Mr. Wittingham was a tall and very respectable-looking gentleman, somewhat past the middle age, and verging towards that decline of life which is marked by protuberance of the stomach, and thinness of the legs. But, nevertheless, Mr. Wittingham carried it off very well, for his height diminished the appearance of that which is usually called a corporation, and his legs were skilfully concealed in his top-boots. He was exceedingly neat in his apparel, tolerably rosy in the gills, and having a certain dogmatical peremptory expression, especially about the thick eyebrows and hooknose, which he found wonderfully efficacious in the decision of cases at petty sessions. The moment he entered the room, he fixed his eyes somewhat sternly upon Mr. Beauchamp (whom we have forgotten to describe as a very gentlemanlike--even distinguished-looking person of about thirty years of age), and addressing him in a rough, and rather uncivil tone, said, "Your name, I think you told me, is Beauchamp, Sir, and you came to lay an information before me against certain persons for stopping a chaise upon the king's highway." "I am, as you say, Sir, called Beauchamp," replied the other gentleman, "and I waited upon you, as the nearest magistrate, to give information of a crime which had been committed in your neighbourhood which you refused to receive. Do me the honour of taking a seat." "And pray, Sir, if I may be so bold as to ask, who and what are you?" inquired the magistrate, suffering himself to drop heavily into a chair. "I should conceive that had very little to do with the matter," interposed Ned Hayward, before Mr. Beauchamp could answer. "The simple question is, whether an attempt at highway robbery, or perhaps a worse offence, has or has not been made this night, upon Mrs. and Miss Clifford, as they were going over to my friend Sir John Slingsby's; and allow me to say that any magistrate who refuses to take a deposition on such a subject, and to employ the best means at his command to apprehend the offenders, grossly neglects his duty." The host brought in the roast fowl, and stared at the dashing tone of Ned Hayward's speech towards one of the magnates of the neighbourhood. Some words in the commencement of that speech had caused Mr. Wittingham's countenance to fall, but the attack upon himself in the conclusion, roused him to indignant resistance, so that his reply was an angry demand of "Who the devil are you, Sir?" "I am the devil of nobody, Mr. Wittington," answered Ned Hayward. "I am my own devil, if any body's, and my name is Edward Hayward, commonly called Captain Hayward, late of the 40th regiment, and now unattached. But as my supper is ready, I will beg leave to eat my chicken hot. Beauchamp, won't you join? Mr. Wittington, shall I give you a wing? Odd name, Wittington. Descendant of the renowned Lord Mayor of London, I presume?"