, who had gone through all the
vicissitudes of life. "She has been very unfortunate, and I fear very
wicked," added the poor thing, "but she is my mother, and God knows,
with all her faults and failings, she has never been unkind to me. You,
madam, have it in your power to save her; but she has wronged you, and
therefore, if you will not do it for her sake, do it for mine, and the
God of the fatherless will reward you."

Mrs. Logan answered her with a cast of the head, and a hem! and only
remarked, that "the guilty must not always be suffered to escape, or
what a world must we be doomed to live in!"

She was admitted to the prison, and found a tall emaciated figure, who
appeared to have once possessed a sort of masculine beauty in no
ordinary degree, but was now considerably advanced in years. She viewed
Mrs. Logan with a stem, steady gaze, as if reading her features as a
margin to her intellect; and when she addressed her it was not with
that humility, and agonized fervour, which are natural for one in such
circumstances to address to another who has the power of her life and
death in her hands.

"I am deeply indebted to you for this timely visit, Mrs. Logan," said
she. "It is not that I value life, or because I fear death, that I have
sent for you so expressly. But the manner of the death that awaits me
has something peculiarly revolting in it to a female mind. Good God!
when I think of being hung up, a spectacle to a gazing, gaping
multitude, with numbers of which I have had intimacies and connections,
that would render the moment of parting so hideous, that, believe me,
it rends to flinders a soul born for another sphere than that in which
it has moved, had not the vile selfishness of a lordly fiend ruined all
my prospects and all my hopes. Hear me then; for I do not ask your
pity: I only ask of you to look to yourself, and behave with womanly
prudence, if you deny this day that these goods are yours, there is no
other evidence whatever against my life, and it is safe for the
present. For, as for the word of the wretch who has betrayed me, it is
of no avail; he has prevaricated so notoriously to save himself. If you
deny them, you shall have them all again to the value of a mite, and
more to the bargain. If you swear to the identity of them, the process
will, one way and another, cost you the half of what they are worth."

"And what security have I for that?" said Mrs. Logan.

"You have none but my word," said