'For or against?'

'Against the culprit.'

'My discordant friend,' said Smyth, producing a second bottle from an
unsuspected source and making it disappear mysteriously, 'means that he
is prejudiced against England. Am I right, sir?'

'Not exactly,' drawled the composer. 'I don't mind England--but I
think the English are awful.'

'That is a nice point,' said Lady Durwent.

'Ah,' broke in Madame Carlotti, 'but, much as I detest the English, I
hate England more. _Nom de Dieu_! I--a daughter of the Mediterranean,
where the sun ees so rarely a stranger, and the sky and the water it
ees always blue. In Italy one lives because she ees alive--it ees
sufficient. Here it ees always gray, gray--always g-r-ray. When the
sun comes--_sacramento_! he sees his mistake and goes queek away. Ah,
Signor Selwyn, it ees _désolant_ that I am compelled to live here.'

A roar of unfeeling laughter greeting her familiar plaint, Madame
Carlotti took a hitch in her gown and reimprisoned some of her person
which had escaped from custody.

'Then,' said Johnston Smyth, 'if we are all of a mind, there is no need
to have a trial. You have all seen the accusation in Mr. Selwyn's eye,
you have considered the unbiassed evidence of the lovely Carlotti'----