“It is my destruction!” said the constable despairingly.  “Ah, be
reasonable, good sir; only look at this matter, on all its sides, and
see how mere a jest it is--how manifestly and how plainly it is so.  And
even if one granted it were not a jest, it is a fault so small that
e’en the grimmest penalty it could call forth would be but a rebuke and
warning from the judge’s lips.