And may not sweet Grace Acton,-her now repentant father, the kindly Jonathan,-his generous master, and if there be any other of the Hurstley folk we love, may they not all meet destruction at his hands, as a handful of corn before the reaper's sickle ? I say not that they shall, but that they might. Acton's criminal state of mind, and his hunger after gold, gold anyhow, have earned some righteous retribution, unless Providence in mercy interpose; and young Sir John, in nowise unblameable himself, with wealth to tempt the spoiler, lives in the spoiler's very den; and as to Jonathan and Grace, this world has many martyrs. If heaven in its wisdom use the wicked as a sword, heaven is but just; but if in its vengeance that sword of the wicked is turned against himself; heaven showeth mercy all unmerited. To a criminal like Jennings, let loose upon the world, without the clog of conscience to retard him, and with the spur of covetousness ever urging on, anything in crime is possible, is probable none can sound those depths: and when we raise our eyes on high to the Mighty Moral Governor, and note the clouds of mystery that thunder round His throne, -He may permit, or He may control: who shall reach those heights?

M

CHAPTER XXXV.

FEARS.

MOREOVER, innocent of blood as we know Roger Acton to be, appearances are strongly against him and in such a deed as secret midnight murder, which none but God can witness, multiplied appearances justify the world in condemning one who seems so guilty.

The first impression against Roger is a bad one, for all the neighbours know how strangely his character had been changing for the worse of late: he is not like the same man; sullen and insubordinate, he was turned away from work for his bold and free demeanour; as to church, though he had worn that little path these forty years, all at once he seems to have entirely forgotten the way hither.

He lives nobody knows how, on bright clean gold nobody knows whence: his daughter says, indeed, that her father found a crock of gold in his garden,—but she need not have held

her tongue so long and borne so many insults, if that were all the truth; and, mark this! even though she says it and declares it on her bible oath, Acton himself most strenuously denied all such findings,—but went about with impudent tales of legacy, luck, nobody knows what;—the man prevaricated continually, and got angry when asked about it, cudgelling folks, and swearing like,—like any one but old-time 'honest Roger.'

Only look, too, where he lives in a lone cottage opposite Pike Island, on the other side of which is Hurstley Hall, the scene of robbery and murder :- -was not a boat seen that night upon the lake? and was not the lawn-door open? How strangely stupid in the coroner and jury not to have imagined this before! how dull it was of everybody round not to have suspected murder rather more strongly, with those finger-marks about the throat, and not to have opened their eyes a little wider, when the murderer's cottage was within five hundred yards of that open lawn-door!

Then again, ,-when Mr. Jennings, in his strict and searching way, accused the culprit, he never saw a man so confused in all his life! and on repeating the charge before those

two constables, they also witnessed his guilty consternation: experienced men too, they were, and never saw a felon if Acton wasn't one; the dogged manner in which he went with them so quietly was quite sufficient; innocent men don't go to jail in that sort of way, as if they well deserved it.

But, strongest of all, if any shadow of a doubt remained, the most fearful proof of Roger's guilt lay in the scrap of shawl,—the little leather bags, and the very identical crock of gold! There it was, nestled in the thatch, within a yard of his head, as he lay in bed at noonday guarding it.

One proof, weaker than the weakest of all these banded together, has ere now sufficed to hang the guilty;—and many, many fears have I that this multitude of seeming facts, conspiring in a focus against Roger Acton, will be quite enough to overwhelm the innocent. "Nothing lies like a fact," said Dr. Johnson: and statistics prove it, at least as well as circumstantial evidence.

The matter was as clear as daylight, and long before the trial came about, our poor labourer had been hanged outright in the just judgment of Hurstley-cum-Piggesworth.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

PRISON COMFORTS.

MANY blessings, more than he had skill to count, had visited poor Acton in his cell. His gentle daughter Grace, sweet minister of good thoughts, she, like a loving angel, had been God's instrument of penitence and peace to him. He had come to himself again, in solitude, by nights, as a man awakened from a feverish dream; and the hallowing ministrations of her company by day had blest reflective solitude with sympathy and counsel.

Good-wife Mary, too, had been his comforting and cheering friend. Immediately the

crock of gold had been taken from its ambush in the thatch, it seemed as if the chill which had frozen up her heart had been melted by a sudden thaw. Roger Acton was no longer the selfish prodigal, but the guiltless persecuted penitent; her care was now to soothe his griefs, not to scold him for excesses; and indignation at the false and bloody charge, made him appear a martyr in her eyes. As to his accuser,