f to keep himself from falling.

The young duke turned away his eyes. The sight was too painful. He looked
around him over the densely packed crowd, in which he recognized many of
his old friends and neighbors, a great number of his clansmen and nearly
all the old servants of his family.

Although the month was October, and the weather cool in that northern
climate, the atmosphere of such a packed crowd would have been unbearable
but for the fact that the six tall windows that flanked the court-room
on each side were let down from the top for ventilation.

The duke turned his attention to the Bench.

There seemed to be some pause in the proceedings. The judges were sitting
in perfect silence. The prosecuting counsel were arranging papers and
occasionally speaking to each other in low tones.

The duke turned to a gentleman, a stranger, who was sitting on his left,
and inquired:

"I have heard that the girl Cameron is not to be arraigned. I have also
heard that she is held as a witness for the crown. Can you inform me
whether it is so?"

"Yes, sir, it is so. You perceive that she is not in the dock with the
other prisoner. She is in custody, however, in the sheriff's room. The
prosecution cannot afford to arraign her, because they cannot do without
her testimony," answered the stranger.

A buzz of conversation passed like a breeze through the impatient crowd.

"Silence in the court!" called out the crier.

And all became as still as death.

Mr. Roy, assistant counsel for the crown, arose and read the indictment,
charging the prisoner at the bar with the willful murder of Sir Lemuel
Levison, at Castle Lone, on the twenty-first day of June, Anno Domini,
so and so. Without making any comment, the prosecutor sat down.

The Clerk of Arraigns then arose, and demanded of the accused--

"Prisoner at the bar, are you guilty or not guilty of the crimes with
which you stand indicted?"

Potts, who stood pale and trembling and clutching the rails in front of
the dock, replied earnestly though informally:

"Not guilty, upon my soul, my lords and gentlemen, before Heaven, and as
I hope for salvation."

And overpowered by fear, he sank down on the narrow bench at the back of
the dock.

The trial proceeded.

Queen's Counsel, Mr. James Stuart, took the indictment from the hands of
his assistant, and proceeded to open it with a short, pithy address to
the judges and the jury, and closed by requesting that Alexander McR