering public punishment
under sentence of yours."

"Yes?" Mr. Bellingham's smile grew vaguer, and his two hands touched
finger-tips in front of his magisterial stomach--an adequate stomach but
well on the right side of grossness. He glanced at his
fellow-magistrates right and left. "It--er---sometimes happens," he
suggested.

"I dare say." Captain Vyell took him up. "But she has fainted under the
punishment. She has passed the limit of her powers, poor child; and
they tell me that what she has endured is to be followed, and at once,
by five hours in the stocks. Gentlemen, I repeat I am quite well aware
that this is most irregular--you may call it indecent; but I saw the
poor creature fall, and, as it happens, I know something that might have
softened you before you passed sentence."

Here the Clerk interposed, stiffening the Chief Magistrate, who wore a
smile of embarrassed politeness.

"As His Honour--as Captain Vyell--suggests, your Worships, this is quite
irregular."

"To be sure--to be sure--of course," hemm'd Mr. Bellingham. "We can