not be asleep. His eyes are open! A veteran politician,
such as he, would never fall asleep with wide-open eyes,
lest some enemy or mischief-maker, taking him thus at
unawares, should peep through these windows into his
consciousness, and make strange discoveries among the
reminiscences, projects, hopes, apprehensions, weaknesses,
and strong points, which he has heretofore shared with
nobody. A cautious man is proverbially said to sleep
with one eye open. That may be wisdom. But not with
both; for this were heedlessness! No, no! Judge Pyn-
cheon cannot be asleep.

It is odd, however, that a gentleman so burdened with
engagements, -- and noted, too, for punctuality, --
should linger thus in an old lonely mansion, which he has
never seemed very fond of visiting. The oaken chair, to
be sure, may tempt him with its roominess. It is, indeed,
a spacious, and, allowing for the rude age that fashioned
it, a moderately easy seat, with capacity enough, at all
events, and offering no restraint to the Judge's breadth
of beam. A bigger man might find ample accommodation
in it. His ancestor, now pictured upon the wall, with all
his English beef about him, used hardly to present a front
extending from elbow to elbow of this chair, or a base that
would cover its whole cushion. But there are better
chairs than this, -- mahogany, black-walnut, rosewood,
spring-seated and damask-cushioned, with varied slopes,
and innumerable artifices to make them easy, and obviate
the irksomeness of too tame an ease, -- a score of such
might be at Judge Pyncheon's service. Yes! in a score
of drawing-rooms he would be more than welcome.
Mamma would advance to meet him with outstretched
hand; the virgin daughter, elderly as he has now

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