wn--my limbs were conscious of their
freedom--my spirit felt its liberty--what hindered instant flight? In
the midst of my reverie Dr Mayhew entered the room--and I remember
distinctly that my immediate impulse was to leave the two friends
together, and to run as fast as love could urge and feet could carry
me--to the favoured spot which held all that I cared for now on earth.
The plans, however, of Doctor Mayhew interfered with this desire. He had
done much for me, more than I knew, and he was not the man to go without
his payment. A long evening was yet before us, time enough for a hundred
jokes, which I must hear, and witness, and applaud or I was most
unworthy of the kindness he had shown me. The business over for which Mr
Fairman had come expressly, the promise given of an early visit to the
parsonage on the following day, an affectionate parting at the garden
gate, and the incumbent proceeded on his homeward road. The doctor and I
returned together to the house in silence and one of us in partial fear;
for I could see the coming sarcasm in the questionable smile that played
about his lips. Not a word was spoken when we resumed our seats. At last
he rang the bell, and Williams answered it----

"Book Mr Stukely by the London coach to-morrow, Williams," said the
master; "he _positively must and will depart to-morrow_."

The criminal reprieved--the child, hopeless and despairing at the
suffering parent's bed, and blessed at length with a firm promise of
amendment and recovery, can tell the feelings that sustained my
fluttering heart, beating more anxiously the nearer it approached its
_home_. I woke that morning with the lark--yes, ere that joyous bird had
spread its wing, and broke upon the day with its mad note--and I left
the doctor's house whilst all within were sleeping. There was no rest
for me away from that abode, whose gates of adamant, with all their bars
and fastenings, one magic word had opened--whose sentinels were
withdrawn--whose terrors had departed. The hours were all too long until
I claimed my newfound privilege. Morn of the mellow summer, how
beautiful is thy birth! How soft--how calm--how breathlessly and
blushingly thou stealest upon a slumbering world! fearful, as it seems,
of startling it. How deeply quiet, and how soothing, are thy earliest
sounds--scarce audible--by no peculiar quality distinguishable, yet
thrilling and intense! How doubly potent falls thy witching influence on
him whose spi