a candid account of the
manner in which I became possessed of the notes; but my explanation did
not appear to meet much credit: the magistrate, to whom I have in
particular alluded, asked, why I had not at once stated the fact of my
having received a fourth note; and the agent, though in a very quiet
tone, observed that he could not help thinking it somewhat strange that I
should have changed a note of so much value for a perfect stranger, even
supposing that he had purchased my horses, and had paid me their value in
hard cash; and I noticed that he laid a particular emphasis on the last
words. I might have observed that I was an inexperienced young man, who
meaning no harm myself, suspected none in others, but I was confused,
stunned, and my tongue seemed to cleave to the roof of my mouth. The men
who had taken my horses to Horncastle, and for whom I had sent, as they
lived close at hand, now arrived, but the evidence which they could give
was anything but conclusive in my favour; they had seen me in company
with an individual at Horncastle, to whom by my orders they had delivered
certain horses, but they had seen no part of the money transaction; the
fellow, whether from design or not, having taken me aside into a retired
place, where he had paid me the three spurious notes, and induced me to
change the fourth, which throughout the affair was what bore most
materially against me. How matters might have terminated I do not know,
I might have been committed to prison, and I might have been--. Just
then, when I most needed a friend, and least expected to find one, for
though amongst those present there were several who were my neighbours,
and who had professed friendship for me, none of them when they saw that
I needed support and encouragement came forward to yield me any, but, on
the contrary, appeared by their looks to enjoy my terror and
confusion--just then a friend entered the room in the person of the
surgeon of the neighbourhood, the father of him who has attended you; he
was not on very intimate terms with me, but he had occasionally spoken to
me, and had attended my father in his dying illness, and chancing to hear
that I was in trouble, he now hastened to assist me. After a short
preamble, in which he apologized to the bench for interfering, he begged
to be informed of the state of the case, whereupon the matter was laid
before him in all its details. He was not slow in taking a fair view of
it, and spoke