to enter. And when, slowly following the officer, the witness
advanced to the foot of the table, Effie, with the whole expression of
her countenance altered, from that of confused shame and dismay, to an
eager, imploring, and almost ecstatic earnestness of entreaty, with
outstretched hands, hair streaming back, eyes raised eagerly to her
sister's face, and glistening through tears, exclaimed in a tone which
went through the heart of all who heard her,--"O Jeanie, Jeanie, save me,
save me!"

With a different feeling, yet equally appropriated to his proud and
self-dependent character, old Deans drew himself back still farther under
the cover of the bench; so that when Jeanie, as she entered the court,
cast a timid glance towards the place at which she had left him seated,
his venerable figure was no longer visible. He sate down on the other
side of Dumbiedikes, wrung his hand hard, and whispered, "Ah, Laird, this
is warst of a'--if I can but win ower this part--I feel my head unco
dizzy; but my Master is strong in his servant's weakness." After a
moment's mental prayer, he again started up, as if impatient of
continuing in any one posture, and gradually edged himself forward
towards the place he had just quitted.

Jeanie in the meantime had advanced to the bottom of the table, when,
unable to resist the impulse of affections she suddenly extended her hand
to her sister. Effie was just within the distance that she could seize it
with both hers, press it to her mouth, cover it with kisses, and bathe it
in tears, with the fond devotion that a Catholic would pay to a guardian
saint descended for his safety; while Jeanie, hiding her own face with
her other hand, wept bitterly. The sight would have moved a heart of
stone, much more of flesh and blood. Many of the spectators shed tears,
and it was some time before the presiding Judge himself could so far
subdue his emotion as to request the witness to compose herself, and the
prisoner to forbear those marks of eager affection, which, however
natural, could not be permitted at that time, and in that presence.

The solemn oath,--"the truth to tell, and no truth to conceal, as far as
she knew or should be asked," was then administered by the Judge "in the
name of God, and as the witness should answer to God at the great day of
judgment;" an awful adjuration, which seldom fails to make impression
even on the most hardened characters, and to strike with fear even the
most upright.