t it before the rest
whom she was going to impeach; perhaps she wished to see how they liked
it before she tasted it herself; and all the rest were poisoned, and one
died, and there was a precious outcry, and the woman cried loudest of
all; and she said, 'It was my death was sought for; I know the man, and
I'll be revenged.' And then the Poknees {254a} spoke to her and said,
'Where can we find him?' and she said, 'I am awake to his motions; three
weeks from hence, the night before the full moon, at such and such an
hour, he will pass down such a lane with such a man.'"

"Well," said I, "and what did the Poknees do?"

"Do, brother! sent for a plastramengro {254b} from Bow Street, quite
secretly, and told him what the woman had said; and the night before the
full moon, the plastramengro went to the place which the juwa {255a}had
pointed out, all alone, brother; and in order that he might not be too
late, he went two hours before his time. I know the place well, brother,
where the plastramengro placed himself behind a thick holly tree, at the
end of a lane, where a gate leads into various fields, through which
there is a path for carts and horses. The lane is called the dark lane
by the Gorgios, being much shaded by trees. So the plastramengro placed
himself in the dark lane behind the holly tree; it was a cold February
night, dreary though; the wind blew in gusts, and the moon had not yet
risen, and the plastramengro waited behind the tree till he was tired,
and thought he might as well sit down; so he sat down, and was not long
in falling to sleep, and there he slept for some hours; and when he awoke
the moon had risen, and was shining bright, so that there was a kind of
moonlight even in the dark lane; and the plastramengro pulled out his
watch, and contrived to make out that it was just two hours beyond the
time when the men should have passed by. Brother, I do not know what the
plastramengro thought of himself, but I know, brother, what I should have
thought of myself in his situation. I should have thought, brother, that
I was a drowsy scoppelo, {255b} and that I had let the fellow pass by
whilst I was sleeping behind a bush. As it turned out, however, his
going to sleep did no harm, but quite the contrary: just as he was going
away, he heard a gate slam in the direction of the fields, and then he
heard the low stumping of horses, as if on soft ground, for the path in
those fields is generally soft, and at tha