e case. And there was pity in his voice
--how seldom a sound that was in that ignorant and savage land!
I remember every detail of what he said, except the words he said
it in; and so I change it into my own words:

"Law is intended to mete out justice. Sometimes it fails. This
cannot be helped. We can only grieve, and be resigned, and pray
for the soul of him who falls unfairly by the arm of the law, and
that his fellows may be few. A law sends this poor young thing
to death--and it is right. But another law had placed her where
she must commit her crime or starve with her child--and before God
that law is responsible for both her crime and her ignominious death!

"A little while ago this young thing, this child of eighteen years,
was as happy a wife and mother as any in England; and her lips
were blithe with song, which is the native speech of glad and
innocent hearts. Her young husband was as happy as she; for he was
doing his whole duty, he worked early and late at his handicraft,
his bread was honest bread well and fairly earned, he was prospering,
he was furnishing shelter and sustenance to his family, he was
adding his mite to the wealth of the nation. By consent of a
treacherous law, instant destruction fell upon this holy home and
swept it away! That young husband was waylaid and impressed,
and sent to sea. The wife knew nothing of it. She sought him
everywhere, she moved the hardest hearts with the supplications
of her tears, the broken eloquence of her despair. Weeks dragged
by, she watching, waiting, hoping, her mind going slowly to wreck
under the burden of her misery. Little by little all her small
possessions went for food. When she could no longer pay her rent,
they turned her out of doors. She begged, while she had strength;
when she was starving at last, and her milk failing, she stole a
piece of linen cloth of the value of a fourth part of a cent,
thinking to sell it and save her child. But she was seen by the
owner of the cloth. She was put in jail and brought to trial.
The man testified to the facts. A plea was made for her, and her
sorrowful story was told in her behalf. She spoke, too, by
permission, and said she did steal the cloth, but that her mind
was so disordered of late by trouble that when she was overborne
with hunger all acts, criminal or other, swam meaningless through
her brain and she knew nothing rightly, except that she was so
hungry! For a moment all were touc