should ask the apothecary to take wine; and he, poor innocent man! when gentlemen whom he had never had the honour to meet at dinner before addressed him with a winning smile, and said, "Mr. M'Garry, will you do me the _honour_?" could not do less than fill his glass every time; so that, to use Jack Horan's own phrase, the apothecary was "sewed up" before he had any suspicion of the fact; and, unused to the indications of approaching vinous excitement, he supposed it was the delightful society made him so hilarious, and he began to launch forth after dinner in a manner quite at variance with the reserve he usually maintained in the presence of his superiors, and talked largely. Now, M'Garry's principal failing was to make himself appear very learned in his profession; and every new discovery in chemistry, operation in surgery, or scientific experiment he heard of, he was prone to shove in, head and shoulders, in his soberest moments; but now that he was half-drunk, he launched forth on the subject of galvanism, having read of some recent wonderful effects produced on the body of a recent murderer who was hanged and given over to the College of Surgeons in Dublin. To impress the company still more with a sense of his learning, he addressed Growling on the subject, and the doctor played him off to advantage. "Don't you think it very wonderful, doctor?" inquired M'Garry, speaking somewhat thickly. "Very," answered the doctor, drily. "They say, sir, the man--that is, the subject--when under the influence of the battery, absolutely twiddled his left foot, and raised his right arm." "And raised it to some purpose, too," said the doctor; "for he raised a contusion on the Surgeon-General's eye, having hit him over the same." "Dear me!--I did not hear that." "It is true, however," said the doctor; "and that gives you an idea of the power of the galvanic influence, for you know the Surgeon-General is a powerful man, and yet he could not hold him down." "Wonderful!" hiccupped M'Garry.