watch, and decides to see the chief clerk (who is himself an attorney, having passed the examination), and is forthwith conducted upstairs.  A burly farmer appears, and the grave senior puts his head up to answer, and expresses his sorrow that the principal is so occupied.  The burly farmer, however, who is evidently a man of substance, thinks that the chief clerk can also do what he wants, and he, too, is ushered upstairs.  Another farmer enters—­a rather rougher-looking man—­and, without saying a word, turns to the advertisement boards on which the posters of farms to be let, &c., are displayed.  These he examines with the greatest care, pointing with his forefinger as he slowly reads, and muttering to himself.  Presently he moves to go.  ‘Anything to suit you, sir?’ asks the senior clerk.  ‘Aw, no; I knows they be too much money,’ he replies, and walks out.

A gentleman next enters, and immediately the juniors sink out of sight, and scribble away with eager application; the senior puts down his pen and comes out from his desk.  It is a squire and magistrate.  The senior respectfully apologises for his employer being so occupied.  The gentleman seems a little impatient.  The clerk rubs his hands together deprecatingly, and makes a desperate venture.  He goes upstairs, and in a few minutes returns; the papers are not ready, but shall be sent over that evening in any case.  With this even the squire must fain be satisfied and depart.  The burly farmer and the builder come downstairs together amicably chatting, and after them the chief clerk himself.  Though young, he has already an expression of decision upon his features, an air of business about him; in fact, were he not thoroughly up to his work he would not remain in that office long.  To hold that place is a guarantee of ability.  He has a bundle of cheques, drafts, &c., in his hand, and after a few words with the grave senior at the desk, strolls across to the bank.

No sooner has the door closed behind him than a shoal of clerks come tripping down on tip-toe, and others appear from the back of the house.  They make use of the opportunity for a little gossip.  Voices are heard in the passage, and an aged and infirm labouring man is helped in by a woman and a younger man.  The clerks take no notice, and the poor old follow props himself against the wall, not daring to take a chair.  He is a witness.  He can neither read nor write, but he can recollect ’thuck ould tree,’ and can depose to a fact worth perhaps hundreds of pounds.  He has come in to be examined; he will be driven in a week or two’s time from the village to the railway station in a fly, and will talk about it and his visit to London till the lamp of life dies out.