Ernest, to speak, and it stands with you to save the honour of our theme.’ ‘I intend,’ said Ernest, ‘to do the last without undertaking to do the first; and for my part, I should not care to combine these two things with each other. Besides, the refutation would draw me away to other subjects, and I might then myself become liable to a penalty. And further, to one who is not accustomed to extempore connected speaking, nothing is more difficult in doing so than to follow up the train of thought of