'

"So she fetched me a silver plate half filled with salt, and I laid it
on the corpse; 'and now,' I said, 'we must have rue and marjoram, run
down and get me some;' and then I frightened her, poor fool as she was,
by telling her that by the limpness of the hand of the corpse, I augured
another death very soon in the house."

"When I told this to Rebecca, the creature was so frightened, that away
she ran, leaving me in the room with the body. Swift as thought,"
continued the woman, "I caught the silver dish, and was running down
stairs,--it was gloaming--when I saw a door open opposite the chamber of
death, and there, in the glimmering, I saw the child of the family
asleep in a little crib. She had on her usual dress, with the ornaments
I spoke of, and seemed to have fallen asleep before her time, as she was
not undressed. I caught her up, asleep as she was, and the next moment I
was out in the yard, and across the court, and through the back-door,
and away over the common, and to where I knew that none would follow me,
but they of my people, who would help my flight."

"And the child with you," said Salmon, "did you take the child?"

"More I will not tell," added the woman; "no, nor more shall any
tortures force from me, unless you bind yourselves not to prosecute
me,--unless you promise me my liberty."

"I have told you," said the Laird, "that if you tell every thing you
shall be free,--do you question my truth?"

"No, Dymock," said the vagrant; "I know you to be a man of truth, and
in that dependence you shall hear all."

"I stripped the child of her gaudery, I wrapped her in rags, and I slung
her on my back; but I did her no harm, and many a weary mile I bore her,
till I came to the moor; and then, because she was a burden, and because
the brand on her shoulder would assuredly identify her, if suspicion
fell on me for having stolen her, I left her in the old blacksmith's
shed, and there she found a better father than you would have made her;
for what are you but a wicked Jew, with a heart as hard as the gold
you love."

The fixed, and almost stone-like attitude in which the old man stood for
some moments after his understanding had admitted the information given
by the vagrant, so drew the attention of all present, that there was not
a sound heard in the room, every one apprehending that the next moment
they should see him drop down dead, nor did any one know what was best
to do next; but this moment of te