It was with no very pleasant feelings, it must be confessed, that Chandos Winslow found himself tête-à-tête with a man who had moved heaven and earth to hang him, not more than four or five hours before. But whatever notion he had previously formed of the worthy sergeant's demeanour in private life, from the part he had borne in the trial, it was very speedily dissipated after he entered unwigged and ungowned. The sergeant shook him heartily by the hand, congratulated him with a very joyous laugh, upon the result of the trial, and talked of the whole affair in which a fellow-creature's life had been at stake, as if it had been a mere game at cards, where Sir ---- had held most trumps, and won the rubber. Never was there a more jovial companion; and when they sat down to dinner, after several other barristers had arrived, the sergeant laughed and talked and cracked his jokes, and drank his champagne, till one of the uninitiated might have thought a consultation with him, after the meal, an expedient somewhat dangerous. The conversation during dinner principally turned upon snipe-shooting. There was very little law; and the "feast of reason and the flow of soul" did not afford the banquet the lawyers seemed most to delight in. Habit is very strong in its power over the body; but, I think, even stronger with the mind. The most vehement rivalries, the most mournful ceremonies, the most tragic scenes, aye, even the most fatal events lose their great interest when they become habitual. The statesman, the undertaker, the physician, the soldier can bear witness to it, as they feast after the fierce debate, the solemn funeral, the painful death-bed, or the battle-field. Nothing on earth ever makes twice the same impression. How those lawyers laughed and talked, though two trials had taken place since that of Chandos Winslow had terminated, and a woman had been condemned to death, a man had been sent to expiate one half of a criminal life by labouring during the rest in chains and exile! Chandos felt benumbed by the heavy weight of the past, and not cheered by the light emptiness of the present; so that he was glad when dinner was over, and coffee drunk. The men of law betook themselves to earnest consultations, reinvigorated by the temporary repose; for in reality and truth, during that seeming revel, the giant minds had but been sleeping. It was rest that they took: and happy are they who are enabled to cast off the burden of heavy thought, the moment that it is no longer necessary to bear it.