is mentioning "certain circumstances, which he is bound to tell the jury have made a strong impression on his own mind." . . . Alack, that, owing to the incorrigible mumbling of his diction, I cannot succeed in ascertaining what these said circumstances are! . . . He has begun (I think) to discourse concerning my latest offer of marriage in open Court. What a pity that hon'ble judges should not study to acquire at least ordinary proficiency in such a simple affair as Elocution!
"It may strike you, gentlemen, that if the plaintiff had any genuine affection for the defendant, or any actual intention of linking her lot with his, she would——" (the rest is a severe mumble!) "Or again, you may take into consideration——" (but precisely what they are to take is, to myself, a dumb show!). "Still, after making every possible allowance for the idealising effects of the tender passion upon the female judgment, I confess I find it a little difficult to persuade myself that——" (Again I am not in at the finish—but, from the bristling and tossing of Jessimina's hat-plumes, I am in great hopes that it contained something complimentary to myself.) . . . He has just concluded with the observation that, "after what they have seen and heard of the defendant during the proceedings, the jury should find little difficulty in arriving at a fairly accurate estimate of the loss which a young lady of British birth and bringing-
