Oh, dooee take and have me locked up,
gentlemen, dooee now: tellee I ain't fit to be about, my poor head is so
mazed."
"Well, well," said Mr. Hardie, "I'll give you an order for the Union."
"What, make a pauper of me?"
"I cannot help it," said the magistrate: "it is the routine; and it was
settled at a meeting of the bench last month that we must adhere to the
rule as strictly as possible; the asylum is so full: and you know,
Maxley, it is not as if you were dangerous."
"That I be, sir: I don't know what I'm a looking at or a doing. Would I
ha' gone and killed my poor Susan's hen if I hadn't a been beside myself?
and she in her grave, poor dear: no, not for untold gold: and I be fond
of that too--used to be, however: but now I don't seem to care for money
nor nothing else." And his head dropped.
Look here, Maxley, old fellow," said Alfred sarcastically, "you must go
to the workhouse, and stay there till you hoe a pauper; take him for a
crocodile and kill him; then you will get into an asylum whether the
Barkington magistrates like it or not: that is the _routine,_ I believe;
and as reasonable as most routine.
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