Bastards all the raven never yet was father to the dove. And say it were not so say that it is the blood of Calverley which flows so lustily -what then? The brother, who has lain under the same heart with me -who has drawn life from the same bosom, must not waste his young days in a prison. I will clear away all obstacles between him and the estate-myself the last. Yes, I swear it, brother, by everything that man most loves, or hates, or fears, you shall be lord of Calverley; and that you may be so, to work-to work-to work.".

In this desperate mood he hurried with the dead child in his arms to Philippa's bed-room, where she lay asleep, exhausted by recent illness. A maid servant, who watched for her waking, was nursing a younger boy by the fire. Upon seeing her master rush into the room, his face pale as death, his hands and clothes covered with blood, and the murdered child in his arms, she started up with a cry of horror. Walter immediately dropt his burthen, and catching the other child from her, a struggle ensued between them, during which he inflicted several wounds, only half parried by her efforts to intercept his blows. Finding the strength of the woman likely to prevail over him, for she was young and powerful, while he was feeble by nature, and still more so from dissipation, he grasped her by the throat so tightly that she was forced to let go the child, when, by a last exertion of his strength, he managed to fling her down the stairs. The noise of her fall awoke Philippa, who had hitherto slept through the scuffle, not soundly indeed, but in that broken slumber, in which the near reality makes itself heard and seen in the sleeper's dreams, though perhaps distorted, and mingled with things foreign to it. The first impulse of maternal instinct led her to catch up the wounded child, that lay moaning heavily upon the floor; but Walter, who, after flinging the servant down stairs, had turned back to complete his bloody work, made a sudden dart, and tried to wrest it from her. This occasioned a second struggle no less eagerly maintained than the former had been, in which the mother received several stabs intended for her child, when at last she swooned away from fright, exhaustion, and the loss of blood.

Not for a single moment did Walter pause to gaze upon this horrible scene. Yet it was no regret for what he had done, no sympathy with the murdered, nor any fears for himself, that made him fly as if pursued by some demon; he recollected that he had a third child at nurse about ten miles off, and in the fever of his insanity, he conceived that neither his revenge for his wife's supposed unfaithfulness, nor his desire to help his brother could be carried out, so long as one of his family was living. Down the great staircase therefore he might almost be said to fling himself, in the hope that his extraordinary speed would outrun the news of what had just happened, but he suddenly found himself brought to a halt at the bottom, by a servant whom the noise had brought there, and who was now listening to the maid's story.

66

Oh, sir! what have you done? exclaimed the man, stopping him. "Done! replied Walter, "that which you will never live to see me repent of."

With this, he aimed a blow at him with the dagger, which being dexterously warded of, they closed, and he had the good fortune to fling his adversary, but not before he had so mangled him with his spurs in the course of their short wrestling, that, when once down, the poor fellow lay rolling upon the ground in agony, unable to get up again.

In his way to the stables, whither he now hastened, he was met by the gentleman from Cambridge, who, wondering at his strange plight, and not without some alarm, hoped that nothing unpleasant had happened.

"Oh that," replied Walter," is as men shall see and understand things; for, look you, sir; what shall make some laugh, shall make others weep; and again, that which some shall deem well and wisely done, shall to others be as a sin and a stumbling-block. But beseech you, sir, go in, where I have taken orders for my brother's business, and will presently resolve you of that and all necessary matters."

The collegian, though unable to comprehend the secret meaning of his words, and suspicious of evil, went in as he had been desired, without attempting to detain his host by farther questions. Here, however, he found an ample comment on the text that had so much puzzled him. The floor covered with blood, the children and their mother to all appearance dead, the serving-man still groaning, and unable to move, from the rending and tearing of the spurs, formed a key to the riddle, that hardly needed any help from the explanations poured in upon him from all sides, for by this time the uproar had collected the whole family. So completely, however, was everyone occupied in telling or hearing, wondering, or conjecturing, that none thought of pursuing the assassin, till it was suggested by the visitor, and then it would have been too late to prevent farther mischief, had not Providence interfered.

Fully resolved to complete his bloody work by the murder of his remaining child, Calverley had set off without the loss of a moment, sparing neither whip nor spur by the way, and was already near the spot, when his horse stumbled and threw him. Before he could recover his feet and seize the bridle again, the affrighted animal started off. This gave the advantage to his pursuers, who, while he was slowly limping along from the effects of his fall, overtook him, and, after some opposition on his part, carried him before Sir John Saville, at Howley, one of the magistrates for the West Riding. Great was this gentleman's surprise at seeing a person of Calverley's name and estate in the county brought before him on a criminal charge, and much was it increased, when the collegian, as the highest in rank of the party, and the most capable orator, narrated all that he had just heard or seen, and referred to the testimony of the actual eye-witnesses for confirmation. During the recital the magistrate could not so far command his feelings, as not to give, from time to time, unequivocal signs of them, by looks, and even by broken words, and when the accusers had brought their several versions of the affair to an end, there was as much compassion as there was horror in the manner of his address.

"You have heard all this, Master Calverley, have you anything to say in reply? can you deny the whole, or any part of it?—or, if true, what cause?-what motive? Gracious heavens! it is almost too horrid for belief; and you, whom I have known from a boy; well for your poor father that he did not live to my years. Surely you must have been mad with wine at the time, and repentance of the deed has sobered you again."

"Repentance," said Walter, sullenly; "I repent of nothing but that I did not kill the other bastard brat."

Why, Master Calverley, it is your own child you are defaming, your own wife you are slandering. Are you man, or devil?" "You asked the question, and I answered you. you like that better."

I can be silent if

"I should like best to hear you reply honestly and truly, yet in a manner beseeming your condition, and which may not harden the hearts of men against you. Was this deed the devil's instigation at the moment, or is it long that you have entertained the idea of it?"

"So long that I only wonder it was not done and forgotten by this time."

"And what moved you thereto,"

"I have already said it; but you do not like the phrase, and so I have the less occasion to repeat it."

After a few more questions, which failed in eliciting any fresh matter of importance, he announced his purpose of sending Walter to the new jail at Wakefield, the plague happening just then to rage at York with much violence. For the first time the culprit gave some signs of human feeling, and asked "if he might not be permitted to see his wife?"

"She is too sorely wounded, as appears by the witnesses, to come to you; and Calverley, you well know, is in the opposite direction to Wakefield."

Sorely wounded!

repeated Walter, in the tone of one who hears evil tidings for the first time-" sorely wounded! and perhaps dying!— you spoke it truly, Sir John; I have been mad-or it may be I am mad now-I've done enough to make me so."

The thrill of horror that went through him as he said this, communicated itself to all around. Sir John, in particular, was deeply affected. He turned to Sir Thomas Bland who was also in the commission of the peace, and had dropt in during the examination.

"How say you, Sir Thomas? may we, think you, comply with Master Calverley's request without blemishing our character as magistrates ?" "Why not?" said Sir Thomas; "he will be in sufficient custody, and such being the case, it is no more than Christian charity to oblige him in so small a matter."

"I am right glad to hear you say so," replied his brother magistrate; "for, be things as they may, I must needs grieve for Master Calverley's condition, and would do any thing, honestly in my power, to amend it. To tell you the truth neighbour," he added in a whisper, "it's my constant belief that the poor fellow is not in his right mind-not wholly mad, perhaps, but mad by fits and starts."

"If it's no more than that comes to, it won't do him much good with judge or jury," said Sir Thomas, in the same tone.

"I am afraid not," said the other.

And here the conversation ended, when the prisoner was led off under a strong escort, and taken, as he had desired, to his house at Calverley. It might have been supposed that he would prove no welcome visitant at the house which he had made a house of mourning; but dearly as Philippa loved her children, when he appeared she forgot the mother in the wife, while as to the wounds he had inflicted on herself they weighed as nothing in the balance against her true affection. With pain and difficulty she raised herself from the couch where they had laid her, and flung

her arms about his neck, sobbing as though her heart would break, and unable for several minutes to say anything beyond, "Oh, my husbandmy dear husband!"

"Would that I had indeed deserved such an epithet from your lips," replied Walter, sadly; "I should not then have stood before you as I do now, a self-condemned criminal, repenting when repentance can no longer avail him. But if I wronged you in my life, at least I will not in

my death."

The constable, who, contrary to the character usually assigned to such officials, was a shrewd fellow, considered this as an intimation that the prisoner meant to commit suicide, and advancing from the door, where he had hitherto remained, drew near to be ready in case of the worst"though how," he said to himself, "Master Calverley intends doing such a thing I can't imagine, seeing that we haven't left him so much as a penknife.'

In the midst of his grief, Walter observed the action, and was at no loss to guess what had caused it.

"Do not fear me," he said; "I have no such intention."

"It's best though to be on the safe side, Master Calverley; and with your good leave I'll stay where I am. When I've once lodged you safe in Master Key's house at Wakefield, you can do as you please, or rather as he pleases."

Walter was too much beaten down by his new grief, to dispute the point any farther, and if he felt a momentary pang at finding himself for the first time in his life, thus completely at the will of another, the feeling was completely banished, when he again heard the low moaning voice of his Philippa.

"They will not take you from me, will they?" she murmured.

"Alas! yes, my love; we must part in a few minutes, and, I fear, for ever on this side the grave."

"Oh, no-they will not-cannot, be so cruel! For one day-only for one day I have so much to say to you."

"My gentle, loving, Philippa! how could I ever feel otherwise towards you than I do at this moment? It seems like some horrid dream ; but what realities has it left behind!"

"Give them gold," whispered Philippa; "my purse is in the oak cabinet, with the money I had saved up for William's birth-day to-morrow. Oh my child! my child!"

Walter could not reply; the words seemed well nigh to choke him when he would have uttered them, and even the constable was fain to wipe his eyes with his coat sleeve as he again drew back to allow them greater freedom in conversing.

Nearly an hour had passed in this way so agonizing to all parties, the constable feeling too much sympathy with their distress to abridge the interview, when the surgeon, who had been sent for long before, at last made his appearance. With more judgment, though perhaps less feeling, than had been exhibited by the officer of the law, he insisted upon their immediate separation, roundly assuring Walter that if he did not wish to complete the mischief he had begun, he would leave the room instantly. "I must needs," he said, "look to the lady's wounds with as little delay as possible, besides that your presence keeps her in such a state of agitation as may well render all our cares unavailing."

This blunt protest was not lost upon the constable, who moreover felt that it was high time to set out for Wakefield. Joining his authority to the rough but well-meant remonstrances of the surgeon, a separation was effected by something between force and persuasion, in the course of which Philippa fainted, and thus put an end to a scene, which was growing inexpressibly distressing to all parties.

Day followed day-night followed night-all alike dark and cheerless to the prisoner, and rendered yet more so by the monotony of suffering. At length came the day of trial, and Walter, who had been previously removed to York for that purpose, was put to the bar in due course of law, when to the general surprise he refused to plead to his arraignment. It was in vain that the judge explained to him the horrible penalty of forte et dure, which the law at that period affixed to such contumacy, and that so far from escaping death he would only make it more certain, and in a form more dreadful. To all this he replied, "I am familiar with every thing you can urge, my lord; I know full well that I shall die under lingering tortures, being pressed to death beneath a load of stone or iron, but such pains are as welcome to me as ever were the child-bed throes to the heart of a loving woman, they are the only atonement I can offer to man or heaven; may they be accepted."

"Why, then, you do acknowledge your crime?" said the judge hastily, eager to catch at anything by which the more cruel form of punishment might be avoided. "In that case

"By no means, my Lord," interrupted Walter, without allowing him an opportunity of pronouncing judgment; "when I talked of atonement I said not for what offence, it might be for deeds ten times worse than any I stand accused of, but which, as the secret of them lies buried in my own bosom, come not within your cognizance,"

Upon this declaration Calverley was removed from the bar, leaving the people much divided in their opinions upon his conduct. Some considered that he was committing an act of suicide, quite forgetting that he stood a fair chance of being hanged, and thus did no more in refusing to plead than exercise the only choice the law allowed him, which was not between life and death, but between a rope and the peine forte et dure. Others took his words in their literal meaning, and believed that he intended these voluntary pains as a sort of catholic penance for his crimes. The wiser few concluded that it was done to save his attainder and prevent the corruption of his blood and consequent forfeiture of lands in case, as there could be little doubt, he was attainted of felony; in other words, they suspected that his object in submitting to so terrible a death, was to save his estate for his surviving son Henry, for if he allowed them to press him to death, as no felony would have been proved against him for want of trial, no forfeiture could be incurred. Which, or whether any of these conjectures were right, we shall learn presently.

He was now led from court and taken to a cell which had long borne the name of Pompey's parlour, a phrase, no doubt, originally given to it by some sailor convict, and borrowed from the negroes, who used to give the grave that appellation. It is about eighteen feet square, and affords sufficient light to read by, and, though entirely devoted to condemned prisoners, it has the luxury of a fire place. In each corner of this dungeon a strong iron ring was then fixed into the wall, but these have been removed, the horrible punishment in which they once aided being