His scarlet robe only seemed to accentuate the colour of his puffy pink cheeks, whilst the blackness of his little beady eyes and pointed nose rather gave him the appearance of some overfed bird gorged to repletion after a particularly satisfying meal, slightly apoplectic, with its beak out of focus. The Judge, moreover, appeared to be afflicted with a little wheezy asthmatical cough which attacked him at intervals as he prepared to arrange his papers. The Clerk carefully placed a glass of water upon the desk by his Lordship's side, but whether this was done by way of a simple remedy for the Judge's wheezy little cough, or merely as a gentle reminder that the case was likely to be a dry one, cannot be guessed with any certainty. The preliminaries having been arranged, the case having been called, the Ushers of the Court having again shouted unnecessarily for silence, Sir Simon Gold having stared at the Judge, and Mr. Learned Bore having stared at everybody, the Judge having appeared to have closed his beady eyes in slumber, like a broody hen upon a perch, Mr. Gentle Gammon rose and opened his case for the plaintiff. As Ridgwell observed in a whisper, "the Round Game had started." Mr. Gentle Gammon opened his case in his proverbially gentle tones. It was a silky voice, purring in its gentleness, but with a curious power of penetrating every corner of the over-crowded Court; it insisted even whilst it soothed, and its effect upon his Lordship the Judge seemed to be most pleasing, as he immediately appeared to nod to it as if in greeting. Mr. Gentle Gammon related to the Court how his client, holding the highest Civic position in London, had been made the subject of a virulent and unscrupulous newspaper attack by a man who, in addition to writing plays which nobody professed to understand, undoubtedly wrote articles that all fair-minded people unquestionably deplored. This unprincipled person, Mr. Learned Bore by name, had seen fit to attack no less a person than the Worshipful the Lord Mayor of London, and that, moreover, during his Lordship's tenure of office, believing that he, an unscrupulous journalist, could drag the Lord Mayor down from his exalted position by means of a few clap-trap phrases written for money, although he, the learned Counsel, marvelled how any one could find it in their hearts to remunerate such a person engaged in such a calling using such questionable language in such a preposterous case.