No appeals for me, if I can avoid it.

Send News a telegram." "That," began James, in his most solemn and legal tones, "is a view of the matter in which I am glad to be able to heartily coincide, although it seems to me that there are several points, which I will touch on one by one." "Good gracious! no," broke in Lady Holmhurst; "but I think it is rather _mean_ of them, don't you, Mr.Short ?" James looked puzzled.

"I do not quite take Lady Holmhurst's point," he said plaintively.
"Then you must be stupid," said Eustace, "Don't you see the joke?
--'_mesne_ profits,' _mean_ of them ?" "Ah," said James, with satisfaction; "I perceive.

Lady Holmhurst does not seem to be aware that although 'mesne'-- a totally erroneous word--is pronounced 'mean,' it is spelt m-e-s-n-e." "I stand corrected," said Lady Holmhurst, with a little curtsey.

"I thought that Mr.James Short would take my ignorance into account, and understand what I _mean_!" This atrocious pun turned the laugh against the learned James, and then, the telegram to News and News having been dispatched, they all went in to the wedding breakfast.
In a general way, wedding breakfasts are not particularly lively affairs.
There is a mock hilarity about them that does not tend to true cheerfulness, and those of the guests who are not occupied with graver thoughts are probably thinking of the dyspepsia that comes after.