that is more than any one has said these many years! Forgive me, young woman; but in your face I see over again the good angel that delivered Peter from his dungeon, and it is a blessing to my eyes to look upon one like you. I am not mad, young lady; indeed I am not. Nay, do not shrink. I would dash this head against the wall sooner than dream of injury to you. I had a wife once at your age: your youth brings her back again, till I could think she had come from heaven to plead for me! I have been here twenty winters,-I have given up all my land and money-everything but life-for liberty, and have still been basely deceived! Now do not, for the love of God and of justice! do not doubt me. I am not mad. I never was. I was stolen from my home, and from my daughter-a child—a little child."

Fanny's brain grew dizzy. She clung to her companion for support.

"Let us go, my dear," said Mrs. Rowel. You cannot bear it. James, why do you talk so?"

"I will not go!" cried Fanny eagerly, and struggling hard to rally herself. "Tell me your name-your name!" added she, addressing the captive.

"Woodruff!" cried the poor prisoner.

Fanny's glazing eyes were fixed on him for an instant, she sprung forwards with a shriek, and fell at full length on the ground, and, as though dead, at his feet!

Mrs. Rowel, and the unfortunate James Woodruff, stood equally astonished. The latter attempted to raise Fanny: he could not-his arms were bound-and he laughed. But the next instant, as he requested the mistress of the mansion to do so, he stooped over the insensible body before him, and burst into a flood of tears.

"Who is she?" he demanded. "What soul of beauty is it?” "I do not know, James," replied the lady; "she is a stranger to

me."

"Would that I could touch her cheek with my finger!" said Woodruff. "She is good-good indeed!"

In the mean time, Robson had answered the call of Mrs. Rowel, and come to her assistance.

"Carry her into the house. Or, stay, fetch water," said the lady; "she had better be recovered here," and Robson was accordingly despatched for a glass of water, with which he soon returned. It was applied to her lips, and partially sprinkled on her forehead. After a time she began to recover; she opened her eyes, looked round, and spoke.

"Where is he?"

"Here! I am here, young lady," replied Woodruff, as he looked her earnestly in the face to fix her attention. "What of me?"

66

My father!" exclaimed Fanny, as she again sunk into a state of insensibility.

"Father!" repeated Woodruff,-" my father! I her father! She my daughter!" He strove to wrench his arms free to clasp her to his bosom, but again he could not.

"Take her away, Robson," said the lady of the house. "What does all this mean? Take her away !-take her away!"

And Fanny was carried back by the strong man to the room into which she had at first been introduced; while James Woodruff re

mained standing upon that spot, gazing on that ground where his child had lain, as though the great world contained in it no other place which, even to him, deserved for a moment to be looked upon.

CHAPTER IX.

Is so very necessary between the eighth and tenth, that it could not possibly be dispensed with.

WHEN Fanny was sufficiently recovered, the lady of the house questioned her very particularly upon the circumstances that had occurred, and exhibited a great deal of laudable curiosity to be fully enlightened touching the mystery that had been enacted before her. The young woman would fain have kept it to herself; but too much had already passed in the presence of Mrs. Rowel to render such a line of conduct altogether practicable. Nevertheless, it was not until a faithful promise of secresy had been made on the part of the doctor's wife, that Fanny was induced to communicate to her so much of her story as was needful to render something like an intelligible whole. In this account she omitted any mention of the source from whence the information respecting her father had been obtained; and also forebore making the most distant allusion to the death of her late master, or to the part which she secretly believed the doctor had taken in that

event.

The lady listened to her narrative with great admiration, and when it was concluded, seized both her hands in an affectionate manner, and exclaimed,

"Then, my dear, you are my niece:-the doctor is your own uncle, for your mother and he were brother and sister."

This information, as may be readily supposed, astonished Fanny, though it did not affect her so much as the discovery of her father made just before. She thought of her own uncle being a murderer; — she regretted ever having mentioned the subject to Colin, and resolved never to allude to it again before any one. She dreaded the very thought that, bad as he was, her own uncle should owe to her his degradation, and an ignominious death on a public scaffold. The thought of all this she could not endure; and, in order to avert the possibility of danger from any unexpected quarter, she now begged of the doctor's wife to hide from her husband the fact that she had discovered her father in those cells, lest it might lead to a still worse danger, the bare possibility of which she dreaded to think upon. Mrs. Rowel not only promised to do all this, - a promise which eventually she fulfilled, but also gave Fanny the fullest assurance that she would exercise her utmost endeavours in the attempt to prevail upon her husband to set James Woodruff at liberty. For all this Fanny returned her most heartfelt thanks, and then took her leave.

For some time afterwards she could take no rest, no food, think of nothing in the world save her father. She felt eager to see Colin, and inform him of what had occurred, but found it impossible to do so until some few days after, when she took the opportunity afforded by a Sunday afternoon to hasten over to Whinmoor.

As she passed down the fields, she felt fearful of again encountering Miss Sowersoft, and tried to plan several little ways for seeing Colin

unknown to her. In the midst of her reveries she suddenly beheld old George sauntering along the hedge-side, with his hands on his back, and a bit of hawthorn blossom stuck in the button-hole of his coat. To him Fanny applied; and as the old man most readily undertook to execute her wishes, she waited in the fields until he sent Colin out to meet her. Together, then, they slowly traversed the fields, while Fanny detailed her extraordinary story, and listen. ed with additional wonder to that which the youth in turn related respecting his adventure at Kiddal Hall, and the great assistance which, in consequence, the Squire had promised to afford him. This mightily revived Fanny's hopes; for in the person of Mr. Lupton she fancied she now saw one who would aid in the liberation of her father.

But Colin somewhat clouded these fair visions when, after some thought, he told her that, as, in consequence of Mr. Lupton being from home so long, it would be impossible to communicate the matter to him, he would not wait until the time was passed, and leave her father in such a horrible place so much longer, but would try a plan of his own contrivance for effecting his liberation.

Having explained his scheme, and succeeded in quieting Fanny's distrust as to its execution, Colin bade her farewell, and promised to see her again in a few days.

CHAPTER X.

Plot and counter-plot.-The difference between two sides of the same question curiously illustrated.

As Mrs. Rowel very strictly kept her word with Fanny, and con trived to evade telling the doctor any portion of the discovery that had been made, that gentleman remained in the happy belief that his project to convince his niece of the deceased lawyer's falsehood had entirely succeeded James Woodruff was therefore allowed to spend the day out of his cell, as usual.

Early one morning, shortly after the interview between himself and his daughter already recorded, he was pacing mechanically up and down the yard, revolving in his agitated and confused mind the inexplicable doubts attending all that had recently occurred, when he was momentarily startled from his revery by observing something white skim above the wall, making a seeming pause in the air, and then fall to the ground within his inclosure. Woodruff advanced towards it, and beheld a piece of paper folded up like a letter. He eagerly stooped to pick it up; but his arms were bound in that accursed ligature, which made him more helpless than a child. He threw himself wildly on the ground, and gathered it up with his mouth; still he had no hands to open it. He looked angrily round, but could not discover anything that might aid him. He placed it between his knees;-the attempt failed, and the little packet dropped again to the ground. Again he gathered it up, and rose to his feet; he placed it against the wall, and with tongue and lips contrived after much trouble to force it open. Again he sat on the ground, placed it on his knee, and read as follows:

"The young woman who came to see you is your own daughter, Frances Woodruff. Be of good heart, as she is making all possible exertions to liberate you. In order to effect this, it is necessary that

yard until ten

you contrive some pretext for staying out in your o'clock at night, or later, on the third night after this. If you should not succeed, then try each night afterwards successively until you do succeed. You will then see a head over the north-east corner of the wall of the yard where the yew-tree stands, and opposite the thickest part of the east plantation. Wait in the corner beneath, and a ropeladder will be let down, by which you can climb to the top and escape. This is written by your daughter's friend, Colin Clink, who will do his best to get you out; so do not be afraid of being betrayed.

"Fanny has seen this, and she prays God night and day that you will be able to agree to it. Do not be afraid, as Colin is sure to come (happen what may, short of death) at the time appointed. The third night, mind,—or any night after, at ten o'clock."

Poor James could scarcely believe his eyes. He almost doubted at first whether he was not at length really growing insane, and whether the circumstances which he fancied had so recently occurred were not mental delusions, consequent on his burning desire to be at liberty. Could it indeed be possible that the glorious hour was so near at hand?—that his daughter was alive?-that he had seen her, -a beautiful young woman, like what his own wife was when first he took her to his home;-that she was aiding him once more to tread the earth free?—that he might again have a home,-be revenged on the man who so cruelly wronged him, and, once more reinstated in his house at Charnwood, enjoy that greatest of ail earthly blessings, a father's pride in the beauty, the virtue, and the heroism of his child?

These thoughts were almost more than he could bear, and he wept aloud, as he mentally offered up a prayer of gratitude to Heaven for all its goodness to him.

Afterwards in order to prevent the possibility of any discovery, he tore up the letter into the most minute fragments with his teeth, and buried them in a hole which he made with his foot, near the trunk of the old yew-tree. Nevertheless he was not safe. There were enemies without, of whom he knew nothing, and treachery was at work to undermine Colin's project.

It was stated some few pages back that Fanny and Colin were sauntering in the fields on the old farm at Whinmoor, when the former related her discoveries at Nabbfield, and the latter explained to her the plan he had formed for assisting her father to escape. Now, at the time when he was earnestly engaged in doing this, Miss Maria Sowersoft was standing behind an adjacent hedge, having stealthily crept there with her shoes off, in order to gratify a certain irrepressible curiosity to know what object Fanny could have in coming so far to see Colin, old George having announced her arrival. Although Colin frequently, and very fortunately, spoke in too low a voice for Miss Sowersoft to catch the meaning of the projected attempt, and also mentioned so few of the details of his plan, that she could scarcely make head or tail of it; yet so much reached her attentive ear as sufficed to form in her mind the ground-work of some very horrible suspicions of Colin's honesty. The great fertility of her genius in matters of this description soon enabled her to make out, from the broken discourse she had heard, that Colin was no better than a thief, and that he actually meditated committing a bur.

glary upon the premises of Dr. Rowel some night in the course of the ensuing week; while Fanny was doing neither more nor less than aiding and abetting him in his nefarious attempt. But as her information was not of a sufficiently positive kind to justify her in acquainting the constable, and getting him immediately apprehended, she came to the conclusion that Dr. Rowel ought at least to be put upon his guard, in order that he might station proper watchmen in his neigh. bourhood to seize the culprit whenever he might make his appear. ance. This matter also afforded such an excellent opportunity for her to revenge herself upon Fanny for what she had formerly said before the doctor's face, on the occasion of Colin's illness, that she could not think by any means of allowing it to slip by. Accordingly, some time before the night arrived which Colin had appointed for his trial, the amiable Miss Sowersoft might have been seen marching with important step up the gardens of the doctor's establishment, with the serious and great intention of communicating to that gentleman in person some hints of the imminent danger that threatened his property.

On her introduction to him, she announced the object of her visit in the following manner.

"It is a most unpleasant thing to me, Dr. Rowel, to have to call upon you on such a case of secresy as the present. You are aware, doctor, that I have a boy about me over at the farm—”

Yes, yes," interrupted the doctor, "I know him well. thorpe, you mean.”

Pale.

"Oh no, sir!-oh no!-not him-by no means. He is a middle. aged man, and a very honest one too. No, no. I mean the boy that you attended a while ago-Colin Clink. That boy, sir, I am sorry to say, is as vicious and bad a character as ever crossed a threshold. I am sure, if he escapes the gallows at last, it will only be because he was born to be drowned. He has been hatching mischief of one sort or another every day since he came into the world, and now he has got to such a pitch-"

Here Miss Sowersoft bent her head towards the doctor, and whispered during the space of ten minutes, in so low a voice that nobody save the doctor himself could catch a word of what was said.

"Miss Sowersoft, you amaze me!" exclaimed the doctor.

"I assure you, doctor, "she reiterated, "I believe every word I have said is as true as that you sit there."

The doctor thanked Miss Sowersoft for her information, assured her two or three times over that he would make the best use of it, and very politely ended the conference by wishing her good morning.

Never, I verily believe, did any mischief-maker on the face of this pleasant earth feel a greater degree of self-satisfaction than did Miss Sowersoft, as she returned to Whinmoor. What revenge should she not take, when Colin was caught in the very fact of housebreaking, and when Fanny could be immediately involved in the same crime! The thought was so inspiriting, that she tripped along with a degree of briskness which would have induced any one who did not see her face to believe her at least twenty years the junior of herself.