The commissioner: or, de Lunatico inquirendo / With twenty-eight illustrations on steel by Phiz [i.e. H.K. Browne] [Anon].

George Payne Rainsford James

Date:: 1843

Credit: The commissioner: or, de Lunatico inquirendo / With twenty-eight illustrations on steel by Phiz [i.e. H.K. Browne] [Anon]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$himself was rather gayer tlian ordinary, and in A arious points of liis demeanour, there were strong touches of the place from whence he came, which, however, we shall not pause upon here. Besides tlie aforenamed persons, there were a number of otliers present, invited by the family of the bride, and almost the whole parish of Outrun, without any invitation at all. In the tall man in black, dear reader, with the straight-cut coat and clear sparkling eyes, who stands behind Mr. Longmore, and looks full of a sort of a splenetic content- ment, which he will not sutler to run over, you immediately recognise Mr. Longshanks. But who is that fair-haired youth, with a pair of not very well-grown mustachios, Avho appears somewhat behind, on the left hand, in the attitude of the Antinous ? You have not forgotten Joey Pike, surely ?—and the cause of the harvest displayed by his upper lip is, that Joey is now a wealthy man—]\lr. Scapulary’s last will, together with the reward pro- mised and paid by Mr. Longmore, having given him more than a hun- dred a-year. Thus, Joey is a great personage, not only in his own estimation, but in that of all the neighbourhood ; and he has faint visions of a distant relationship between himself and the great house of Lucy, which bears upon its shield three of the fish called Luce, or Pike— Avhicli, indeed, gives greater probability to the connexion than is gene- rally required by the Herald’s College on such occasions. There is one strong objection, hoAvever, which has prevented Joey from putting in an open claim to that alliance. He fears that it might prove a bar to his speedy union Avith Miss de Tuppins, Avhich his con- stant heart could not brook, either for the ancestry of a Lucy, or for the tender interest attached to the situation of a crossed and disappointed lover. While speaking on the subject of Joey Pike, and the fortune Avhich he derived from Mr. Scapulary, Ave are naturally led to say that the unhaijpy girl Avliose Aveakness, together Avith the vice of another, made her the cause of some of the most tragic incidents in this book, Avas suddenly rescued from a life of crime and misery by the land and houses of old Scapulary falling to her as his next of kin. Betsy Trollop, however, never'returned to Outrun, but, hiring a small house not far from Market Greenford, she passed the rest of her days in bringing up her child in a course of virtue, Avhich she had herself once abandoned, and in daily visiting her unhappy father, who never recovered his senses. The Avidow of Mr. Tobias Scapulary, about ten days after the marriage of Harry Worrel Avith Laura Longmore, and her Iriend, ]\Ir. Thomas Smalldram Avere, as the naval Avorld says, placed in dock, but not for the purpose of repair. The cruel attorney-general had refused to admit Mr. Smalldram as king’s evidence, thinking that there Avas quite sufficient before him to convict both the lady and gentleman of certain practices in regard to the windpipe of Mr. Scapulary, Avhich Avere likely to produce similar results in regard to their OAvn. His opinion on the subject proved much more sound than that of many other laAvyers in many other cases, for the jury took the same vieAv of the matter, the judge did not differ with them in the least, and after putting a black cap$