f the same pitfalls, with
our faces set towards the same precipice--slipping, fainting,
experiencing agonies together. She knew my secret, and I, alas! knew
hers. So I interpreted this intolerable, overwhelming blush.

Recoiling from the prospect, I buried my face in my hands, and so missed
the surprising sight of this young girl, still in her teens, conquering a
dismay which might well unnerve one of established years and untold
experiences. In a few minutes, as I was afterward told by my friends, her
features had settled into a strange placidity, undisturbed by the
levelled gaze of a hundred eyes. Her whole attention was concentrated on
her brother, and wavered only, when the duties of the occasion demanded a
recognition of the various gentlemen concerned in the trial.

Mr. Moffat prefaced his examination by the following words:

"May it please your Honour, I wish to ask the indulgence of the court in
my examination of this witness. She is just recovering from a long and
dangerous illness; and while I shall endeavour to keep within the rules
of examination, I shall be grateful for any consideration which may be
shown her by your Honour and by the counsel on the other side."

Mr. Fox at once rose. He had by this time recovered from his astonishment
at seeing before him, and in a fair state of health, the young girl whom
he had every reason to believe to be still in a condition of partial
forgetfulness at Lakewood, and under the care of a woman entirely in his
confidence and under his express orders. He had also mastered his chagrin
at the triumph which her presence here, and under these dramatic
circumstances, had given his adversary. Moved, perhaps, by Miss
Cumberland's beauty, which he saw for the first time--or, perhaps, by the
spectacle of this beauty devoting its first hours of health to an attempt
to save a brother, of whose precarious position before the law she had
been ignorant up to this time--or more possibly yet, by a fear that it
might be bad tactics to show harshness to so interesting a personality
before she had uttered a word of testimony, he expressed in warmer tones
than usual, his deep desire to extend every possible indulgence.

Mr. Moffat bowed his acknowledgments, and waited for his witness to take
the oath, which she did with a simple grace which touched all hearts,
even that of her constrained and unreconciled brother. Compelled by the
silence and my own bounding pulses to look at her in my o