destruction. I shall never forget his first look of horror and
astonishment. Had a spectre risen up, arrayed in all the terrors of the
prison-house, he could not have exhibited more appalling symptoms of
unmitigated despair. He shuddered audibly. It was the very crisis of his
agony. A portentous silence ensued. Some minutes elapsed before it was
interrupted. Mr L---- was the first to break so disagreeable a pause.

"Mr S----, it is useless to carry on this scene of duplicity: neither
party would be benefited by it. _You have forged that deed!_ We have
sufficient evidence of your attempt to destroy this document I now hold,
in the very mansion which your unhallowed hands would, but for the
direct interposition of Providence, have levelled with the dust. On one
condition, and on one only, your conduct shall be concealed from the
knowledge of your fellow-men. The eye of Providence alone has hitherto
tracked the tortuous course of your villany. On one condition, I say,
the past is for ever concealed from the eye of the world." Another
pause. My uncle groaned in the agony of his spirit. Had his heart's
blood been at stake, he could not have evinced a greater reluctance than
he now showed at the thoughts of relinquishing his ill-gotten wealth.

"What is it?"

"Destroy with your own hands that forged testimony of your guilt. Your
nephew does not wish to bring an old man's grey hairs to an ignominious
grave."

He took the deed, and, turning aside his head, committed it to the
flames. He appeared to breathe more freely when it was consumed; but the
struggle had been too severe even for his unyielding frame, iron-bound
though it seemed. As he turned trembling from the hearth, he sank into
his chair, threw his hands over his face, and groaned deeply. The next
moment he fixed his eyes steadily on me. A glassy brightness suddenly
shot over them; a dimness followed like the shadows of death. He held
out his hand; his head bowed; and he bade adieu to the world and its
interests for ever!

CLITHEROE CASTLE;

OR,

THE LAST OF THE LACIES.

"By that painful way they pass
Forth to an hill that was both steep and high;
On top whereof a sacred chapel was,
And eke a little hermitage thereby."

--SPENSER'S _Fairy Queen_.

Clitheroe, _the hill ly the-waters_, the ancient seat of the Lacies,
carries back the mind to earlier periods and events--to a rude and
barbarous age--where justice was dispensed, an