t the manse, I had set out on my
way to Rosehall. The meeting betwixt the foster-father and the child
was, of course, exceedingly affecting. Investigations into the whole
matter were renewed, but no other way could be thought of for accounting
for the presence of the missing property in Phebe's locked trunk, than
the supposition which implied her guilt.

"I could stake my life, my salvation," said I, "on Phebe's innocence."
But Lord D---- doubted; his Lady could not have believed it possible;
but still there were, she said, similar cases on record--one, quite in
point, had just occurred in her neighbourhood, where the guilty party
had, up to the dishonest act, borne a very high character. The circuit
trial came on in about ten days, and Phebe, accompanied by the minister,
and the best legal advice, was seated at the bar on her trial. Witnesses
were examined, who swore that they saw the trunk opened, and Lady
D----'s property discovered; others, particularly the lady's maid, swore
that she all along suspected Phebe, from seeing her always shutting, and
often locking her door inside. She once looked through the key-hole, and
saw Phebe busied with her trunk; she saw something in her hand that
sparkled. Phebe had no exculpatory evidence but her simple averment that
she knew not how the articles came there--she never brought them. The
king's advocate having restricted the sentence, and the jury having
brought in unanimously a verdict of guilty, the judge was on the point
of pronouncing a sentence of banishment, when the poor pannel fainted.
It was a most affecting scene to hear the sentence of banishment
pronounced over a piece of insensate clay. All wept--even the judge; and
Phebe was carried out of court, apparently quite dead.

Next morning I was found sitting with a cheerful countenance by Phebe's
couch, in the prison-house. I had good news I said to impart to her:--

"The girl who has been the principal witness against you, has been
suddenly seized, during the night, with an excruciating and evidently
fatal disease; in the agonies of death she has confessed to me, and in
the presence of Lady D---- too, that she had sworn to a lie; that she
herself with her own hand, and by means of a false key, placed the
articles--which she had originally stolen with the view of retaining
them--in your chest. This she had done from jealousy, having observed
that her lover, the gardener's son, had fixed his affections upon you."

All