l satisfy you, that I cannot be the object either of your suspicion
or your enmity."

"But, my dear sir," replied Sir Robert, "the nobleman you mention is
a suspected man himself, and I have reported him as such to the
Government. He is married to a Popish wife, and you are a seminary
priest and harbored by her and her husband."

"But what is your object in stopping and surrounding me," asked the
priest, "as if I were some public delinquent who had violated the laws?
Allow me, sir, to pass, and prevent me at your peril; and permit me,
before I proceed, to ask your name?" and the old man's eyes flashed with
an indignant sense of the treatment he was receiving.

"Did you ever hear of Sir Robert Whitecraft?"

"The priest-hunter, the persecutor, the robber, the murderer? I did,
with disgust, with horror, with execration. If you are he, I say to you
that I am, as you see, an old man, and a priest, and have but one life;
take it, you will anticipate my death only by a short period; but I look
by the light of an innocent conscience into the future, and I now tell
you that a woful and a terrible retribution is hanging over your head."

"In the meantime," said Sir Robert, very calmly, as he dismounted from
his horse, which he desired one of the men to hold. "I have a warrant
from Government to arrest you, and send you back again to your own
country without delay. You are here as a spy, an incendiary, and must
go on your travels forthwith. In this, I am acting as your friend and
protector, and so is Government, who do not wish to be severe upon you,
as you are not a natural subject. See sir, here is another warrant
for your arrest and imprisonment. The fact is, it was left to my own
discretion, either to imprison you, or send you out of the country. Now,
sir, from a principle of lenity, I am determined on the latter course."

"But," replied the priest, after casting his eye over both documents,
"as I am conscious of no offence, either against your laws or your
Government, I decline to fly like a criminal, and I will not; put me in
prison, if you wish, but I certainly shall not criminate myself, knowing
as I do that I am innocent. In the meantime, I request that you will
accompany me to the castle of my patron, that I may acquaint him with
the charges against me, and the cause of my being forced to leave his
family for a time."

"No, sir," replied Whitecraft, "I cannot do so, unless I betray the
trust which Government repos