"Cap'n Burwell gave him to her, you know," explained the general, who laughed whenever his daughter spoke, as if the fact of her talking at all was a source of amazement to him, "and she hasn't let go of him since she got him. By the way, Judge, you have a first-rate garden spot. I hear your asparagus is the finest in town. Ours is very poor this year. I must have a new bed made before next season. Ah, what is it, daughter?" "You've forgotten to buy the sugar," said Eugenia, "and Aunt Chris can't put up her preserves. And you told me to remind you of the whip--" "Bless your heart, so I did. Sampson lost that whip a month ago, and I've never remembered it yet. Well, good-day--good-day." The judge raised his hat with a stately inclination; the general nodded good-naturedly, still grasping the linen robe with his plump, red hand; and the carriage jolted along the green and disappeared behind the glazed brick walls of the church. The judge regarded his walking-stick meditatively for a moment, and continued his way. The smile with which he had followed the vanishing figure of Juliet Burwell returned to his face, and his features softened from their usual chilly serenity. He had gone but a short distance and was passing the iron gate of the churchyard, when the droning of a voice came to him, and looking beyond the bars, he saw little Nicholas Burr lying at full length upon a marble slab, his head in his hands and his feet waving in the air. Entering the gate, the judge followed the walk of moss-grown stones leading to the church steps, and paused within hearing of the voice, which went on in an abstracted drawl. "The most cel-e-bra-ted sys-tem of juris-pru-dence known to the world begins, as it ends, with a code--" He was not reading, for the book was closed. He seemed rather to be repeating over and over again words which had been committed to memory. "With a code. From the commencement to the close of its history, the ex-posi-tors of Ro-man Law con-sistently em-ployed lan-guage which implied that the body of their sys-tem rested on the twelve De-cem-viral Tables--Dec-em-vi-ral--De-cem-vi-ral Tables." "Bless my soul!" said the judge. The boy glanced up, blushed, and would have risen, but the judge waved him back. "No--no, don't get up. I heard you as I was going by. What are you doing?" "Learnin'." "Learning! Dear me! What do you mean by learning?" "I'm learnin' by heart, sir--and--and, if you don't mind, sir, what does j-u-r-i-s-p-r-u-d-e-n-c-e mean?" The judge started, returning the boy's eager gaze with one of kindly perplexity. "Bless my soul!" he said again. "You aren't trying to understand that, are you?" The boy grew scarlet and his lips trembled. "No, sir," he answered. "I'm jest learnin' it now. I'll know what it means when I'm bigger--" "And you expect to remember it?" asked the judge. "I don't never forget," said the boy. "Bless my soul!" exclaimed the judge for the third time.