sh."

"Then it must go to Sally Rocliffe. There is no other relation."

This was now the great trouble of Mehetabel. She had accepted the
inevitable, that wrong judgment would be pronounced, and that she
would be hung. Then the thought that her little darling would be
placed under the charge of the woman who had embittered her married
life, the woman who believed her to be guilty of murder,--this
was more than she could endure.

She had passed completely from confidence that her innocence would
be acknowledged and that she would at once be released, a condition
in which she had rested previous to her appearance before the
magistrates at Godalming, into the reverse state, she accepted,
now that she was in prison, awaiting her trial, as a certainty that
she would be condemned and sentenced to the gallows.

This frame of mind in which she was affected the jailer's wife, and
made her suppose that Mehetabel was guilty of the crime wherewith
she was charged.

All Mehetabel's thoughts and schemings were directed towards the
disposal of her child and its welfare after she was taken from it.
All the struggle within her torn heart was to reconcile herself to
the parting, and to have faith in Providence that her child would
be cared for when she was removed.

How that could be she saw not; and she came at length to hope that
when she was taken away the poor little orphan babe would follow
her. In that thought she found more comfort than in the anticipation
of its living, ill-treated by its aunt, and brought up to be
ashamed of its mother.

"You say," said Mehetabel to the jaileress, "that they don't hang
women in chains now. I am glad of that. But where will I be buried?
Do you think it could be contrived that if my baby were to die at
some time after me it might be laid at my side? That is the only
thing I now desire--and that--oh! I think I could be happy if I
were promised that."

CHAPTER XLVII.

BEFORE THE JUDGE.

Previous to the Assizes, Joe Filmer arrived in Kingston in a trap
drawn by old Clutch. He was admitted into the prison on his
expressing his desire to see Mehetabel.

After the first salutations were passed, Joe proceeded to business.
"You see, Matabel," said he, "the master don't want you to think
he won't help you out o' this little mess you've got into. But he
don't want Polly to know it. The master, he's won'erful under that
young woman's--I can't say thumb, but say her big toe. So if he