years. Few
children, born or reared in that county thirty, or even
five-and-twenty years ago, who were not occasionally frightened into
'being good,' and going to sleep, and not crying when left alone in
the dark, by _huggath a' Pooka_, or, 'here's Lady Betty.' The only
fragment of her history which we have been able to collect is, that
she was a person of violent temper, though in manners rather above the
common, and possessing some education. It was said that she was a
native of the County Kerry, and that by her harsh usage she drove her
only son from her at an early age. He enlisted; but, in course of
years, returned with some money in his pocket, the result of his
campaigning. He knocked at his father's door, and asked a night's
lodging, determined to see for himself whether the brutal mother he
had left had in any way repented, or was softened in her disposition,
before he would reveal himself. He was admitted, but not recognised.
The mother, discovering that he possessed some money, murdered him
during the night. The crime was discovered, and the wretched woman
sentenced to be hanged, along with the usual dockful of
sheep-stealers, Whiteboys, shop-lifters, and cattle-houghers, who, to
the amount of seven or eight at a time, were invariably 'turned off'
within four-and-twenty hours after their sentences at each assizes. No
executioner being at hand, time pressing, and the sheriff and his
deputy being men of refinement, education, humanity, and sensibility,
who could not be expected to fulfil the office which they had
undertaken--and for which one of them, at least, was paid--this
wretched woman, being the only person in the jail who could be found
to perform the office, consented; and under the name of Lady Betty,
officiated, unmasked and undisguised, as _hangwoman_ for a great
number of years after; and she used also to flog publicly in the
streets, as a part of her trade. Numerous are the tales related of her
exploits, which we have now no desire to dwell upon. We may, however,
mention one extraordinary trait of her character. She was in the habit
of drawing, with a burnt stick, upon the walls of her apartment,
portraits of all the persons she executed.

THE WILL AND THE WAY.

I learned grammar when I was a private soldier on the pay of
sixpence a day. The edge of my berth, or that of my guard-bed, was my
seat to study in; my knapsack was my bookcase, and a bit of board lying
in my lap was my writing-t