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 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 J. CORDY JEAFFRESON. 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 " NOVELS AND NOVELISTS," " CREWE RISE,' 
 
 ETC. ETC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS, 
 SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN, 
 
 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 
 
 1859. 
 
 , The tight of Translation is reserved.
 
 LONDON : 
 
 R. BORN, PRINTER, GLOUCESTER STREET, PARK STREET, 
 
 REGENT'S PARK.
 
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 TO MY READERS, — 
 
 Doubtless every reader of this 
 work, either at the outset, before commenc- 
 ing the first chapter, or during his pro- 
 gress through my confessions and remini- 
 scences, or at the end, while passing judgment 
 on the selfishness, vain-glory, vindictiveness, 
 and general moral turpitude of my nature, 
 will inquire what my object is in publishing 
 revelations so painful, and, in many instances, 
 so little to my credit. Such a question will 
 
 VOL. T. B
 
 2 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 be put solely for the sake of information 
 — when is a question asked for any other 
 purpose ? — and such curiosity will be laudable, 
 — curiosity, I believe, always is. It is there- 
 fore only meet and proper in me to spare my 
 friends the trouble of searching out a suffi- 
 cient motive to account for my conduct, and 
 to save them from the danger and temptation 
 of attributing a mean one to me. We all of 
 us have an object in view whenever we act. 
 In this generous and uncalculating age we 
 never perfect a thought, or take a step, or 
 stir our bodies, without having our eyes 
 strained towards an end — and our ends, as 
 our consciences can attest, are invariably 
 noble and praiseworthy. 
 
 But, unfortunately for the curious, I cannot 
 in the most secret recess of my heart — and 
 of course in that sacred apartment it is im- 
 possible for chicanery, or self-deception, or 
 humbug of any kind to find place — detect
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 6 
 
 any passion or sentiment, grand or disreput- 
 able, which I can honestly point to as a sole 
 or contributory cause of my singular beha- 
 viour. It is not for distinction that I write, 
 for notoriety is the atmosphere that I have 
 breathed for more than a quarter of a century, 
 and am so sick of that I would gladly exchange 
 my lot for the monotonous experiences of a 
 country rector's wife. It is not for fame and 
 praise — why should I want them, since I have 
 bought them daily, for many a year, with 
 dinners, and guineas, and smiles ? It is not 
 for the sake of contradicting the prejudices, 
 and disturbing the self-love of my weaker 
 companions in the great wide-world madhouse, 
 — why should I want to annoy them, poor 
 things ? they never did me a kindness ! 
 Neither do I publish for money — artists 
 never do ; — or for love — I have outlived it 
 in myself and all care for it in others; — or 
 from caprice — as an English gentlewoman, I 
 
 B 2
 
 4 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 am above it. I don't want to elevate my 
 kind, for the human race appears to me quite 
 good enough ; and, now that so much has been 
 done for it in the way of slave emancipation, 
 peace societies, model lodging-houses, educa- 
 tion, free-trade, and reform bills, I, for one, 
 am of opinion that everything has been done 
 which it was ever possible to do, and that 
 nothing will make it better. On the other 
 hand, I do not aim at degrading my fellow- 
 creatures, or rendering them in any way more 
 wretched than they are at present, as the 
 result of a long and careful observation of 
 them, in all ranks and shades of condition, is 
 a firm conviction that it is beyond human 
 power to add to their wretchedness. 
 
 I have written, and I now publish, for the 
 simple reason that I have been, and am, 
 powerless over myself, and merely obeying 
 a steady, unvarying, irresistible, obscurely- 
 shrouded impulse. It has not given me either
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 5 
 
 pleasure or ease to write, and to publish affords 
 me no satisfaction ; as my pen has traced the 
 lines, I have endured some of the sharpest 
 anguish that has visited my chequered life, 
 and it is without one sensation of joy or hope 
 that I give my work to the world. I know 
 well what I lay myself open to by this last 
 step — the censures, the compassion, the scan- 
 dal ! I shall be condemned, — there are so 
 many good people who will feel a duty to 
 condemn. I shall be pitied, — commiseration is 
 so plentiful and mercy so fashionable. Then, 
 too, the delicacy, and refinement, and aesthetic 
 sensibility, which will feel themselves at- 
 tacked, and will respond in their various 
 delicate, and refined, and altogether exemplary 
 strains ! How severe will wives, whose hus- 
 bands are neither mad nor felons, be on me ! 
 And how sternly will murder be judged by 
 gentle creatures who are too good Christians 
 to love their children better than their own
 
 6 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 souls! But it matters not. Let the storm 
 come. At least, the book that now leaves my 
 keeping has been written — I will not say 
 honestly, for that word has grown to mean so 
 many things that it now signifies nothing — 
 has been written to the best of my ability, 
 and contains no lies.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MY ENTRANCE INTO LIFE. 
 
 I AM ignorant of the date of my birth, 
 although to set a proper example to my sex, 
 I invented one for publication some years 
 since in De Brett's Dictionary of the Peerage ; 
 — and if I knew it, I would not honour its 
 anniversary with any expression of joy, for it 
 brought death and shame to her who bore me, 
 sorrow to the honest clown who begot me, 
 and to me a lot in which happiness has by no
 
 8 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 means outweighed trouble and pain. It was 
 well done by those ancients who uttered cries 
 of lamentation when a child was born, and it 
 would give me no slight solace to be able to 
 feel that they were equally wise in giving way 
 to gladness, whenever a child of man was re- 
 moved from this earth of sin and disappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 But there was one day I remember well, 
 and to which I look back with sensations of 
 the profoundest awe, that was the gateway 
 through which I passed from oblivious child- 
 hood into a life of vivid self-consciousness, 
 strange experiences, and startling vicissitudes. 
 This day I have in my inner life — with which 
 no human creature, save one who has long 
 since been in the grave, has meddled — always 
 regarded as that of my nativity. It was the 
 28th day September, in a year now full forty 
 years since. Of it, and the events that imme- 
 diately followed it, I will proceed to speak, and
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 9 
 
 if in some respects I am prolix and tedious in 
 this part of my narrative, I must sue for par- 
 don on the ground that, firstly, it is necessary 
 for all who would become acquainted with my 
 character to have a distinct knowledge of cer- 
 tain early occurrences, that contributed in no 
 ordinary degree to its formation — and, 
 secondly, that so mysterious and powerful an 
 influence has the memory of this day and its 
 consequences had on me, that every petty in- 
 cident and minutest recollection of alarm and 
 suspicion connected with it, I am compelled 
 to regard as of grave importance. 
 
 It was my daily pleasure and duty to feed 
 the hogs in the swine-yard entrusted to my 
 father's care. The piggery was an establish- 
 ment of considerable dimensions, and contained 
 at times not less than a hundred inmates. 
 The crazy sheds, with faggot walls and straw 
 roofs, of which it was composed, stood mid- 
 way up the side of a stiff clay hill that com-
 
 10 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 manded a wide and noble prospect of well- 
 cultivated farms and rich woodland. But 
 though from this exalted situation three 
 villages were within sight, and, to all appear- 
 ance, within hail, it was remote from the habi- 
 tations of man. The nearest cottage to my 
 father's was a mile and a-half distant, and 
 the road leading past the piggery from Ufford 
 on the one side of the hill to Loudham on the 
 other was little frequented, and in wet seasons 
 was almost impassable to any carriages except 
 those used for agricultural purposes. Between 
 the hog-yard and this road lay a small and 
 somewhat neglected garden, which surrounded 
 the wretched clay cabin in which I first saw 
 the light, and had lived up to this 28th of 
 September. 
 
 My father was not the proprietor of the 
 swine or the buildings. He, poor man, was 
 nothing more than the hard-worked, ill-paid, 
 insulted drudge of one Joel Haggart, of whom
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 11 
 
 I shall soon have to make particular mention, 
 and with a few of whose amiable charac- 
 teristics the reader will become acquainted. 
 
 It required a good deal of exertion and 
 adroit management of my physical powers to 
 convey from the swill-tubs the appointed 
 quantity of food to my eager and riotous 
 family of grunters. I was small — not for my 
 age, but from it, for I could have been but 
 little more than twelve years old ; and ere I 
 could get a ladleful of the nauseous culsh, I had 
 to mount a high stool placed by the side of 
 the tubs, and then, ere I could put it into my 
 pail, I had to dismount from the high stool, 
 which eminence had to be ascended again 
 for each separate ladleful; and when the 
 pail was filled, and had been conveyed with 
 much toil to the spot where the pigs were 
 assembled ready to devour it, I had to mount 
 another stool ere I could pour it over the 
 wall of the sties down into the troughs. This
 
 12 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 toil, unfit as it may appear for a child, was to 
 me a real enjoyment ; the intense pride with 
 which I listened to my father's announce- 
 ment that he committed to me the proper 
 discharge of this part of his work, and the 
 gratitude with which I witnessed him put up 
 the long stools of clumsy shape, so that I 
 should be enabled to be of some real use to 
 the world of which I was an insignificant 
 member, were the strongest emotions I ever 
 felt previous to my memorable 28th of Sep- 
 tember. 
 
 On the occasion, however, of the morning 
 of this day, everything went well, and I com- 
 pleted my task in a shorter time than usual. 
 I had given the light wash to the young pigs, 
 the grains, and bones, and heavy roots of 
 vegetables to those somewhat their seniors, 
 and peas, or barley-meal mixed with water, to 
 those that were being fatted (according as 
 their flesh was destined for the tables of the
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 13 
 
 wealthier or the poorer of Joel Haggart's 
 customers), and yet it wanted some few 
 minutes of seven o'clock. I stayed, therefore, 
 a short time, looking at my happy charge. 
 Either those pigs were strangely like human 
 creatures, or I was strangely like a pig ; for 
 they and I had a perfect and mutual under- 
 standing of all we wished for and thought 
 about ; I talked to them, they grunted to me ; 
 and very much they resembled men in their 
 fashion of herding together, amiably enough 
 during their indolent and sleepy moments, and 
 of rising eagerly and rushing forth with 
 clamour, each for himself and every one 
 against his neighbour, on any booty of food 
 that was presented to their appetites. Pos- 
 sibly many of my readers think my old office 
 of swine-tending a very humble and even ig- 
 nominious one; but I have never reflected 
 upon it with any sense of humiliation, or 
 blushed to mention it in the society of nobles
 
 14 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 and princes. It was necessary that the work 
 should be done, and proudly can I say that it 
 was always done well by me ; and as for the 
 lowliness of its character, what more do 
 rulers and great ministers of state spend the 
 glory of their days and the vigour of their 
 intellects in accomplishing ? Do they not per- 
 petually, if they are true and honest men, 
 weary and vex their brains only to feed in the 
 best, and at the same time cheapest, way, in- 
 numerable herds of animals that are merely 
 swine in nature, though not in name ? The 
 time indeed was, when kings and earthly lords 
 strove to protect and advance the welfare of 
 their subject's souls, and made sacred war on 
 all that threatened jeopardy to their eternal 
 salvation; but now, thank God! we have 
 grown wiser, and in the government of men 
 the one grand end in view is to produce and 
 fatten bodies. 
 
 I did not turn from the pig-yard with any
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 15 
 
 such reflections as the foregoing, and yet, 
 God knows, I was very sad at heart. As I 
 passed by and looked in at two empty sties, 
 that had only the day before been vacated by 
 a pair of enormous hogs ready for the 
 butcher's knife, a sense of having lost two 
 old friends, and of the possibility of being 
 bereft of more, took possession of me, and a 
 sudden waft of melancholy robbed me of my 
 accustomed cheerfulness. Immediately I con- 
 ceived a disgust for my occupation ; it was 
 vain and profitless, leading to nothing — but 
 disappointment. 
 
 I walked up the narrow path of the un- 
 tidy garden, went straight through our 
 cottage into what was called the front yard, 
 and having advanced to within six paces of 
 the road, paused before a shaggy, middle- 
 aged man, who stood leaning against the 
 garden gate. He was dressed in the or- 
 dinary costume of " a working man " (strange,
 
 16 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 that in such a work-a-day world as this, 
 working should be despicable) ! greasy fustian 
 coat, red neck-tie, patched corduroy breeches, 
 very old leather gaiters, and hobnailed 
 boots ; he had no hat on his head, the dusty 
 unkempt hair of which was sprinkled with 
 dirty white ; his face, thin and pale, was dis- 
 figured by three days' growth of beard, and 
 his form was bowed by long toil and recent 
 sickness. 
 
 " Little gorl," said this ungainly indi- 
 vidual, addressing me with rough tenderness 
 of voice, but moving no external part of his 
 body save his lips, " the gloom of the cloudy 
 morning has come down on ye, and rests on 
 your eyebrows, scowling like a black dog. 
 Art well ? — ay, thou art well. Art hungry ? 
 — no, say not ye're hungry yet, for we have 
 emptied the locker o' its very dust, and 
 shared the last morsel thegither this very 
 morning an hour and more agone, and by the
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 17 
 
 mercy I hope to have in the next world, and 
 ever have shown to dumb brutes i' this, I 
 know not how to get another loaf this day 
 unless the good woman, Susan Latchett, will 
 stand me in my need about noon/' 
 
 He spoke in the marked provincial dialect 
 of one of our southern counties, but clearly 
 and nervously. 
 
 " I am neither ill nor faint." 
 
 " Glad am I to hear ye, child. Were the 
 last the matter wi' ye, I could not stay your 
 hunger, save with the filth from the swill-pail, 
 and even that it would be robbery for you to 
 take, and so that honest God-fearing wolf, 
 Joel Haggart, would let you know if he 
 caught you making the prodigal son's meal. 
 But why art in the glums ? Has thy work 
 been too hard? and in toiling for thy sick 
 father, have ye got a wring in the small of 
 your slender back ? Tell me, child, and speak 
 out." 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 18 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 "I am not hurt, and there's nought the 
 matter with me," I responded, sullenly. 
 
 The man's brow darkened, and his eye 
 flashed as he scanned me through impatiently. 
 He was an irritable mortal, and a stern one ; 
 many a blow had I received from him, consi- 
 derate and well-intentioned churl as he was, 
 and now I, with reason, trembled, lest he 
 should decide that a sound flogging was the 
 best remedy for my dejection. 
 
 "Not hurt, child, you say — nor hungry, 
 nor ill? Then the sore devil of thy corrupt 
 temper is on you, and you are come to pester 
 me with your sullen looks." 
 
 I saw that the danger of his wrath break- 
 ing out yet more violently was imminent, and 
 I determined to try the strength of a charm in 
 my possession, which only a few days before 
 had calmed him in a fit of passion. By 
 accident, during play, I had discovered that 
 addressing him by his name in a gentle
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 19 
 
 plaintive voice had a strong and softening 
 influence over him. Now was a fine oppor- 
 tunity to test the power of the spell. 
 
 "Koger Copley/' I said, with sedate mea- 
 sured accents, throwing as much feeling as I 
 could command into my words — " I meant no 
 wrong ; I would not grieve you for a single 
 minute, and that you know right well ; 
 surely, though I am small and young, surely 
 it is as pitiful a thing for me to be tearful and 
 spirit-broken as it would be if I were older 
 than you." 
 
 The charm worked quicker than I had 
 dared to hope. Roger Copley raised his 
 hands from his sides ; one he held up with a 
 gesticulation of astonishment and entreaty, 
 and with the other he drew me to him, 
 saying :— 
 
 " Hist, child ! Tis not thou who art 
 speaking — who is it ? who are you ? " 
 
 " Roger Copley, I am your poor little 
 
 c 2
 
 20 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 child. Don't treat me harshly. The sows in 
 the swine-yard don't bite at their young till 
 they are old and strong enough to resent it 
 or get out of the way. I am yours, a part of 
 you — you have often told me so ; but what 
 my body suffers yours doesn't feel, and the 
 pain of my heart, too, is my own, and not 
 yours." 
 
 For a few moments the poor clown clutched 
 me with his horny hands, that trembled as if 
 shaken with the palsy, and then, his knees 
 giving way beneath him, he sunk down 
 sobbing on the bank in which our garden 
 fence grew. 
 
 Soon he grew more composed, and drawing 
 me to him, kissed both my cheeks, and placed 
 me on his knee. 
 
 " I should have thy pardon to beg, little 
 Miriam," he said, mingling his broken sen- 
 tences of rugged sarcasm and deep pathos 
 with many grotesque expressions of con-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 21 
 
 trition and reconcilement — "only I am thy 
 parent, and 'tis impossible for a parent to 
 stand in need of a child's pardon ! How 
 should a father sin towards his own offspring ? 
 He owes it no duty. The duty is all on the 
 other side. Ought not a child to be grateful 
 to him who gave it life, not to please himself 
 in the least degree, but solely for the sake of 
 it. You understand me ? Oh, little woman, 
 if e'er ye live to be the wife of an honest man, 
 have consultation with the yet unborn, and 
 make it a fair statement of what life really 
 is, and make it give you an acknowledgment, 
 writ out on parchment and duly signed in the 
 presence of witnesses, that it yearns for life, 
 bitter and sweet, ere you put your hand to it 
 yourself, and do that which maybe you'll fain 
 undo when it has become another's business — 
 ere you put on the sinful earth, and under the 
 light of the weary sun, a creature you can't 
 gather back into nothingness as you called
 
 22 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 him out o' it, and who perhaps will live to 
 feel you cheated him of bliss when you gave 
 him existence." 
 
 He thought he was altogether beyond my 
 comprehension ; but I was quite at home with 
 his words and meaning. A feeling of the 
 perplexing mystery life was, is, and ever will 
 be, the excitement of longing to know the 
 secrets of the still, deep sea of exis- 
 tence in which I floated, and a triumphant 
 recognition of being able to act and think for 
 myself (although my ideas of thought and 
 action were extremely vague and confused) 
 made the blood circulate in my heart, quick 
 and warm, as it does in the breast of a child 
 for the first time witnessing a melo- drama. 
 At the same time, I deemed it prudent to hold 
 my tongue, and to avoid responding to the 
 best of my intelligence ; for, in my cautious, 
 calculating little brain, I judged that if my 
 father detected my knowingness, he might be
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 23 
 
 startled and offended by it, and cease to be 
 communicative. So I feigned stupidity. 
 Was it with me the beginning of artifice ? 
 Heaven knows it was not the end. 
 
 " Heart o' mine ! " said the poor fellow, 
 with great gentleness, after a pause, during 
 which he had shifted his weak rheumatic 
 limbs into an easier position, and with 
 his coat-sleeve had removed from his eyes the 
 dews of sorrow, "heart o' mine, you bean't 
 afraid of me, and you know when my anger 
 has passed fairly over me, it doesn't return 
 till another sun has risen. So take courage, 
 and tell one, if ye can, what troubles you 
 within. Speak in your ordinary voice for 
 the most part — but — if you'd wind up your 
 speaking now and then with 'a Roger Copley' 
 — musicked, as you did just now — you'd make 
 your sick father glad, though the water might 
 wet the lashes of his eyes." 
 
 I was silent, for tremor, like that which
 
 24 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 seizes a young man when he is called upon to 
 make his first speech in public, prevented my 
 utterance. 
 
 " Child ! don't vex yourself to tell me, if to 
 do so grieve you/' gently put in my father. 
 " Te said truly ; you're a living creature dis- 
 tinct from me. And what right have I to 
 pester you with questions, and to break into 
 the quiet spots of your bosom ? Your 
 thoughts are your own ; little else is the 
 property you have besides them ; and where- 
 fore should I plunder you of your only trea- 
 sures, only because there is no mortal above 
 me to punish me for the wrong ? " 
 
 This kindness gave me courage ; and 
 rapidly, but without confusion, I told my sire 
 what had caused my unhappiness. Sympathy 
 was not what I was accustomed to, and I was 
 astonished by seeing how deeply he was 
 moved by my simple and affecting words. 
 He did not speak for two minutes, and then it
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 25 
 
 was only with a great effort that he gave ex- 
 pression to his thoughts. 
 
 " Little daughter, you're a small wee thing, 
 but there's knowledge in ye, such as learned 
 men who put their heads in wigs often lack. 
 You did right in being sorry for the poor 
 swine; they're the best and gentlest friends 
 you've known, and I question whether, apart 
 from a lot of cunning and malice, which we 
 call breath divine, human creatures have better 
 understandings or more courage than they. 
 And so, poor lassie, your old friends are gone, 
 and the fear is on you, you may soon have to say 
 good bye to others of your acquaintance ; you 
 didn't say it in words, but I read in your great 
 black eyes, that a cold shudder holds you that 
 ere long you'll look in your father's crib, as 
 you did just now in the fatting-sties, and find 
 nothing of him there, but have to turn round 
 and fight the world with your weak little 
 arms. Don't cry, at least not for me ; it will
 
 26 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 be better resting under the bank when my 
 gibing tongue has left off fleering at friend and 
 foe, than it is here, on the green grass, where 
 I cannot say i God love ye ' even to the 
 flowers, because, poor things, they do not 
 suffer pain like me." 
 
 I cried bitterly, but, without checking me, 
 he went on slowly and with increased solemnity 
 of manner. 
 
 "And don't cry for yourself ; there'll be more 
 people to care for you when your old dad is 
 gone, and go he will, for the strange tones of 
 your voice have told me so ; and the moon- 
 light, as it slept yonder, down in the low 
 meadows, last night, told me so ; and the 
 spirit within me — that is within all who are 
 of a living sort — has told me so. I am not all 
 clear as to whether there is a world ayont, 
 but if there be, perhaps some of us will have 
 a better chance in it than we have had here ; 
 and a worse one than the best here, I don't wish
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 27 
 
 even Joel Haggart. It would be hard indeed 
 to have to keep hogs for him on the other side 
 of the grave. But don't be downcast, little 
 woman ; dry thine eyes — they are sweet ones, 
 bless them ! How they shine ! they'll help 
 ye one fine day to make a living ! " 
 
 " What mean you by Ho make a living ? ' " 
 I asked, still feigning ignorance. 
 
 "To get on, and grow richer and richer 
 every day." 
 
 " To get richer is — to live ; then, father, 
 what is it to do as we have done- — to get 
 poorer and poorer ? " 
 
 The anguish of that unhappy man's coun- 
 tenance, as I put this question with the sim- 
 plicity natural to my years, I shall never 
 forget. An ashy pallor came over his 
 gaunt face, and for a few seconds his lips 
 twitched convulsively, as if he were about to 
 have a fit, but with manly exertion, the 
 heroism of which I was little able to appreciate,
 
 28 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 he compressed within himself the bitter tide 
 of grief that had almost burst forth, and fond- 
 ling me once again with feminine softness, 
 diverted my thoughts from the melancholy 
 subject on which they had fixed. 
 
 " Wait a little, my queen, and you'll be 
 old enough to serve a beautiful lady as her 
 own maid." 
 
 " That will be nice ! " cried I, smiling and 
 becoming genuinely happy at the proposition. 
 It was no new idea to me, but the favourite 
 romance — offspring of my father's imagination 
 and paternal pride — which had on many 
 previous occasions given me a gust of plea- 
 sure. 
 
 " She'll be very tall, with a bonny colour, 
 and golden hair — shan't she, father ? When 
 she goes abroad, she shall be dressed beautiful 
 in silks, and a bonnet covered all over with 
 feathers, and at home she shall play at pyan- 
 ners and church-organs, and never wear
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 29 
 
 nothing less on her head than a crown of gold 
 and diamonds ? And there shall be a carriage 
 and beautiful horses, and a footman and coach- 
 man, all over sky-blue and silver, and a maid 
 to wait on me, and do whatever I don't wish 
 to do myself? And then, when my charming 
 young lady has fell in love, and married a 
 lord, she'll give me hundreds of pounds, and 
 I'll marry the steward or the richest farmer on 
 the 'state, and have a finer house and more 
 servants than any other farmer for miles 
 round?" 
 
 My father smiled assent to all my ques- 
 tions; and when I paused, breathless with 
 the excitement of so delicious a dream, he 
 vowed that everything should be much 
 grander than I had stated. My lady should 
 be the daughter of a duke, her husband should 
 be a marquis, and I should marry — not a 
 farmer, but a general in the army, with a 
 plume nodding over his head, a horse dancing
 
 30 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 and prancing as if he wanted to jump over 
 the sun. 
 
 He was still continuing to pour into my 
 ears enhancing assurances of future triumph 
 and distinction, when suddenly he lifted up 
 his hand, and an expression came over his 
 countenance that showed he was listening 
 intently to some distant sounds. 
 
 " Hist ! little one ; don't ye hear wheels 
 coming from Loudham? Keep quiet till I know 
 whose music it is." 
 
 Concern and perplexity clouded his brow 
 as he uttered the words and leaned forward 
 in the direction of Loudham Eise. Soon it 
 became evident that his ears had not deceived 
 him ; for as the seconds flitted past us, they 
 brought nearer and nearer the ringing and 
 grating of wheels, revolving at the rate of 
 twelve miles an hour, and the clattering hoofs 
 of a horse driven furiously over the rough hill- 
 side. The noise was familiar to me ; such was the
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 31 
 
 customary pace with which our master dashed 
 about the country. And, had I been deaf, the 
 murky gloom, becoming every instant deeper 
 on Roger Copley's countenance, would have 
 warned me that his tyrant was approaching. 
 Another minute, and Joel Haggart had 
 checked his panting bay horse, and, having 
 leapt from the cross-board of his cart, was 
 standing before us.
 
 32 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 JOEL HAGGART AND HIS MAN. 
 
 I had entered upon life. During the brief 
 space of time that I had spent on the garden- 
 bank with my father, I had mastered one of 
 the grand secrets of existence. A sense of 
 my own personality had come upon me, and 
 while detecting in myself an independent 
 living creature, distinct and separate from all 
 similar animals about me, fashioned by my 
 Maker to act, think, and suffer in my own
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 33 
 
 way — and in none other — I had made a rapid 
 and searching examination of all I saw or 
 could remember of my poor father's experiences 
 and character. My judgment of him was no 
 cruel one. With all the fervour of a child's 
 impetuous nature, my heart bounded and 
 burned with love for him ; and rarely, if ever, 
 in my entire life, have I experienced such a 
 sense of aversion, and contempt, and indigna- 
 tion for any mortal as I then felt for Joel 
 Haggart. My very flesh crept with fear and 
 hate as I saw him standing with his hands in 
 his pockets, and surveying with an air of 
 vulgar insolence the bowed and wasted form 
 of his slave. 
 
 "Your rheumatics worse — of course?" were 
 his first words of greeting ; and the voice with 
 which he uttered them proclaimed it as his 
 opinion that rheumatism in another was a cruel 
 insult to himself, which, as a man of honour, 
 he was bound to resent. 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Joel Haggart was a short, stout, athletic 
 man. He certainly was not more than five 
 feet and four inches in height, and of that 
 altitude a singularly small proportion was 
 given up to the neck. An enormous glutton, 
 and an habitual drunkard, he would have 
 fallen years before a victim to apoplexy, had 
 it not been for his remarkable habits of 
 bodily exertion, which converted all the beef 
 and beer he swallowed into muscle that 
 covered his unwieldy shoulders, and made his 
 limbs miracles of weight and strength. What 
 the man was, and what his history had been, 
 it would be hard to say. Land-agent, horse- 
 dealer, surveyor, jobber, farmer, public- 
 house keeper, auctioneer! — by turns he had 
 been, or called himself, all these over and 
 over again. His reputation as an utter 
 scoundrel was a proverb on the lips of the 
 peasantry for miles round ; at least half-a- 
 dozen times he had been a fraudulent
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 35 
 
 bankrupt ; in every direction one came upon 
 a fresh proof of his violence and wicked- 
 ness ; in a wretched child clinging to an 
 unwedded mother, in an honest family 
 reduced to beggary through having re- 
 ceived from him a trifling pecuniary accom- 
 modation, or in a community of smugglers 
 or poachers that he had organized and 
 was known to hold in his pay ; and 
 yet the fellow, infamous and hated as he 
 was, held his own, and received an amount 
 of patronage and support from his superiors 
 that he would never have gained by 
 honesty and useful toil. Many of the 
 gentlemen of the county employed him 
 to obtain information about the races of 
 the district, to get up prize-fights, to 
 spoil their neighbour's preserves, to nego- 
 tiate sales of horses, to set about reports 
 to the detriment, or the reverse, of the 
 favourites for the next steeple-chase, to 
 
 d2
 
 36 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 depreciate the condition and character of 
 a kennel of dogs they were desirous of 
 purchasing, and to execute many other 
 similar commissions requiring in their agent 
 no ordinary store of judgment, delicacy, and 
 honour. Even the graver of the neighbour- 
 ing potentates afforded the fellow a degree 
 of countenance and approval, giving him a 
 greeting 'as he rattled his square cart past 
 their carriages, and describing with manifest 
 enjoyment to their friends his most audacious 
 acts of knavery. It appeared to them in 
 the light of an inspiriting comedy, that a 
 man, who so richly deserved suspension by 
 the neck outside the county jail, should be 
 well-fed, thriving, rich (as some maintained), 
 at liberty to do as much harm as he liked, 
 and all the while receiving a laughing " Good 
 day to you " from nine out of every ten 
 people he encountered. 
 
 " Thank you, Joel Haggart, for your
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 37 
 
 polite enquiries — my rheumatism is less 
 painful this morning than usual ; but I am 
 still weak." 
 
 In making this reply to Haggart's greet- 
 ing, my father used a quick mocking tone of 
 voice that gave peculiar force to his 
 words. 
 
 "Ah, you are weak — very weak — about 
 the weakest bit of human flesh that ever ate 
 his master's husks out of a swill-pail ! But, 
 man, how can you expect to be otherwise, 
 when you wont live generously, as I do? 
 Take a leaf out of my book, and improve 
 your diet. Begin the day with a good pound 
 and half of beef-steak, stewed or made into a 
 pie, wash it down with a quart of ale, and 
 pack it tight and easy with a bowl of bread- 
 and-milk ; then go out and get an appetite 
 for a good dinner of pork chops and sausages, 
 after which meal sleep till supper time, when 
 you make up for previous abstinence, and
 
 38 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 then sheer off to bed and recruit your 
 exhausted nervous energies." 
 
 "Well, Joel, I have not begun this day- 
 after your plan, for I and this brat of mine 
 have shared about a pound of bread between 
 us, and we have not an ounce of food left in 
 our store." 
 
 Joel stroked each side of his fat, sleek, 
 close-shorn face, passed his right hand over 
 his thick low-browed head, surveyed the 
 width and depth of the burly form that 
 was encased in his velveteen jacket and 
 corduroy trowsers, stuck his legs wide apart, 
 wagged his pate to and fro, and then, with 
 an indescribable expression of malicious en- 
 joyment, gave loose to the playfulness of 
 his nature. 
 
 "And why not have more food by you, 
 Roger? This is unwise. You shouldn't be 
 so fond of money. What good is there in 
 keeping all that stock of golden sovereigns
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 39 
 
 which you have in the chest upstairs, when 
 your belly is crying out for a slice of bread ? 
 Money is good only for what it'll bring ; and if 
 you are so perverse — I may say so obstinate, 
 in opposing the merciful designs of providence 
 — as not to let it fetch you what nature requires, 
 you deserve pity no more than the Whatbury 
 Plucky-one did last week when he dropped 
 his guard and let the Mealy Pet bung his 
 peepers, first right and then left, and send 
 him reeking off the ground, groggy and 
 piping. Take my advice, Eoger Copley, and 
 disperse a little of that superfluous succulat- 
 ing medium which you now hoard up to 
 worship and adore like a golden calf, or 
 Balaam's ass in the vision." 
 
 So tickled was Mr. Joel Haggart with the 
 originality of his humour in charging my 
 poor father with being a miser, and with 
 undergoing slow starvation of his own free- 
 will and choice, that he stroked his chin
 
 40 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 repeatedly, winked with a lively apprecia- 
 tion of his own brilliance, chuckled, and 
 looked round him as if he expected the 
 hedge to send forth sounds applauding his 
 facetiousness. 
 
 Rising from the ground where he had 
 retained his reclining posture during Joel 
 Haggart's frolicsome address, my father 
 said : — 
 
 " Miriam, run away and count the pigs ; I 
 and Joel Haggart must have a few words 
 with each other." 
 
 My father never addressed me by my 
 Christian name save when he desired especially 
 to arouse my attention and secure my interest. 
 On the present occasion, his manner of pro- 
 nouncing my name told me plainly the motive 
 he had for wishing me out of the way of 
 hearing what passed. By himself, he could 
 endure the gibes of his master, but he winced 
 under the humiliation of having his child a
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 41 
 
 witness of the insults he was compelled to 
 bear uncomplainingly. 
 
 I obeyed, and withdrew — down the path, 
 through the cottage, and down to the hog- 
 yard. But I could not rest there. My won- 
 der and curiosity had been awakened by what 
 I had heard, and the thirst of learning more 
 overcame every other consideration. I would 
 steal up on tip-toe behind the scant bushes 
 that ran along one side of the garden, and 
 listen to what passed between the two 
 men. 
 
 " What ! and you can't pay a coin of this 
 year's rent? Tis a weekly holding, by fair 
 bargain and compact, and not one blessed 
 shilling have I seen of your money for twelve 
 months. You lying, cheating, drunken rascal. 
 I'll sell you up. Your chairs, and table, and 
 bedding will fetch enough to pay me my dues, 
 and out you shall go — neck and crop." 
 
 Such were the words that came from Joel
 
 42 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Haggart's lips when I took up my station 
 behind the bushes. 
 
 "You may do what seems well to you, 
 Joel Haggart. If I could, I would pay ye 
 all I owe you ; not for the sake of adding to 
 your prosperity, but of keeping a covering 
 over the head of the little child I just now 
 sent away beyond the reach of your cruel 
 words. But I have neither gold, nor the 
 strength to earn it, nor power to steal it, 
 and there is no charitable person nigh from 
 whom I can beg any. I am a poor, decrepid, 
 used-up man ; but I work as hard as the little 
 powers the Almighty has endowed me with 
 will allow me. Do I not trudge miles a-day, 
 the country round, collecting offal for your 
 hogs ? Has aught of yours suffered in my 
 hands? Have I not guarded and tended 
 your brutes well ? For six long years — long 
 years — have I not been to you a good ser- 
 vant? You're a hard man, Joel Haggart,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 43 
 
 but look me full in the face, and say if, debtor 
 though I be, I owe you anything. And say 
 if, were I not weak and crippled, you'd dare 
 to taunt me as you did but now before my 
 child ? " 
 
 " You've worked for me, but you've been 
 paid. I have had your toil, you have had 
 my money."* 
 
 " And little enough of it." 
 
 " Why, you see, Koger, you weren't, at the 
 best, worth much ; and now you aren't worth 
 so much as you were. You're a poor feeble 
 animal, and you know you could not get work 
 from anybody near here but me. You see, 
 although bygones may be bygones, you're 
 nought but an emancipated jail-bird. And 
 what is a chap without a character f " 
 
 "Hist, fool!" responded my father, quickly, 
 " not so loud ; I would not have my little one 
 know I have been in prison. True, it was 
 years ago, and it was for helping you in a
 
 44 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 little affair that was no great crime ; but she 
 may not know it." 
 
 A cunning smile ran across Joel's face as he 
 heard the supplication, and saw his power. 
 Clearing his throat and folding his arms, he 
 resumed the conversation in a style of unctu- 
 ous morality that would become an Evan- 
 gelical preacher in Bethesda Chapel. 
 
 " Don't be afraid, Roger Copley ; far be it 
 from me to lower a parent in the eyes of that 
 parent's child, for what would become of the 
 blessed infant if it could not look up with 
 filial affection and reverence to the author of 
 its being ? And if I alluded to a little diffi- 
 culty that is now gone and past — indeed, 
 a passage in your early life that you don't care 
 about walking through again — it wasn't done 
 to crush your broken spirit, or overwhelm you 
 with a sense of your corruption and unworthi- 
 ness, but just to remind you what your posi- 
 tion was when I took you in hand. As I said,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 45 
 
 you haven't got a character. You're not like 
 me, who have a character. Ah ! I have good 
 reason for thankfulness. What a sweet thing 
 it is to be looked up to as a righteous, God- 
 fearing, upright man ! But, Roger, to return 
 to that matter of the rent, and the money 
 advanced. Principal and interest, it altogether 
 amounts to four pounds, seventeen shillings, 
 and sixpence." 
 
 " Not one farthing of which can I pay." 
 
 ** Now look you, Roger, what would you 
 say if I told you this morning I meant to do 
 a liberal thing, and set all square between us 
 about the rent, and allow the question about 
 the money advanced to stand over for the pre- 
 sent — what would you say ? " 
 
 " I should ask what it was you wanted to 
 tempt me to do." 
 
 "A sensible answer; and the service ain't 
 a hard one. It will be a sweet moonlight 
 night, to-night, man, and you'll like a drive
 
 46 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 for the sake of driving away the rheumatics 
 and giving tone to your constitution. Well, 
 about nightfall, a man whose name is Joel 
 Haggart will drive a light cart and strong 
 horse up here, and leave the animal and trap 
 tied up in the shed at the bottom of the hog- 
 yard. I am a bit of a prophet, and some- 
 thing after midnight you will get into this 
 cart, and drive quietly along the lanes till you 
 come to the corner of the long plantation at 
 Melton Stubbs, and there you'll wait under 
 the cover of the trees until some friends of 
 yours — quite old acquaintances, pals you have 
 nothing to fear from — come and put a few 
 sacks into your cart. Then you'll drive the 
 vehicle off, full pelt, along the lower road to 
 Tutbury, until you are about three miles 
 beyond Martlesham Red Lion, on the turn- 
 pike, where another mate, in a trap very 
 similar to your own, will relieve you of your 
 cargo. Now, are you the man for my 
 money ? "
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 47 
 
 "No, I am not, Joel Haggart," replied my 
 father, sullenly. "You may sell me up, and 
 starve me, but I'll have nought to do with 
 such work as this. I can't do much for little 
 Miriam, but she shall not say I blotted my 
 fame after it belonged to her, so cease tempt- 
 ing me." 
 
 " No cant. You're a coward, and 'tis 
 because you fear that there may be a row, and 
 a few awkward shots fired, and not because 
 you care for the weal of that black-eyed babe 
 of yours, that you hold off from joining us. 
 Come, man, remember what your courage was 
 years back in these matters, when you were 
 called ' Kanting Roger ! ' Your muscles may 
 have been cramped and withered by cold and 
 rheumatism, and hunger and hard times may 
 have made your blood cold and thin, but don't 
 let it be said that dare-devil Roger died a 
 shivering coward." 
 
 I could, from my hiding-place, see my father's
 
 48 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 face as Joel Haggart tried to rouse the pas- 
 sions of his youth, and I remarked that it 
 wore an expression of contempt and amuse- 
 ment as well as of firmness of purpose ; 
 but this aspect changed when, after a few 
 minutes further parley, Joel Haggart altered 
 his tone, and laying aside both bluster 
 and mocking, said in a low, husky, rattling 
 voice : — 
 
 "You must know, Roger Copley, I will 
 have no nonsense here. 1 have asked you to 
 be my assistant as a friend, and you have 
 refused ; now 1 command you as a slave. It's 
 a point of pride as well as gain with me, to 
 clear the Burnham estate of every head of 
 game this year ; and I'll do it ; and you shall 
 drive the cart as I tell you. Whimpering 
 hound as you are, and fit only to feed hogs, 
 I'll use you, because it wouldn't be prudent 
 to send any of my regular gang across the 
 country with the cart, and because you know
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 49 
 
 too well what is for your interest to think of 
 turning on me and peaching." 
 
 " Joel Haggart," returned my father in a 
 hoarse whisper, with the sweat standing in drops 
 on his brow, "we know each other well. 
 I am in your power, and you are in mine. 
 Though I am your drudge, and eat the crust 
 your money buys, I could put a halter round 
 your neck any day I left off caring whether 
 or no I too died on the gallows. But you 
 can rest certain that I shan't give you trouble 
 with blabbing about old times; so why not 
 let me rest here? and why drag me into more 
 peril and into danger I am not fit for ? " 
 
 "No words — no more maundering," Joel 
 Haggart answered, stamping his foot on the 
 ground, and pouring forth a torrent of oaths. 
 " By the Lord who made us, if you give me 
 any trouble, you shall rue your folly !" He 
 added more in a low whisper, the purport of 
 which I could not hear. Perhaps in my 
 
 vol. I. E
 
 50 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 anxiety that nothing of the interview should 
 escape me I stept forward, and in so doing 
 disturbed the bushes that afforded me conceal- 
 ment. Anyhow, Joel Haggart, either by his 
 quick ear detecting a rustling amongst the 
 leaves, or by his keen eye catching sight of 
 my raiment, became aware of my position of 
 observation, and in a voice of rage that made 
 me tremble to the centre of my bones, he cried, 
 "Come out, you skulking little she-devil. 
 Come here, and tell me what you mean by 
 acting the spy and eaves-dropper on me and 
 your father, or in five minutes there shall not 
 be a whole bone left in your body." 
 
 My only chance of safety was to put a 
 bold face on it ; so I tripped up with an air 
 of as complete unconcern as my beating heart 
 would allow me to assume, and declared that 
 I was falsely accused of listening. 
 
 " I have not heard a word of your talk, 
 Mr. Haggart. After I had counted over the 

 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 51 
 
 hogs, as father told me, I came up the garden 
 again, and sat down on the bank there, beyond 
 the reach of hearing, and I haven't heard a 
 syllable you have said." 
 
 The firmness with which I pleaded " Not 
 Guilty " evidently staggered my accuser, and 
 made him hesitate whether or not he should 
 believe me. With an expression of counte- 
 nance that combined with singular force 
 suspicion and cruelty, he eyed me through 
 and through, and then turning to my father, 
 inquired roughly : — 
 
 " Do you believe her ? " 
 
 "I never knew her tell a lie, and she is 
 above the meanness of listening," responded 
 my father. 
 
 " She'd better be ! " rejoined Joel Haggart, 
 shaking his enormous list at me, and once 
 again turning his cruel gaze on my face. It 
 was a painful influence that those crafty eyes 
 had on me; my knees trembled, and such 
 
 E 2 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
 
 52 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 extreme pain struck me in the region of 
 the heart that I fancied I must have cried 
 out. 
 
 Still keeping me steadily in his sight, Joel 
 Haggart lowered his voice to an awful husky- 
 whisper, that seemed as if it must have pro- 
 ceeded from some venomous reptile rather 
 than from a human creature, and addressed 
 to my father slowly, steadily, and with devil- 
 ish emphasis, the following words : — " Roger 
 Copley, keep your eye on that little imp. 
 She's up to mischief. She no listener ! She 
 no eaves-dropper ! Mark my words, she is. 
 She mayn't have listened this time, but she is 
 a sly, lying, crafty, thieving little vixen. If 
 ever you catch her hanging about, and using 
 her ears where she ought not, let her know it 
 — let her know it. Take from that hazel- 
 bush there a good, supple, knotted wand, or, 
 for fear of mishap and lest it should break 
 too soon, take two lithe, supple, knotted
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 53 
 
 wands ; then holding her by the hair of her 
 head with your left hand, take a wand in your 
 right, and teach her how to dance — flog her ! 
 flog her ! flog her!" 
 
 The intense significance the speaker gave 
 to these words by the deliberation with which 
 he uttered them, and the manifest relish with 
 which he gloated over the picture he had 
 drawn, even at this distance of time, causes 
 me to shudder with horror. Doubtless the 
 man's object was to arouse my childish fear to 
 the highest possible pitch, and so convert me 
 into his cowed awe-struck slave. He per- 
 fectly succeeded in his purpose. The terror 
 with which that villain inspired me lasted till 
 his dying day, and even now, to reflect upon 
 it gives me a sensation of loathing, and 
 sickness, and dread. 
 
 My brain reeled. The trees, the bushes, 
 the plants, the fields, the sheds spun round me 
 confusedly. I saw my father's eyes flash
 
 54 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 furiously at the brute who had dared to 
 contemplate such outrage on a weak child, 
 and having staggered away to a distant 
 part of the garden, I sank down stupefied 
 with alarm on the ground. 
 
 For some minutes I was deprived of con- 
 sciousness, and when I recovered my senses, 
 I saw my father and Joel Haggart still in 
 conversation ; but they had changed their 
 position in the garden, and were standing so 
 near to me again, that I could distinctly hear 
 their words. 
 
 " Then as your weak heart has a fondness," 
 Joel Haggart was saying, " for that child, 
 obey me — or it will not be many weeks ere 
 you are separated from her. If you get sent 
 to prison again, or if you get lagged and 
 sent abroad for the rest of your days, you 
 wont see much more of your daughter. By 
 Gorms ! she is a pretty little crittur. She 
 grows like her mother. What a dear pretty 
 gal her mother was ! "
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 55 
 
 My father winced as his companion con- 
 tinued: — "How times and circumstances 
 alter, Roger Copley ! Tisn't more than 
 twenty years agone since your father was 
 looked upon as a decent well-to-do farmer. 
 But times were hard, and he took to writing 
 other names besides his own on bits of paper, 
 and — he had to go abroad. I used to work 
 for him when I was a boy ; and many a good 
 beating he has given me. Do you know, 
 when I think of how he used to treat me, and 
 how well nigh he was to killing me, it makes 
 me feel quite pleasant to know how I have 
 his son in my power, and that if I choose to 
 thrash him within an inch of his life, he 
 would have to bear it without complaining. 
 Then, after the farm was broken up, and the 
 old man sent beyond seas, you hung about 
 here for years, trying to live by higgling and 
 dealing. You had something like an educa- 
 tion, and you were quite a fine fellow, with
 
 56 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 your jokes and songs at all the beer-shops 
 round about. But you drank, and got into 
 trouble ; and you turned poacher, and were 
 sent to prison." 
 
 My fathers head bowed as the recollec- 
 tions became more and more painful to 
 him. 
 
 " Then, when you were at liberty, and no 
 respectable person would give you work, or 
 bread, or pity, or have anything to do with 
 you, the pretty girl, Miriam Sandford, who 
 had known you in better times, and who 
 might have married more than one young 
 farmer in the neighbourhood with money in 
 his pouch, took your side against all the 
 world — poor fool ! as if she could fight her 
 betters — and married you. She was a rare 
 girl, I'll own it, and mayhap she would have 
 made you in time a decent man, but she died 
 too soon, — more's the pity ! She just gave 
 birth to that little one, and was laid in the
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 57 
 
 churchyard. Mark me, Roger Copley, I was 
 a meek milk-and-water fool once on a time, 
 and I loved that girl with all my heart and 
 soul and strength, but she scorned me ; she 
 wouldn't have me, and took you in preference. 
 There's no wonder, Roger, that I love you, 
 and like to protect you, and give you work 
 and a crust of bread when you can't get them 
 elsewhere. Perhaps sometimes I am a little 
 proud when I think how, though she flouted 
 and jeered and despised me, I am acting a 
 friendly part by her husband, and doing a 
 father's duty to her child." 
 
 " Joel Haggart," said my father, huskily, 
 " in memory of her, let me off this night's 
 duty." 
 
 "No — no," was the chuckling answer ; 
 " not for a sentiment, Roger — not for a sen- 
 timent. So make ready for to-night." 
 
 Abruptly turning away, Joel Haggart 
 passed through the garden gate, and climbed
 
 58 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 once more to the seat of his cart. The horse, 
 which had stood quietly during the long inter- 
 view his master had had with my father, 
 pawed the ground impatiently, and then 
 dashed forwards; but Joel Haggart reined 
 him in, and waited for half a minute longer, 
 to take a crown from his pocket, and throw it 
 on the ground at his servant's feet. 
 
 " There, get something to stay your hunger 
 with, and put a little courage into your 
 watery blood," he cried, as he drove off at 
 a gallop. 
 
 In servile fashion, my father stooped, 
 picked up the white money, surveyed it with 
 glistening eyes, and put it into his pocket.
 
 59 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A MOONLIGHT RAMBLE. 
 
 I wished my father had spat on the money 
 and flung it away contemptuously. Why I 
 wished so, I could not have said. It was not 
 from any consideration that the money was 
 thrown to him as if he had been a dog, or 
 that it was hardly won even as it had been 
 insolently given. I was a child ; and children, 
 though they entertain strange philosophies in 
 their dreamings, do not draw such subtle
 
 60 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 distinctions in worldly matters ; and, moreover, 
 I was hungry, and poor, and a fainting stomach 
 is not over particular in the colour and quality 
 of the bread that is about to fill it. Still, I 
 would contentedly have fasted all that day, 
 and the next one too, if my father, after pick- 
 ing the coin up, had hurled it with a curse 
 after Joel Haggart's receding wheels. A cold 
 presentiment stole over me that it was 
 payment for work that was to close in 
 disaster. 
 
 Briefly telling me that he should be back 
 in the course of an hour, Roger Copley put on 
 his crushed hat, and strolled down the lane in 
 the direction of our village, some two miles 
 distant, where the beer-house and bread-shop 
 held high positions amongst the houses of 
 business. 
 
 Left to myself, I had much to reflect upon. 
 What strange news had I heard ! what 
 astounding intelligence had I received within
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 61 
 
 the preceding two hours ! What ! my father 
 formerly a prisoner ! I, Miriam Copley, the 
 child of a disgraced man ! the daughter of one 
 who had been punished by " the law, " and 
 who trembled lest I should become acquainted 
 with his degradation? What crime had 
 he committed? Murder? False-swearing? 
 Robbery? It must, have been something 
 strangely wicked, for he and Joel Haggart 
 had both spoken as if each held the 
 life of the other in his own keeping. 
 And now a light of revelation burst upon 
 me, showing me the answers of many riddles 
 that I had puzzled and fretted my little brain 
 over in lonely hours, and bringing to my 
 notice other questions as painful as those it 
 gave replies to. Now I knew why my father's 
 cottage was shunned and avoided as 
 an unholy spot — why neighbours never 
 entered it with hearty greetings, like 
 those I had often heard making the
 
 62 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 music of other poor men's dwellings, as I un- 
 heeded passed the opened doors — why no 
 woman, save good Susan Latchett, liked to 
 cross our threshold for friendly gossip — why, 
 when children of my own age met me in the 
 fields and lanes, they ran away as if a serpent 
 were in their path threatening destruction — 
 why, when I daringly, and under the impulse 
 of curiosity, had forced my timid trembling 
 self under the church porch, and up to the 
 seats where the peasant's children sate, they 
 drew off from me and huddled together with 
 looks both of fear and menace, as a flock of 
 sheep resent and are panic-struck by the 
 advance of an intruder. Heaven help me ; 
 I was contaminated ! The taint of my grand- 
 father's and father's crimes was in my blood, 
 and rendered me an object of detestation to 
 all honest people who came nigh me. Then 
 the thought came to me that it was hard and 
 cruel in men to punish me for sins that I had
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 63 
 
 never committed ; but this rebellious feeling 
 was checked and dispelled by the memory of 
 a certain passage in the Commandments, 
 taught me by my father, rogue though he 
 was, which reminded me of what the way of 
 our Father in Heaven is, and made me with 
 lowly submission accept my bitter lot as 
 necessary, and therefore just. 
 
 Another instant, and by a sudden twist of 
 the mind I was thinking how much happier I 
 might have been, if what had been hadn't 
 been. Possibly, for a few brief moments, I 
 regarded my poor parent as an enemy, to 
 whom was due a debt of vengeance instead of 
 gratitude ; but all irritation with him passed 
 clean away, even as the shadow of a cloud 
 sweeps over a sunny plain, leaving no tinge of 
 darkness in its track, when I recalled the 
 affecting language with which, in the early 
 morning, he had pointed to our mutual 
 relation, and in words, the full significance of
 
 64 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 which now burst upon me, had implored my 
 pardon for giving me form and power to 
 crawl on the earth's surface. The reader 
 will smile, and I smile too, as I record that I 
 sobbed convulsively under the recognition of 
 how very dear to me was my father. Little 
 fool that I was, I loved him all the more 
 because the world and he were at variance, 
 and he had been dishonourably vanquished in 
 the contest ! What a fearful abnormal child 
 I must have been ! Thank my better self, 
 and the teachings of prudence, I have long 
 since displayed greater discernment in 
 choosing the objects of my affection, and 
 have learned to see the excellence of the 
 fortunate and the loveliness of strength. 
 
 When the afternoon had fairly set in, my 
 father returned from his excursion to the 
 village, with a store of bread and cheese for 
 me, and a bottle of strong drink for himself. 
 It was not out of selfishness that he gave
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 65 
 
 none of the latter to me, for he knew so well 
 the great harm continued " drops of comfort " 
 had done his own nature, that it would have 
 been no expression of fatherly care, had he 
 pressed me to join him in his pernicious 
 pleasure. 
 
 The rest of the day he was moody and silent. 
 Once or twice I tried to entice him to renew 
 the confidences of the morning, but he repelled 
 my overtures, and I was constrained to sit 
 silently, waiting for the night that seemed as 
 if it would never come, and keeping my big 
 thoughts to myself. We had no clock, or 
 time-piece of any kind, amongst our scanty 
 possessions, but habit had given me great 
 accuracy in measuring the course of the day 
 by the position of the sun. Intently I 
 watched the great orb of light as the leaden 
 moments lagged slowly on, and more than 
 once I was on the point of crying with 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 vexation, because it persisted in remaining 
 stationary, and refused to sink permanently 
 behind the hill. As if it would quicken the 
 progress of time, I bustled about ; and per- 
 formed the few duties that devolved on me 
 long before it was either necessary or right 
 to discharge them. The pigs had their noc- 
 turnal rations allotted to them an hour sooner 
 than was customary, and I spread a coarse 
 cloth on our solitary table for supper, ere the 
 slightest mist of dusk had fallen on the bright- 
 ness of the afternoon. My restlessness would 
 not have escaped my father's observation, had 
 not all the faculties of his mind been en- 
 grossed by some all-absorbing subject, that 
 caused him to sit with knit brows, and 
 clenched hands that moved only when he 
 took the dram-bottle from his pocket and put 
 it to his lips. 
 
 " It is coming on cold, father/' I observed, 
 with the intention of provoking him into con-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 67 
 
 versation, when he drew his chair up to the 
 table to take his evening meal. 
 
 He shuddered at the word "cold," but 
 made no answer. 
 
 " The mist is rising fast from the low mea- 
 dows, and it will be very cold to-night for 
 those who have to cross them," I continued, 
 slightly varying my former remark. 
 
 "Who told you I was going out to-night?" 
 he demanded sharply, eyeing me with a forci- 
 ble look of displeasure. 
 
 "Lord! father, I never said you were 
 going out to-night, but that it will be cold to- 
 night," was my quick response. 
 
 " Umph — yes — it will be cold — very cold." 
 
 I did not renew my endeavours to induce 
 him to be chatty, but consumed my bread 
 and cheese and water in silence. The crav- 
 ings of hunger satisfied, I packed away the 
 plates, and table-cloth, and remaining provi- 
 sion, and availing myself of the darkness, fast 
 
 f2
 
 68 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 becoming darker, as an excuse for retiring to 
 bed, I approached my father and bade him 
 good-night. 
 
 "Koger Copley, good-night. I hope the 
 rheumatism will let you sleep. Say 'God 
 bless you/ to your little daughter." 
 
 He started — for I had spoken in that silvery, 
 demure, feigned voice, which I had discovered 
 to be a powerful music to him. He looked 
 sharply at me, but there was tenderness in 
 the quick glance of his eyes ; and he took 
 me roughly by the arm, but his horny hand 
 trembled. 
 
 "That voice, Miriam/' he said huskily, 
 " is the voice of your mother, and she has 
 taught it to you — God bless you ! God bless 
 you ! little daughter — don't stop and talk 
 now, for I want to be alone." 
 
 Not many minutes elapsed before I was in 
 bed, watching the moon rise up in the silent 
 heavens, and deriving enjoyment, not with-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 69 
 
 standing the terrible excitement of my mind, 
 from the rays that streamed through the dull 
 diamond-shaped panes of my garret window. 
 Pondering on all that had transpired during 
 the hours that had passed since my eyes last 
 opened from sleep, and striving to banish from 
 my mind the hateful image of Joel Haggart 
 beating a shrieking child to death, and vaguely 
 wondering whether the inhabitants of the 
 calm lunar world fretted, and struggled, and 
 were miserable, like the pitiful millions of 
 slaves who had descended from the exiles of 
 Eden, I waited impatiently for the time of 
 action. At 8 o'clock, or thereabouts, I rose 
 from my restless bed, and crept to the window 
 with noiseless steps, to refresh myself with 
 looking across the valley. The low meadows 
 were bathed in radiance ; the shadows of the 
 trees fell with clear edges, black as pitch, 
 across the luminous ground; and the dikes 
 and winding river, that crossed and meandered
 
 70 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 through the grass-land, were brilliant as bur- 
 nished steel, or lustrous and dark as polished 
 jet. My eyes were strained far away to 
 where the fringe of the distant woodland 
 height kissed the starred firmament, when 
 the click of the gate at the bottom of the 
 hog-yard made me start. A man was leading 
 a horse and cart into the yard — into the shed 
 that abutted on the low meadows. Even if 
 there had been no light to enable me to dis- 
 cern objects, the suffocating heaviness that 
 suddenly came over the atmosphere, and the 
 nervous twitching of my limbs, would have 
 informed me that Joel Haggart was at hand. 
 
 He remained in the shed long enough to 
 secure his horse, and then emerging from the 
 darkness into the full moonlight, approached 
 the cottage. When he came beneath my 
 window of observation, my father advanced 
 and greeted him, and the two parleyed to- 
 gether for a couple of minutes, but their
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 71 
 
 voices were inaudible to me, till they passed 
 into the ground-room beneath me, when, 
 though they muttered in low tones, scarcely 
 above a whisper, I could distinguish their 
 words. 
 
 "It'll be touchy work to-night, Eoger. That 
 cursed moon wants a curtain. But there are 
 clouds coming up. Why can't they be quicker? 
 Is there no wind to drive them?" 
 
 " A wind would bring up the clouds quicker, 
 Joel Haggart, but it would also carry the 
 sound of your guns further than you might 
 wish." 
 
 " Eight, Eoger, right. It is better as it is 
 — and the men have a skirting of timber to 
 cover them almost the whole range through, 
 should that blockhead Purvey get on their 
 track. But he wont — he's outwitted. A 
 knowing dog he thinks himself, but my eye- 
 teeth were cut sharper than his. I've dodged 
 him for once."
 
 72 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 "Ay? dodged him ? " 
 
 " It'll raise my reputation through the three 
 counties. Master Purvey has received special 
 information of our intentions, and he and all his 
 gang have moved over to the Parham hills to 
 look out for us. When they are there, they'll 
 hear our guns about Fieldhead and Burnham, 
 and will come round by Snape Marsh, hurry- 
 scurry to catch us. Let 'em, that's my game. 
 They'll come to Burnham an hour after we have 
 left it, and they'll leave the Parham Hills just 
 in time for my men to walk over 'em without 
 interruption, and strip every cover and planta- 
 tion of every blessed head of game. Ain't it 
 a grand plan, worthy of a general ? " 
 
 " There'll be danger." 
 
 "You, at least, wont share it. All you 
 have to do is to be with the cart where I told 
 you, at Melton Stubbs. If there is a scrim- 
 mage, it wont be there." 
 
 "I am not afraid of danger."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 73 
 
 " Well said, Eoger — well said. But I must 
 be off, for I have to walk a matter of twenty- 
 miles before I meet you i' the morning. Mind, 
 my regiment will have dispersed at least an 
 hour before you see me. I and Jack Tandy 
 will carry the bags to the Stubbs. We have 
 got a tidy bit of muscle between us, and if 
 they are too heavy for us, we shall leave part 
 at my crib at Catton Ferry for a few days, till 
 we can fetch them off quiet and free of obser- 
 vation. But before I go, man, take a little 
 jumping-powder out of my flask." 
 
 " No — I have had enough to drink/' 
 
 " Then pour some out into your own bottle, 
 and keep it for to-morrow." 
 
 This amicable suggestion having been acted 
 upon, Joel Haggart took his departure on foot. 
 The difference between his bearing towards 
 my father in this brief interview and his beha- 
 viour in the morning, struck me with surprise. 
 I was not then aware how community of
 
 74 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 danger and the excitement of a common en- 
 terprise can soften away the harshness of 
 social distinctions, and make a martinet 
 colonel address and treat his soldiers as fellow- 
 men and comrades, and yet leave him, ready 
 as ever, when the city has been stormed and 
 sacked, and the peril is past, to enforce dis- 
 cipline with the cat and triangles. 
 
 Once again I was left alone to continue 
 my anxious and protracted night-watch. The 
 sight of my father and Joel Haggart had ex- 
 ercised all the effects of social intercourse on 
 me, and the time during which I spied at, and 
 listened to them, seemed, as I looked back 
 upon it in my silence and solitude, thrice its 
 actual duration. The loneliness and the turbu- 
 lence of my thoughts were almost too much for 
 my fortitude and powers of endurance ; more 
 than half-a-dozen times I was on the verge of 
 screaming out hysterically, but I refreshed my 
 spirits and strengthened myself by looking at
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 75 
 
 the grand determination I had formed, and by 
 reflecting that any betrayal of mental pertur- 
 bation might prevent my carrying it into effect. 
 My resolve was a bold one for a little child ; 
 for my settled purpose was to follow unseen 
 my father to Melton Stubbs, and be a spec- 
 tator of all that should there take place. 
 
 Slowly — slowly — with torturing tardiness, 
 two more hours passed away, and then I heard 
 a man with heavy, but furtive tread, enter the 
 cottage from the garden, and ascend the stair- 
 case. In another instant my father was in 
 my bed-room. He had made as little noise as 
 possible while climbing the narrow steps, so as 
 not to break the slumber in which he hoped 
 and expected to find me steeped ; and now he 
 approached the mattress on which I lay, with 
 one of his horny hands carefully shading the 
 rushlight which he held in the other. Had 
 I been a wealthy princess, resting amidst 
 precious jewels, and he a robber, bent on
 
 76 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 murder and plunder, he could not have crept 
 to my couch with less noise ; and had I been 
 the image of a saint, and he a devout wor- 
 shipper, he could not have manifested more 
 religious fervour than he did as he proceeded 
 to kneel on the floor by the side of his little 
 girl. What he said, I know not ; for, though 
 his lips moved in obedience to the impulse of 
 his stirred nature, the words were audible to 
 none but that great God "who made and 
 loveth all." When he had concluded his 
 prayer he rose, and stood over me for at least 
 two minutes, looking at me and suspecting, as, 
 in the cowardice of deceit, I fancied, that my 
 sleep was feigned. Then he turned away from 
 me, but not forthwith to leave the room. 
 Taking a key from his pocket, he opened a 
 deal box that was stationed on the floor at the 
 foot of a second mattress, on which he was in 
 the habit of sleeping. This chest was small, 
 and, in every respect, of a common and cheap
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 77 
 
 make, but it had always been to my infantile 
 mind an object of esteem and even reverence ; 
 mystery and awe surrounded it. It had never 
 been unlocked in my presence, indeed I ques- 
 tioned whether it had ever been opened at all. 
 What it contained ; whence it came into my 
 father's possession ; to whom it had belonged 
 before coming into his hands — all these, and 
 many other points connected with that modest 
 box I had long been at a loss about. I knew 
 right well that my father set a high, indeed, a 
 superstitious value upon it, for the smartest 
 whipping I ever received from his hand was 
 bestowed on me for cutting a sliver off the lid 
 with an old shut-knife he had given me for a 
 plaything. 
 
 And now I heard him draw this box towards 
 his person ; I heard the key turn in the lock ; 
 I heard the lid fly up with a smothered crack, 
 as if it enjoyed its unwont liberty. At last 
 the mystery was to be solved; the riddle read;
 
 78 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 darkness dispelled. The busy heart within 
 my small breast had been beating fast before ; 
 now it rattled and thumped against the 
 sternum with a force and velocity that were 
 alarming. With fear and trembling I widened 
 the crevice between my hypocritical eyelids, 
 and was the beholder of a scene I could not 
 then comprehend, but on which I have often 
 in my after life moralized. With his back to 
 me, kneeling on the rough boards of our 
 chamber floor, and inclining over the open 
 box, was my father, gravely and solemnly 
 raising in his hands, inspecting, and laying on 
 the mattress before him, the following articles 
 of feminine apparel : — a lilac gown of printed 
 calico, a plain straw bonnet, trimmed with 
 bows of white riband and an abundance 
 of net- cap ; a black silk apron, divers 
 articles of under-linen, a pair of stout 
 shoes, and — I finish with the most mag- 
 nificent article — a large and really well-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 79 
 
 looking shawl, of a material composed of 
 wool and cotton, and of various colours, in 
 which crimson dominated. Had all the trea- 
 sures of the Sultan's harem been showered 
 before me, I should not have been more 
 dazzled and confounded than I was by this 
 unlooked-for display. Such costly and splen- 
 did raiment, it seemed to me, I had never before 
 set my eyes on. It was impossible to keep 
 altogether still in the presence of such stores. 
 I shifted in my bed, and sat up, so as to get a 
 fuller view, thereby running the risk of attract- 
 ing my father's attention. But he was too 
 deeply engrossed to heed the slight disturbance 
 caused by my movement, for he remained for 
 several minutes eyeing the paraphernalia, and 
 it was not till he had replaced each thing 
 neatly and orderly in the box, and had locked 
 the box, and pushed it back to its usual place, 
 that he rose from his knees, and once more 
 turned and looked at — his slumbering child.
 
 80 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 At length he quitted the room, shut the 
 door, groped his way down the stairs, and, 
 leaving the house, went down the yard to the 
 piggery. Quick as a flash of lightning I leapt 
 from my bed, and having put on my ordinary 
 clothes with a celerity that at least proved 
 my fingers were " used to their trade," I crept 
 into the garden, without making the noise 
 of a mouse, cantering over a smooth carpet, 
 and concealed myself behind the swill-tubs. 
 Scarcely had I effected this, when my father 
 backed the cart out of the shed, turned the 
 horse, and led it through the upper gate into 
 the drift that opened into the main road, that 
 passed our cottage. When he had fastened 
 the last gate behind him, he mounted the cart 
 and drove away for a mile at a steady, but 
 slow trot of six miles an hour. Silently, 
 stealthily, under the shadow of the fence, I 
 ran after him. Like a cat pursuing its prey, 
 with long, noiseless, regular strides, ere it
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 81 
 
 makes the final pounce on its victim, I 
 hastened on, with my head forwards, and 
 selecting for my course the spots that were 
 darkest with the lush grass so that my steps 
 should not be heard. On — on — and still on. 
 Once, when my breath was almost gone, I 
 stumbled and fell, and, ere I could get up, the 
 object of my chase was out of sight, and when 
 I again proceeded to speed on I could not 
 hear his wheels. Either he had stopped, or 
 been spirited away, or my hearing had failed 
 me. Had I missed him? Had he diverged 
 into some route across the adjacent meadows, 
 where his cart tracked noiselessly? No — 
 there he was, again in sight, and allowing his 
 horse to walk leisurely. Over Marlesford com- 
 mon, round the dark corner where the hall 
 lodge stood, up the sandy hill, and over 
 Bromeswell Heath, he went at a pace never 
 exceeding four miles an hour. I was always 
 within a hundred yards of him. Sometimes 
 VOL. t. G
 
 82 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 he stopped, and having descended from his 
 vehicle, walked himself. Twice he looked 
 back, and I trembled lest he should discern 
 me crouching behind the furze-bushes that 
 dotted the way-side. Only once did he en- 
 counter a passenger on his peaceful way ; but 
 this wayfarer was an unusually inquisitive one 
 — a gentleman in a gig, and driving a spirited 
 high-mettled horse. 
 
 " Haigh, my man ! where are you off to this 
 fine night ? " cried this person to my father. 
 
 "Wickham," was the reply. 
 
 "And what have you got so precious in 
 your cart that you must cover it up with a 
 tarpaulin this fine night ? " 
 
 " Coals. I did not know that it was going 
 to be fine to-night when I started off this 
 morning — you'll not remain a fool for want of 
 asking questions." 
 
 "Yours is a fine horse to use for coal- 
 carrying," retorted the gentleman, still curbing
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 83 
 
 in his fretful steed, which began to rear and 
 leap from one side of the road to the other in 
 a very unpleasant manner. 
 
 " You — fool," roared my father, " never 
 mind my horse. Look after your own." 
 
 The advice was neither unneeded nor given 
 too soon, for in another instant the indignant 
 creature stood straight up on his hind legs, 
 and seizing the bit between its teeth, dashed 
 off at full gallop, bearing the gig along at the 
 rate of twenty miles an hour. Crouching on 
 the bank, I heard the driver swear a furious 
 oath, and I felt the air quickened as man, and 
 horse, and carriage flew past me. Luckily 
 the road was straight, and wide, and no acci- 
 dent ensued, for I and my father both re- 
 mained without stirring till our ears informed 
 us that the imprudent man, on reaching the 
 summit of a distant hill, recovered the com- 
 mand of his beast. 
 
 After this, nothing occurred till we arrived 
 
 g2
 
 84 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 at Melton Stubbs. When we reached that 
 spot, I was so beaten with fatigue that I could 
 scarce put one foot before the other, and a 
 sharp spasm crossed my chest every time I 
 drew breath. It was lucky for me that 
 Melton Stubbs stood where it did, for not a 
 hundred yards farther could I have proceeded, 
 when my father drew up a few paces off the 
 crown of the road under the dense boughs of 
 the skirting timber of the long plantation. 
 On either side of the way were magnificent 
 oaks, ashes, and maples, that afforded an 
 umbrage of the deepest gloom, even during 
 the scorching days of midsummer. And now, 
 as Joel Haggart had predicted, the clouds 
 drifted up, and, concealing the moon, deepened 
 the black of the avenue. The change from 
 the bright moonlight, to the Egyptian dark- 
 ness that now surrounded us, was of itself 
 depressing ; but, as if there were not enough 
 influences at work to chill my blood and make
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 85 
 
 my heart turn faint with terror, the wind rose 
 plaining through the plantation, and sweeping 
 the fallen leaves with fantastic sounds of pain 
 and distress. 
 
 Another hour of tedious waiting ! It 
 began to rain, and my father, having lit his 
 pipe, secured his horse by the head, and then 
 got into the cart and sheltered himself under 
 the tarpaulin, for, though the foliage of the 
 boughs overhead was thick, the torrents of 
 water penetrated it. Not daring to lose sight 
 of the cart, I remained in the lurking-place I 
 had selected when we first stationed ourselves 
 in the Stubbs ; and, feeling the wet gradually 
 steal through my thin dress, I resolutely 
 did battle with all the horrors that chased each 
 other through my brain. At length the rain 
 ceased, and my father, coming out from under 
 the covering, paced impatiently up and down 
 the road. He raised his hand to his ear, and 
 listened, but there was no noise in the air
 
 86 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 except that of nature's sadness. Again the 
 drops fell faster, and once more he crept back 
 to the cart for shelter. 
 
 Then it was that a sound reached my ear. 
 It was a low crushing sound in the dry under- 
 wood, twenty yards below me, and forty yards 
 distant from the cart. It might have pro- 
 ceeded from a horse or cow moving at foot- 
 pace. But no — it could not be that. It 
 came nearer — was behind — over me. Look- 
 ing round, I beheld a tall man, bearing a 
 double-barrelled gun. It was too dark to 
 examine his costume, or form any opinion of 
 his appearance, save that he was gifted with 
 unusual height. As I looked at him, his eyes 
 met mine, and they flashed as those of a tiger 
 must when making a fatal spring. His glance 
 burned in the black covert with ruby bright- 
 ness, and as he scanned me he levelled his gun 
 at my head. In another instant I should have 
 screamed for help, but, either from seeing how
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 87 
 
 small and helpless I was, or because he feared 
 to cause any clamour or fire a needless shot at 
 a critical moment, he dropped the mouth of 
 his weapon to the ground, and, laying a heavy 
 hand on me, said in a whisper that thrilled 
 my marrow: — 
 
 "Hush! I know you — no noise — the 
 keepers are close upon us — and if you're not 
 able to keep quiet, your father, and I, and 
 Joel Haggart are dead men." 
 
 " I wont move — I wont speak." 
 
 " That'll do, you strange little devil ; now 
 I'm off to save your father. Don't stir, what- 
 ever happens, and I'll be back in five minutes 
 to look after you." 
 
 So awe-struck that I could not at the 
 instant have uttered a word, or walked a step, 
 had I tried to break my promise, I saw the 
 man creep on, crouching down, and resembling 
 in the darkness a huge dog, rather than a 
 human creature. My eyes were able to follow
 
 88 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 his course till he reached the cart, indeed, till 
 he had gone a few paces beyond it. Remem- 
 bering then his parting words, I was astonished 
 at seeing him steal past my father, who was 
 lying, sleepy and heavy with drink, in the cart. 
 What could it mean ? Was it treachery ? Had 
 I held my tongue when I ought to have given 
 warning ? Anyhow, I resolved in an instant 
 to be nearer the scene of action, and, springing 
 to my feet (which, to my surprise, obeyed my 
 will), I hurried along at the bottom of the 
 ditch that ran beneath the plantation palings, 
 and, ere many seconds had elapsed, was within 
 a yard of the horse. 
 
 " Hist ! — father — father — up ! there's dan- 
 ger," I cried in a shrill under-tone not much 
 louder than a whisper. 
 
 " D — n I" he roared, throwing the covering 
 off his body, and leaping up as if a galvanic 
 current had imparted activity to his limbs. 
 " Who brought you here ? "
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 89 
 
 But it was no time either to make or answer 
 questions. The alarm had been given too late; 
 the fray had already begun. A shot was fired 
 thirty paces in front, and forward rushed my 
 father — leaving me alone — to throw himself 
 into the peril. I heard oaths and cries, and 
 the noise as of two or more men struggling 
 with each other locked in a deadly embrace. 
 Too panic-struck to be otherwise than courage- 
 ous, I hastened to the very spot of the contest, 
 and arrived upon it in time to see the gigantic 
 gamekeeper, who had addressed me a few in- 
 stants before, spring from the ground, on which 
 he had fallen with his first antagonist beneath 
 him, and having freed himself from my father's 
 gallant but weak grasp, seize a gun from the 
 turf at his feet, and strike him a deadly back- 
 handed blow with it on the back of the head. 
 My father fell like a bullock knocked down at 
 a butcher's shambles. Without a cry, or sigh, 
 or single agony, he dropt beneath the murder-
 
 90 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 ous blow dealt on the posterior part of the 
 skull. But speedily was his death avenged. 
 A second shot was fired by a marksman sta- 
 tioned behind a tree ; and he who, for two brief 
 instants, had appeared the victor in the sharp 
 battle, threw up his arms with a loud yell — 
 staggered backwards like a drunken man — 
 and sunk lifeless on the body of the wretch 
 whose soul he had just before despatched to 
 the unknown world. 
 
 Throughout my observation of this encoun- 
 ter, I kept standing in the ditch, along the 
 bottom of which I had run, when I quitted my 
 first post and endeavoured to make my father 
 aware of the imminent danger. And now, 
 instead of scrambling out of the trench and 
 throwing myself on Eoger Copley, as un- 
 questionably all lovers of melo-drama would 
 have done, I deemed it prudent to keep quiet 
 for a few seconds and see the drama to its 
 close. In an instant a man, clearly he who
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 91 
 
 had picked off the gamekeeper from behind 
 the tree, jumped from a high bank down on 
 the road-side, and walking up to within three 
 paces of the crouching child, who, without 
 breathing, speculated on his movements, pro- 
 ceeded deliberately to inspect the three bodies 
 that lay prostrate on the ground. 
 
 " Dead ! — dead ! — stone-dead ! you wont 
 give me any more trouble, Master Purvey,' 7 
 said this man in a harsh voice that I well 
 knew, as he pulled the form of the trusty 
 keeper round, and by an artistic examination 
 of his wound and the state of his heart, satis- 
 fied himself that life had fled. 
 
 " Hullo! Koger? — what? — you gone too? 
 No ? not a beat of the pulse ? Drat the clouds, 
 why don't they give me a little light, for I 
 can't leave you without being certain that the 
 life has left you ? " 
 
 "Don't trouble yourself, Joel," said the 
 voice of the first man who had been sent to
 
 92 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 the ground, "he has got his dowse. I saw 
 him drop, and if he ever orders another glass 
 I'll pay for it." 
 
 " What, Jack Tandy, 'tis you ? — and you're 
 all safe?" 
 
 " Not done for, yet. Don't you wish I was, 
 Joel?" inquired the fellow, getting up and 
 chuckling. 
 
 " Well, Jack," was the cool response of Joel 
 Haggart, " it would have been a neater busi- 
 ness, and been on the whole more convenient 
 for me, if you had taken a charge of shot into 
 your lungs. For, you see, you are so pre- 
 pared to go ; and an ugly story is much better 
 kept by one than two." 
 
 Jack Tandy was evidently a humorous 
 scoundrel, for he laughed agreeably at this 
 address, and only brought his expressions of 
 mirthful satisfaction to a close, that he might 
 remind his friend of the necessity of removing 
 their persons from the field of slaughter as 
 quickly as possible.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 93 
 
 "As to that poor brute," observed Jack 
 Tandy, jauntily, kicking my father's body 
 with his right foot, " he got a settler at the 
 back of his head, with the muzzle of Purvey's 
 gun." 
 
 ■ • Don't abuse him, Jack, and don't lift your 
 foot against him," replied Joel Haggart with a 
 sneer, " he came of a good stock ; the blood of 
 the old Copleys is in him ; and his father was 
 transported (lucky to escape hanging — he was 
 condemned to it) for forgery. Moreover he 
 has been my guest for a sort of years, and we 
 were friends in early youth, and what's more, 
 we both loved the same girl. So if you will 
 pardon the weakness of a frail crittur, Jack 
 Tandy, I will take the melancholy satisfaction 
 of setting it beyond doubt, that he is sent 
 out o' the power of troubling us." 
 
 Joel's curiosity seemed so altogether reason- 
 able, and even laudable, to Mr. Tandy, that 
 he condescended to assist in a surgical exami-
 
 94 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 nation of the injury his fallen comrade's skull 
 had received. The two men kneeled together 
 on the ground, and pursued their investigation 
 as coolly and sagaciously as a couple of hospital 
 surgeons would have done, the one slightly 
 elevating the body, and the other using his hands 
 to ascertain the extent and character of the 
 damage. 
 
 "Drat it, what a smash! The skull-bone 
 must be fractured and starred like a pane of 
 glass ! " Such was Joel's comment when he let 
 go the dead man's head, and rose from the 
 turf. But no time was to be lost. In all 
 probability, the guns fired during the affray 
 had been heard in the distance, and Purvey's 
 under-keepers and helps were speeding to the 
 bloody ground to avenge his death. The first 
 and most important business was to escape from 
 the locality of the tragedy. 
 
 With common motives,, and with no more 
 delay or words, Jack Tandy and Joel Haggart
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 95 
 
 prepared for flight. The former unfastened 
 the strap that tied the horse's head to the 
 plantation-gate, and the latter, having sprung 
 up the opposite bank and disappeared for a few 
 seconds, speedily came back with a couple of 
 sacks upon his shoulders. With equal celerity, 
 Jack Tandy leaped into the adjoining field, 
 and returned with two other bags crammed 
 with game. In a twinkling the spoil and the 
 spoilers were in the cart, and the horse in- 
 spirited by Joel Haggart's whistle and lash, 
 was galloping furiously through the unfre- 
 quented bye-roads and lanes. 
 
 And what did the little girl do in that dark 
 and terrible hour, left in dreary solitude with 
 %e corpses of her father and his murderer 
 lying with their sullen faces turned up to the 
 clouded heavens? Did she fall back numbed 
 into unconsciousness with terror? Did she 
 passionately wring her hands, and implore the 
 aid of that Father who defends with constant
 
 96 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 care the widow and orphan? Or, stricken 
 with the ghastly horrors of what she had wit- 
 nessed, did she complain miserably, and with a 
 sense of impotence to struggle with the tide of 
 trouble that whelmed past her, sit watching it 
 motionless and despairing ? — No ! — That child 
 crawled out of the ditch, stealthily drew near 
 her father's form, and with a heart beating 
 loudly, introduced her hand into her father's 
 pocket, and took from it the key of a certain 
 deal box. And with this acquisition clutched 
 in her hand and clasped against her bosom, the 
 maiden ran — mile after mile — mile after mile 
 — over stones, through mud and mire, across a 
 weary waste of common, and threading a net- 
 work of rutted lanes until, just as dawn was 
 breaking, she stumbled, faint, hungry, bemired, 
 almost senseless with fatigue, across the thresh- 
 old of what a few hours before had been her 
 father's cottage.
 
 97 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE NEXT DAY. 
 
 Without deliberation — and it is without 
 deliberation we usually take our wisest steps 
 in life — I crept into bed and slept pro- 
 foundly — and for hours. How untroubled was 
 my conscience, drugged with the matchless 
 opiate of bodily fatigue! No cruel dream, 
 no ghostly spectres of men struggling for 
 life and falling dead, scared me in my 
 chamber. When I awoke, it was broad day- 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 light, and more — the brightness of a clear 
 September day had received the first softening 
 touches of the sun's setting. The outer 
 world was not allowed to break upon me 
 gradually, gently loosing the bands of un- 
 consciousness with drowsy murmurings of 
 intelligence and wayward coquetries with 
 reason. There was a thundering blow on 
 the outer door, that no less weighty a 
 weapon than a sledgehammer or a hobnailed 
 boot could have produced; and this salute 
 was followed by a quick rattan of minor 
 strokes, each of which would have gone some 
 way towards braining a rhinoceros. 
 
 " Here they are !" I cried, and sprung out 
 of bed. 
 
 Who were " they ? " What did I mean 
 by using the word ? I had no friends. 
 The simple truth was that as the noise reached 
 my ear, and the sun's rays streamed through 
 my dazed eyes, it flashed upon me that
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 99 
 
 the immediate consequence of the last night's 
 events would be my temporary advancement 
 into social celebrity and popularity with my 
 neighbours, and that an assembly of admirers 
 already waited below to offer me homage. 
 Some moralists — for the most part, those 
 cynical followers of Diogenes who inhabit 
 tubs from compulsion rather than choice — are 
 very severe on the emptiness of ordinary 
 friendships, and the frivolity and selfishness 
 mere worldlings display in seeking out and 
 laying aside acquaintances. For my part, 
 I am of a contented disposition, am ready to 
 take human nature as I find it, and though I 
 never profess to entertain any high regard 
 for it, have too good an opinion of it to think 
 that my sarcasms and reproaches will ever 
 make my neighbours better. So, I jog on 
 amicably with all the bearded and flounced 
 creatures around me, and for the sake of their 
 self-love and my own comfort, make it a rule 
 
 h2
 
 100 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 to have my words and actions rather below 
 than above the ordinary moral standard of 
 my time, — not requiring my companions to 
 adapt themselves to me ; but, out of prudence 
 and easy savoir faire, conforming myself to 
 them, and being a different kind of person, 
 according to the locality in which I am 
 placed. I climatize rapidly, and my skin 
 changes colour as the heat of the sun increases 
 or diminishes. In London, I select my 
 society according to the received rules. 
 Possibly the rules are not good ; but that's no 
 affair of mine, I did not make them. If I 
 apply them judiciously, gracefully, and with 
 generosity, my duty is done, and my con- 
 science may rest in peace. Consequently, 
 every season I provide feasts, and ask 
 revellers to them ; not because they are the 
 strongest and best people to be found, or 
 because they are maimed and halt ; not be- 
 cause I can do them good — and only some-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 101 
 
 times, because they can do good to me. I 
 ask two or three hundred men and women 
 to my house, out of no particular motive, 
 except that I have been in the habit of inviting 
 them, from no particular motive, for a series 
 of years. These are quite my old friends — 
 my dear old friends. With much diplomacy, 
 I bring to my board a prince of royal blood — 
 a leading cabinet minister — a great lady 
 about the court — and the heiress of the 
 season, although they are formal and stiff, 
 and bore me with their silliness, because I 
 like that common folk, whom I neither care for 
 nor would help, should read in the papers that 
 such celebrities have been my guests. I ask 
 ladies — not because I love them, or because 
 they are virtuous, but because they dress 
 well, speak French with a good accent, 
 are either rich or good-looking, or married 
 to the men I like flirting with, belong to the 
 right set, and would die rather than violate
 
 102 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 good taste. I bring round me a swarm of 
 club-danglers — numerous as hosts of locusts, 
 and as sharp of sting — because they as- 
 siduously flatter and smile upon me, and lay 
 themselves out to tickle my vanity. I hate 
 popular preachers — one because he is a 
 vulgar Dissenter, and abuses the Church in 
 bad English ; another, because he is a High 
 Churchman, and is continually levelling 
 shafts of satire at his own archbishop ; another, 
 because his gambling debts have compelled 
 him to defraud honest creditors, and the 
 legal process of passing through the Insol- 
 vent's Court has made him more the rage 
 than ever ; another, because he is an honest 
 fool ; and another, because he is an eloquent 
 swindler. I summon my doctor, because I 
 am in his power, and I don't want him to 
 blab secrets ; and a great surgeon, because he 
 is in the confidence of illustrious personages, 
 and makes thirty thousand a-year, although he
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 103 
 
 first rendered himself notorious as the ac- 
 complice of Bishop, in the murder of an 
 idiot. I ask philanthropists from the House 
 of Commons, out of genuine sympathy, be- 
 cause they put me in mind of the days when 
 I was on the " look-out" for a place ; and I 
 am most liberal in sending cards to two 
 authors — one the editor of a Review, in 
 which my writings and character are syste- 
 matically attacked ; and the other, a fertile 
 poet — and these gentlemen I maintain an 
 alliance with, partly out of feelings of magna- 
 nimity and commiseration, and partly because 
 it is unusual, and, therefore, piquant, to meet 
 a literary man in decent society. If these 
 " becauses " are weak, feeble, and unsatis- 
 factory ones for regulating the choice of my 
 acquaintance, I urge in my defence, that I 
 drop my friends for yet slighter. 
 
 I, therefore, neither do now, nor did then, 
 quarrel with my old neighbours for being
 
 104 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 suddenly seized with a desire to come to a 
 more intimate knowledge of me. Unex- 
 pected events had made me an interesting 
 personage — or, at least, had made them 
 interested in me; and what more can the 
 greatest lion, now taking his meal on the 
 British public, say of his celebrity? I had 
 not improved, but the circumstances and 
 associations of my humble self had. As a 
 work of art, I remained what I ever had 
 been; but fortune had taken me out of a 
 corner, and hung me in a better light. The 
 world had begun to care about me. And 
 there, grouped around the door, I found the 
 world in a ragged costume of battered hats, 
 dusty bonnets, patched fustian, and calico 
 petticoats, clacking in an unusual state of 
 excitement, and, according to its wonted 
 freedom from selfishness, manifesting a 
 lively anxiety to obtain information capable of 
 leading to no earthly good. The parish-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 105 
 
 clerk and the village schoolmaster were about 
 the only males present at first, for they were 
 not required, by grinding farmers, to be at 
 field-labour, and the church and popular 
 education get on best when left quite alone. 
 But there was an imposing assortment of 
 matrons, and children of every period of help- 
 less age. As I slipped the bar from the 
 staple, and let the door fly open, a hum, and 
 then a roar, gave expression to the world's 
 excitement. 
 
 " She harn't washed herself." 
 
 " She ain't hooked up behind." 
 
 " She harn't got her shoes on." 
 
 " She's only just up — a little lazy slut." 
 
 " But she'll catch it." 
 
 " Wont the justices let her know it." 
 
 Such were the first exclamations of " the 
 world ;" and forthwith, like a pack of frantic 
 dogs, the world rushed into the cottage, 
 scrambled upstairs sniffing for blood, and
 
 106 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 clamouring loudly for evidence; and then, 
 having come down again in turbulent con- 
 fusion, danced round me — hustled me — called 
 me every name that conveyed the idea of 
 " deep" and " sly," and then demanded that 
 I should explain myself. What was I to do ? 
 Nature, kindly mother, taught me then to 
 pursue a course that long experience assures 
 me is always the best for an unprotected 
 female placed unexpectedly in a difficulty. I 
 seated myself on the ground, and commenced 
 crying piteously. What I wanted in tears, I 
 made up in noise. I would not utter one 
 intelligible word, for that might have produced 
 a reply, which would, in return, have pro- 
 voked a rejoinder, and so unpleasant dis- 
 cussion might have ensued. I did not give 
 vent to my grief in silent tears, for I knew 
 that the nerves of the ears are much more 
 intimately connected than those of the eyes 
 with the sources of all gentle emotions.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 107 
 
 Squatting on the brick floor, I simply blared, 
 — which is the only word that at all 
 expresses the unspeakably abominable row of 
 screams and sobs commingled, with which I 
 drove my audience to the verge of dis- 
 traction. 
 
 " Such grief is often feigned," said the 
 schoolmaster, nodding his head, with an air of 
 much experience. 
 
 " Deceit is the father of lies, and sloth is 
 the mother of evil inventions/' responded the 
 clerk, bowing deferentially to the school- 
 master. 
 
 But the clerk and schoolmaster were no- 
 where on the present occasion. Their influ- 
 ence on the female mind had for the time 
 vanished ; and the ladies proclaimed by 
 various gestures and words of contempt that 
 just for once in their lives they were deter- 
 mined to have their rights, and didn't mean 
 to submit to dictation.
 
 108 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " It ain't a case for men," boldly said 
 Mrs. Seagrim, a lady who by the nature of 
 her commercial transactions (she was the 
 village shopkeeper), not less than by her 
 imposing and majestic corpulence, had great 
 weight in local gatherings, " to meddle with. 
 I never interferes with men when they keeps 
 in their right places, but when they pushes 
 themselves into my chair, I alius tell 'em 
 there ain't easy sitting for two. If the gal's 
 father were here, why, then I should admit he 
 was a man, and shew myself as become a 
 female — who is nothing but a female, though, 
 thank God ! thriving in her business. But 
 this gal is a gal, and she so being a gal, this 
 here affair is one to be considered on by 
 women." 
 
 " Ay, ay — women who have had children," 
 exclaimed, above the general hum of approval, 
 a dame who had contributed a round dozen 
 of stalwart soldiers to the armies of her 
 sovereign.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 109 
 
 " Exactly so," put in a young woman who 
 had been led to the nuptial state only a 
 fortnight before ; " exactly so, Mrs. Seagrim ; 
 and it ain't no fit place for unmarried girls." 
 
 This was said with a sarcastic toss of the 
 head in the direction of the aged spinster of 
 the immediate vicinity, whom nature in en- 
 dowing with a beard had rendered con- 
 temptible in the estimation of man, whose 
 attention, as we all know, is too frequently 
 not to be attracted by any save personal 
 charms. 
 
 The squabbling went on, and so without 
 break or pause did my roaring. 
 
 "Drat the child, why can't she hold her 
 peace ! " 
 
 " We are not going to hurt you." 
 
 " A little worriting vixen — it's only to put 
 us off the scent." 
 
 " Oh, bless you, she knows a wownded 
 deal more than she will ever let out."
 
 110 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 "My belief is, she is worse than her 
 father." 
 
 Such is a fair sample of the hundreds of 
 voluble and disjointed sentiments that the 
 world, leaving internal differences, and once 
 more concentrating the common intelligence 
 on me, gave utterance to ; the commotion 
 reaching its highest point when Patty Ferret, 
 the ratcatcher's wife — a lady whose reason 
 was, under ordinary circumstances, the slave 
 of an impetuous temper, and who, on the 
 present occasion, was infuriated by my 
 infernal yells — sprung out upon me from the 
 dense crowd of spectators, and having seized 
 me by both shoulders, shook me to and fro 
 with such energy, that my teeth produced a 
 melody similar to that of castanets handled 
 by a skilful player. Nor was my tormentor 
 satisfied with this manual violence, but during 
 the whole time that she was employed, to use 
 her own expressive language, in " shucking me
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. HI 
 
 till I rottled like an ottomi," she gave vent to 
 the agitation of her feelings in a harangue 
 that in some respects will bear comparison 
 with the most admired specimens of classic 
 oratory — " yar little divel, yar earth warm, 
 yar cunning mole, is this the way yar trit 
 yer father's best friend, who knowed him 
 long afore he ever took to evil ways, and 
 even now ain't ashamed to come and drop yar 
 a word o' comfort, although he died a mur- 
 derer, and you're, I dare bet a penny, 
 an accomplish to the agressories after the 
 fact. Harn't you been a scandal to the 
 whole village, and don't every child o' 
 mother born for three miles round pray not to 
 be led into yar evil courses ? Didn't yar 
 steal the fruit off Mary Mather's gooseberry 
 bushes? and didn't yer only eight months 
 since stone my husband's dog, and call him 
 names, and fleer on him as he rode past, 
 speaking to no man, on his jackass? Then
 
 112 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 stop yer blaring, yar wretched brat o' a mud- 
 derer, and demean yersel' like a Christeean 
 gal to yer betters." 
 
 What would have become of me if Mrs. 
 Ferret had been allowed to have her own way, 
 it is impossible to say; most probably she would 
 have shaken my heart into my head, and my 
 head into my heels, and so have made an end 
 of me in a jumble. But fortunately Susan 
 Latchett came on the scene, and rescued me. 
 She was the honest wife of an honest peasant, 
 frank in her language, gentle in her nature, 
 and conciliating in her aspect. God bless thee, 
 Susan Latchett, and thy offspring to all gene- 
 rations, for the tenderness with which you 
 cheered me in my gloomy childhood, and the 
 noble courage with which you defended the 
 memory of my poor father. 
 
 " Martha Ferret, cease ye abusing that poor 
 child, as you yourself have children who may 
 one day stand in need of man's mercy as well
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 113 
 
 as God's," thus did Susan begin, and at her 
 words Mrs. Ferret fell back from me scared 
 into quiet, and the rest of the assembly held their 
 tongues in silence to listen to Susan Latchett's 
 words. 
 
 " Neighbours," proceeded that honest crea- 
 ture, "you are all kindly women, and ill 
 would the mortal hear from me who dared 
 speak ill of you, for I have received help 
 from your hands in the times of trouble, and 
 there is no one here that I don't know more 
 good of than I could put into words. Don't 
 then do aught uncouth to this poor child ; for 
 you've feeling hearts, and it will sorrow you to 
 look back on your conduct if you do. She is 
 one o' us, and so was the dead man ; they both 
 ate and drank one poverty with us ; and hard 
 will be the times when the poor give over 
 standing by each other! A terrible accident 
 has happened, and blood has been shed. But 
 it ain't in me to condemn any who are already 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 before the judgment seat of God. Nor will 
 I be so presumptuous as to defend any. But 
 serious, and as wishing the Almighty to judge 
 me by my truth, I say I cannot believe Koger 
 Copley committed murder, at least with intent. 
 He had his faults, and they were hardly 
 punished, indeed over severely ; and he got 
 hard words from those who had better gi'en 
 him kind ones ; but it is no more than scant 
 justice to say that he was far better than his 
 reputation. He had a tender womanish heart, 
 and he would have been happier had the Lord 
 who made him given him a stronger body or a 
 less Hearing wit. He said much that was wrong, 
 and did much that was good ; and though 
 folks talked enough of the first, they ne'er 
 spent breath on the second. Patty Ferret, 
 when your sister, Joe Mattock's wife (may her 
 soul be happy !), died of the fever, and her six 
 children were like to have followed her out of 
 sheer want of proper food and nursing, who
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 115 
 
 brought them bread, and meat screwed out of 
 his own hard earnings ? Roger Copley. It was 
 a bitter night when he brought the bottle of 
 brandy to the sick room ! He was a drunkard, 
 may be, — but to pay for that bottle of brandy 
 he lived on bread and drank nought but water 
 for a month ! There's many a one, fair-spoken 
 of, who'll play the helpless foul ; but Roger 
 Copley, with all his bad repute, ne'er wronged 
 a living creature but himself. But now he is 
 gone from us ; — and may God deal with him 
 with pitifulness ! and as for this poor girl — 
 this orphan child — if she'll trust me, and call 
 on me to do the part of a mother, out of the 
 good-will I bear and always bore the dead 
 man who begot her, she shall be welcome to 
 sup and bite with my childer, and a tender 
 mother she shall always find me." 
 
 Orators of the pulpit, embryo Ludships of 
 the bar, glib gentlemen of the senate, noisy 
 ranters of the hustings, if you want to become 
 
 12
 
 116 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 masters of your art, condescend sometimes to 
 listen to the street-corner and wayside gos- 
 sipings of the poor. I have heard in my 
 time the fluent rhetoric and polished invective 
 of many who have talked themselves out of 
 starvation and garret obscurity up to the 
 rank and pay of cabinet ministers, but they 
 all failed to stir me as I have at times been 
 stirred by the rude eloquence of ill-clad, 
 untaught wranglers in the recesses of dingy 
 markets, where outcast has spoken to outcast, 
 not for lucre, but for sympathy. 
 
 When Susan Latchett ceased, there was not 
 a dry eye or a heart unsoftened in the room. 
 Swayed by one strong impulse, the women 
 closed round me with a thousand grotesque as- 
 surances of affection and good-will. " You're 
 a right good woman, and better than the 
 parsons," exclaimed sturdy Mrs. Seagrim, 
 with a cordial intonation. And as for Patty 
 Ferret — blubbering hysterically and running
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 117 
 
 from one extravagance of speech and ges- 
 ture to another, she averred that Susan was 
 the best woman on the face of the earth, and 
 that she herself would die sooner than hurt a 
 hair of my head. 
 
 Rising from the ground with my heart 
 swelling with emotions of gratitude till it 
 nearly choked me, and with my eyes 
 swimming with honest tears, I threw myself 
 into Susan Latchett's maternal arms, and was 
 on the point of telling, without miscolouring 
 or reserve, the entire story of the previous 
 night. How different might the after part of 
 my life have been had I acted on this resolve ! 
 But at the very moment when my tide of 
 communicativeness was about to set in, there 
 was a stir among my auditors, and an air of 
 perplexity — even of consternation — came over 
 their faces. " It's Master Haggart," flew 
 through the assembly in whispers ; and forth- 
 with returned Joel Haggart, dressed in his
 
 118 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 usual costume, and wearing his customary- 
 appearance, except that an increased light of 
 vigilance and cunning made his eyes look 
 more wary, unscrupulous, and cruel than ever. 
 A chill crept through me as I beheld him; 
 and yet so powerful an influence had that 
 hateful being gained over me in the course 
 of the last twenty-four hours, that I removed 
 my clasped arms from Susan Latchett's neck, 
 and advanced a few paces to give him greet- 
 ing. 
 
 " The heat o' the day to you, my friends," 
 commenced Joel Haggart, with a grin of 
 amazing politeness ; " it's kind and neighbour- 
 like in you to put yourselves out of the way- 
 to come and cheer me now that I am worried 
 in this most annoying matter. Hope you are 
 well, Mrs. Seagrim. How does your shop 
 get on? Taking care of itself, ay? and 
 charging double, so that it mayn't suffer in 
 your absence ? And you, too, Patty Ferret,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 119 
 
 I am glad to see you; and when you go 
 home again, if you mean ever to go home 
 again, just tell your husband that he don't 
 keep my rats and moles down as he ought, 
 and that if he don't look sharp, come Christ- 
 mas, I shall say, 'no cure, no pay.' Hallo, 
 skulemaster, you here? Do these dames 
 here pay you a penny a-week for neglectin to 
 eddicate their children? If so be, yours 
 must be a pleasant business. The top of 
 health to you, too, clerk, and may you have 
 strength to mind your own business, and dig 
 with judgment a grand grave for Master 
 Purvey — seven foot by three and a-half." 
 
 Great was the power Joel Haggart wielded 
 over all he came in contact with. On the 
 present occasion the force of his will was 
 signally displayed. The bold confident 
 garrulity of the women ceased, and many of 
 them in sheer affright rose and slunk away ; 
 those who were brave enough to hold their
 
 120 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 ground for a time looked sheepish and 
 crestfallen, and as Joel persevered in his 
 sneers and bitter comments, they writhed 
 under his sarcasms, and turned pale with 
 impotent rage and a sense of defeat. One by- 
 one they [rose and slipped away, until the 
 entire assembly had vanished, like snow 
 before a vernal sun, with the exception, 
 however, of Susan Latchett. She was brave 
 in her goodness and singleness of purpose ; 
 and it struck me that even Joel Haggart, as 
 he eyed her askance, mitigated somewhat the 
 effrontery and harshness of his demeanor. 
 "Miriam, your master naturally doesn't 
 like such a crowd on his premises immediately 
 after the unpleasant occurrences of last night, 
 and I myself had some doubts as to whether I 
 would come where I knew there would be so 
 many. But since I am here, I don't like the 
 thoughts of leaving without taking you with 
 me. You can't remain here alone, child,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 121 
 
 with all the horrors that will come upon 
 you." 
 
 This address of invitation was made as 
 much to Joel Haggart as myself, and he re- 
 lieved me from the difficulty of a reply by 
 saying : — 
 
 " Susan Latchett, you are a good woman, 
 and unlike the crowd who swarmed here out 
 of curiosity, and I would let you do exactly 
 as you list — either keep here with the child 
 or take the child with you — but at present I 
 must be cautious. In an hour's time, the con- 
 stables will be here to collect evidence, and I 
 and Miriam must help them in every way in 
 our power ; for it is a life and death matter — 
 two lives have been already lost, and the law, 
 as in duty bound, will make a strict search 
 after all instigators and accomplices to the 
 awful crime. So I think you will say that 'tis 
 better for all parties that, till Miriam and I 
 have been before, and given our 'davits to,
 
 122 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 the justices, you and she should not be to- 
 gether. She will give her evidence more 
 straight and unconfused if she have not 
 talked the matter over backwards and for- 
 wards : and in case she should break down, 
 it had better not be in people's mouths to say 
 that you put wrong notions into her head." 
 
 Though Joel said this civilly and even de- 
 ferentially, his voice was firm and decided, 
 and allowed no doubt to remain in Susan's 
 mind as to his wish and resolve. She was ex- 
 pected forthwith to depart, and leave him 
 alone with me ; and as she had no means of 
 effectual resistance, and moreover as she was 
 compelled to recognise a certain show of 
 reason in the arguments advanced in favour 
 of her absenting herself, she rose and took 
 her leave — reluctantly, but without offence. 
 
 " I'll step down to you in the morning, 
 Susan Latchett, and tell you if anything new 
 happens. If I do,' you wont gossip about it,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 123 
 
 I knows," remarked Joel, in a most concilia- 
 tory manner. 
 
 "Thank you, sir; I shall be anxious to 
 hear," responded Susan, and she passed over 
 the threshold. 
 
 She was no sooner out of sight than Joel 
 Haggart walked into the garden and round 
 the cottage, seeing if the ground was really 
 clear of spies and eaves-droppers. The result 
 of his investigations proving satisfactory, he 
 returned into the dwelling, and after scanning 
 me deliberately and with searching glances, 
 he commenced his verbal examination. 
 
 Will the reader be shocked or surprised 
 that, ere he asked me his first question, I had 
 determined to tell truth, half-truth, no truth, 
 and direct falsehood, just as it answered my 
 purpose ? Children reared under the influence 
 of fear are admirable liars. And the memory 
 of Joel Haggart's amiable suggestion, made 
 only the day before, of disciplining me with
 
 124 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 maple rods, warned me that I had better not 
 let him know that I had acted as a spy on 
 his movements. 
 
 " Tell me, Miriam, little girl, all that hap- 
 pened here yesterday after I left your father, 
 and gave him some money for his last week's 
 wages ? " Joel observed, with a kind and re- 
 assuring tone that startled and comforted me, 
 and yet did not prevent my noticing that it 
 was his pleasure to speak of the donation of 
 the crown-piece as payment for work done, 
 and not as a gift or bribe. 
 
 I obeyed, and narrated without falsification, 
 and with every attention to minutiae, the 
 events of the preceding day — how father had 
 bought bread, and cheese, and drink in the 
 village, how we had dined and supped, how I 
 had fed the pigs, and finally how I had gone 
 to bed. — Had I seen anything of my father 
 after that? — Yes, he had come upstairs and 
 kissed me in bed, and then he went down
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 125 
 
 again and went out. — Oh ! had I seen him 
 since then? — No. 
 
 Joel now left me for a few minutes, and 
 went down the yard to the piggery, the 
 members of which society had so completely 
 vanished from my mind, that it only then oc- 
 curred to me that they had been fasting all 
 the day. 
 
 When Joel had made the round of the hog- 
 yard, shed, and bottom of the garden, he 
 came back, and again fixing his keen cruel 
 eyes on me, enquired sternly why the hogs 
 had not been fed. 
 
 Scarcely able to speak above my breath, I 
 answered : — 
 
 "Oh, sir, I forgot them. I am only just 
 up." 
 
 " How ? only just up ? " 
 
 " I was very tired, and I slept till the 
 people came and woke me." 
 
 " What made you tired ? "
 
 126 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " I don't know." 
 
 " Where are your shoes ? " 
 
 " Upstairs." 
 
 "Go — and fetch them. No, stay — I'll 
 go up with you, and look at the bedroom. 
 Come on. You go up first — and I will fol- 
 low." 
 
 As soon as we entered the apartment, his 
 quick eye ran over every spot of the floor, 
 walls, and furniture. 
 
 " Umph ! he did'nt use his bed last night, 
 and you did yours, that's clear. Trunk? 
 trunk locked? what's in it? — never mind." 
 And so he went on with a mutter between his 
 teeth — when he suddenly changed his tone, 
 and startled me by exclaiming in a sharp tone, 
 " Haigh ! those shoes are covered with mud — 
 how comes that ? " 
 
 " The ground is muddy." 
 
 "Ah! but the rain did not come on till 
 after you were in bed, according to your
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 127 
 
 account, and there was no mud yesterday, 
 and you have not been out to-day." 
 
 I trembled, as he, hissing like a serpent, 
 clutched me to him with a grasp of iron, and 
 subjected me to another scrutiny. 
 
 " And your frock is draggled with mud — so 
 is your petticoat, you little hussy ; you have 
 been telling me lies." 
 
 " I have not." 
 
 " You went out after the rain came on last 
 night." 
 
 "I did not." 
 
 " It's no good your trying to deceive me. 
 The justices will make you tell a different 
 story." 
 
 " They wont." 
 
 " They'll make you." 
 
 " They can't. They may drag me to pieces 
 — but what I've said is true, and I wont tell 
 a lie to please anyone." 
 
 I saw clearly that the obstinacy with which
 
 128 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 I persisted in my falsehood did not impose on 
 Joel Haggart's shrewd understanding ; I knew 
 well that he was thoroughly alive to the fact 
 of my intention to deceive him ; but something 
 also told me that he would be well satisfied 
 with my lie — indeed, would like it better than 
 the truth — if I would only be firm in main- 
 taining it when questioned by the magistrates. 
 He regarded me in silence, as a gamester may 
 be supposed to regard the table on which he 
 has staked his last gold pieces— warily, dis- 
 trustfully, eagerly, and with a desperate re- 
 solve to be calm. 
 
 " Where's your father, now? " 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 " What's happened to him ? " 
 
 " He is killed— shot dead." 
 
 " Where was he killed? " 
 
 "At Melton Stubbs." 
 
 " How did it happen? " 
 
 " He was with the poachers, and the game- 
 keeper killed him."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 129 
 
 " A j — and he shot the gamekeeper." 
 
 "He didn't — he couldn't. How could he 
 kill the keeper when he was already dead ? " 
 
 " Who told you all this ? ay ? " exclaimed 
 Joel Haggart, with the fierce glare of a tiger 
 in his eyes, and a return of the hateful rattle 
 in his throat. Again he had detected me. 
 
 Promptly, and without hesitation, I answered, 
 " Susan Latchett. She was talking of it just 
 now, with the other women, and she said she 
 wouldn't believe father committed a murder." 
 
 As I made this reply, it crossed my childish 
 brain, how dangerous and peculiar the ground 
 was on which I stood, and that notwithstanding 
 all the hubbub, and tumult, and clatter of the 
 morning, no one had thought to inform me of 
 the particulars of my father's death, and that 
 had I not known them from being an eye-wit- 
 ness of the catastrophe, I should not even then 
 have been acquainted with the barest outline 
 of the facts. 
 
 vol. I. K
 
 130 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " I hope, for your sake, Miriam," observed 
 Joel Haggart, calmly, but with the rattle still 
 in his throat, " that what you say is true ; for 
 mark me ! — if you are found to have had any 
 hand in this business, even to the looking on 
 at the fray, you'll be taken to Clumford jail, 
 and — you'll be hung ! ! I " 
 
 I heard him with a shudder, and fully 
 believed him. 
 
 He waited several seconds without speak- 
 ing, so that silence should render his words 
 more impressive ; and then, with a voice altered 
 almost to its usual tone, he said : — " But don't 
 stand idle there. Idleness is a bad thing for 
 little girls. Put on your shoes and get your 
 little spade, and come out and dig the potatoe- 
 bed." 
 
 I of course obeyed with alacrity, and soon I 
 was hard at work turning up the wet soil. 
 Without rebuking me further for neglecting to 
 feed the hogs, Joel went off and attended to
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 131 
 
 them himself. That business done, he returned, 
 and stood in a musing attitude, scanning me 
 from under his knit brows. It did not occur 
 to me that his solicitude about the tillage of the 
 potatoe-ground was to be remarked on ; 
 it never struck me that he could have any 
 object to serve in making me cover my shoes, 
 and draggle my petticoats with wet mud. Nor, 
 though it vaguely glimmered upon me that 
 I was about to play, as a mere puppet in the 
 hands of an unscrupulous man, a terrible part 
 in a desperate game, was I able to realize the 
 exact nature of my position with regard to my 
 companion. And yet, child though I was, I 
 might, one would think, have seen, as I after- 
 wards did see, that the man pierced through 
 the thin veil of my deceit, and was well assured 
 by my prevarications, contradictions, lies, 
 muddy boots, sodden clothes, aspect of fatigue, 
 trembling limbs, and slumber prolonged till 
 past mid-day, that I had spent the previous 
 
 K2
 
 132 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 night in watching my father, and consequently 
 in being a spy on him, that I knew he had 
 committed murder, and that his only chance 
 of escaping an ignominious death on the 
 gallows was in his securing my secrecy till 
 legal enquiry had been baffled, and then in 
 removing me from all temptation or power to 
 reveal that which, when discovered, would 
 bring swift destruction on him. 
 
 Cunning, quick-witted, precociously clever 
 though I was, still I was only a poor ignorant 
 child, and all my ideas with regard to the 
 social arrangements of life were necessarily 
 confused and shadowy. The law and justice 
 I conceived of dimly as rich ladies and gentle- 
 men empowered to punish poor people for 
 doing wrong with whips, prisons, and the 
 gallows. Murder I knew to be a terrible 
 crime, — invariably punished with death. And 
 such was my mental perplexity, that I could 
 not, in reflecting on the affray and murder,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 133 
 
 regard myself as otherwise than guilty in the 
 eye of the law of all the violence done. The 
 distinction between a meie spectator and an 
 actor was beyond me. I reasoned that it was 
 law and justice on the one side, versus 
 poachers on the other ; we poachers had mur- 
 dered a man, — and my neck was in danger. 
 That was law. Had not Joel Haggart told 
 me so ? 
 
 "You must be hungry," observed Joel, 
 when I had dug enough to answer his purpose, 
 " for doubtless you forgot to feed yourself as 
 well as the hogs. Go and eat something." 
 
 Availing myself of this merciful permission 
 with alacrity, for I was faint with inanition, I 
 hastened to the cottage, and was speedily 
 munching bread and cheese, and slaking my 
 thirst with water. But it was not till I had 
 consumed a liberal allowance of victuals that I 
 recognised how much I had needed the sup- 
 port of food. With the ravenous greed of a
 
 134 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 young wolf I continued to eat, swallowing as 
 much and thinking as little as possible ; and 
 so engrossed did I become with the pleasant 
 occupation that it was almost with a start of 
 surprise I saw, on raising my eyes from my 
 plate, Joel Haggart once more by my side, 
 and heard him repeat his valuable piece of 
 legal information, in the same harsh rattling 
 tone as he had before imparted it to me in. 
 
 " Little girl, I have been thinking about 
 you ; and I must say things look against you. 
 But you know best whether your story is true. 
 I hope it is. For your sake I hope it is. If 
 what you have told me is right, you are all 
 safe, and have nothing to fear. But if you 
 had anything to do with your father s business 
 last night — you will be taken to Clamford — 
 and you'll be hung ! ! ! "
 
 135 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MY FIRST MISTRESS. 
 
 The whole country was in a state of alarm, 
 horror, and intense enjoyment; for few events 
 create such real happiness in a country district 
 as a murder. Next to cases of death by vio- 
 lence, flagrant instances of clerical immorality 
 in dealing with the fair sex or the contents of 
 the poor box afford the liveliest sensations of 
 delight to a rustic population ; but a scandal in 
 the Church is a far less acceptable occurrence
 
 136 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 than a deliberate and fatal attack on human 
 life. On the present occasion, there were 
 numerous minor circumstances that contributed 
 to invest the crime with singular charms. The 
 fact of the murdered keeper having left behind 
 him a sickly wife and six young children, 
 totally unprovided for, and the general repu- 
 tation my poor father had achieved as a 
 drunkard, and one totally unprepared for en- 
 trance on another world, tended greatly to 
 enhance the merits of the affray. The upper 
 classes became quite excited about the horrible 
 vices of the lower orders. Some were of 
 opinion that public affairs were tending to a 
 general state of revolution and anarchy ; 
 some urged that it — (what it signified did 
 not exactly appear) — was owing either to 
 Tom Paine's Age of Reason, or to the 
 general licentiousness of the press ; some 
 wanted to have the penalties of the game-laws 
 increased, and have it forbidden by public
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 137 
 
 enactment for any man to have a gun in his 
 possession, unless he was a gentleman's game- 
 keeper, or had an estate in hand worth 600/. 
 per annum ; the ladies of the county were 
 generally of opinion that the time was come 
 when " decided measures " were imperatively 
 called for, and trusted that their husbands 
 would suspend the habeus corpus act, and 
 teach the populace in plain unmistakable 
 terms that no one could insult the British 
 Constitution with impunity. Every one 
 trusted that some one would be hung. 
 There was a subscription started for the 
 family of the wounded keeper, to which 
 several of the neighbouring squires put 
 down their names for a guinea, and Joel 
 Baggart appended his bluff signature for 51 ; 
 " for " observed that exquisite moralist, 
 " have I not been to a certain extent instru- 
 mental in bringing that poor family to mis- 
 fortune, through keeping in my employ, and
 
 138 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 consequently in the neighbourhood, such a 
 worthless vagabond as that Eoger Copley;*' 
 and this sentiment, together with the liberal 
 subscription, being carried by rumour through 
 the neighbourhood, brought Joel a large 
 return of praise, and orders for joints cut 
 from his celebrated pigs. Certainly there 
 were some bold enlightened individuals who 
 expressed unmitigated disgust at this sub- 
 scription, and were even rash enough to say 
 that Mr. Joel Haggart need not be so anxious 
 to connect his name with the affair, for in all 
 human probability he would, ere long, be 
 nailed to it ignominiously like a bat against 
 a barn-door. And it is also unquestionable 
 that some of the county magistrates winked 
 and laughed insignificantly over their port at 
 Joel's gushing burst of benevolence towards 
 the widow and orphans ; but they were con- 
 tent not to be too noisy or active ; they 
 did not want the game on their estates to
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 139 
 
 be troubled; and if Joel Haggart had in 
 the back-ground been the real spoliator of 
 the Burnham Estate, why, he had managed 
 it very cleverly, and was, in acuteness, 
 audacity, and courage, a rascal that did the 
 entire community credit. 
 
 Still, it was necessary to make some inquiry 
 into the affair, to come to some kind of judi- 
 cial conclusion as to the fray and its instigators. 
 There was a coroner's inquest held at the 
 Melton Oyster, a public-house in a thinly -popu- 
 lated locality, and depending chiefly for its 
 commercial success on transactions with the 
 smugglers and the moral middle classes of 
 that side of the county who liked French 
 brandy best when they got it free of duty. 
 To this court I was taken by the constable 
 and my kind protector, Joel Haggart, who 
 never left me alone, day or night, for so much 
 as a couple of hours together ; and I was ex- 
 amined by a red-faced gentleman (the coroner)
 
 140 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 who alternately asked me questions in a very 
 loud voice and took liberal gulps of brandy- 
 and water with manifest relish. I have a very 
 confused recollection of all that passed, save 
 that 1 told a prodigious quantity of lies, and 
 yet (although my credibility as a witness was 
 irreparably damaged in the estimation of all 
 present) never let out anything that gave my 
 bibulous prosecutor the slightest inkling of 
 the true state of the case. I remember the 
 foreman of the jury (when my examination had 
 terminated in casting doubt on every point of 
 the case, except my own untruthfulness) stating 
 it as his opinion, in plain and distinct terms, 
 "that I was nothing better than the most 
 thorough-paced and horriblest little warment 
 that had ever beenun-earthed." I remember 
 that the coroner assented to this remark, and 
 added in a very unctuous tone, "that it 
 was horrible to find one so young with so 
 slight a sense of moral responsibility. " I re-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 141 
 
 member also that the representatives of the 
 British public who were crammed into the 
 close, stifling little parlour, in which this free 
 and open court was held, gave vent to various 
 expressions of disgust; one aged lady even 
 going so far as to say " that I had lied like a 
 river of blasphemy, and that it was a wonder 
 my teeth did not drop out." — But more than 
 these interesting facts I cannot now recall, 
 except that a few hours afterwards, as Joel 
 Haggart, without the constable, was driving 
 me home, he told me I had behaved very well, 
 that he thought I had for once saved my neck 
 from a halter, and that the intelligent English 
 jury had agreed to the following admirable 
 verdict : — 
 
 " The jury, after careful investigation of the 
 facts of the case, are of opinion that William 
 Purvey and Roger Copley have been found 
 dead ; but which killed which, or whether any 
 third party or accident killed either or both,
 
 142 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 the jury are unable to determine ; but since 
 William Purvey met his death in the perform- 
 ance of his duty, and Eoger Copley had no 
 business to be out of his bed, the jury find 
 that William Purvey was wilfully murdered by 
 Eoger Copley, and that the said Eoger Copley 
 died immediately after by the visitation of 
 God. — Moreover, the jury cannot separate 
 without expressing their sorrow that the said 
 Eoger Copley is not at this present moment 
 alive to hear the conclusion that has been 
 come to." 
 
 The coroner's jury having thus probed the 
 mystery to the bottom, public interest in the 
 matter began to diminish. There was some 
 expectation amongst the populace that the 
 magistrates would do what was called " stir 
 in the matter/' but the magistrates, having 
 learnt by experience the difficulty of stirring 
 in any important business without betraying 
 what lame and impotent creatures they were,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 143 
 
 deemed it better to sit still. They were the 
 more encouraged to adopt this prudent line 
 of inaction, by reflecting, firstly, that the 
 coroner (who was a younger brother of a 
 deputy-lieutenant for the county) would be 
 annoyed if they reversed his finding ; secondly, 
 that they were not paid by the State, and 
 consequently had nothing to gain or lose by 
 the active or negligent discharge of their 
 duties ; and, thirdly, that it was always better 
 to let " things settle down " and " storms 
 blow over." But the good, easy, prudent 
 fellows felt that an example ought to be made 
 for the benefit of public morals, and to the end 
 that an agricultural population should be zea- 
 lous in fearing God and honouring the King. 
 Had my father been alive, the thing would 
 have been plain and straight enough; he 
 would have been made an example of, suspen- 
 ded by the neck outside the county-jail. But, 
 as he had died on the field of strife, the
 
 144 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 exigencies of the case could not be met in that 
 way. Luckily, one of the justices, whose 
 ingenuity and sagacity caused him to be much 
 looked up to in the district, hit on a plan of 
 extracting as much salutary influence out of 
 my father's corpse as could ever have been 
 jerked out of his neck when alive. It was 
 clear, argued this gentleman, that Roger 
 Copley had met his death by wilfully and 
 unlawfully doing that which was likely to end 
 in his destruction ; hence his death was a 
 consequence of his own act ; and the man 
 whose death was the consequence of his own 
 deliberate act (of course, it was quite unneces- 
 sary to enter on any refined arguments about 
 " intention") was guilty of suicide. Ergo, 
 Eoger Copley was a suicide — and he must 
 take the consequences of having killed himself 
 by putting up with an ignominious grave. 
 With great applause this ingenious suggestion 
 was accepted and acted upon; and Roger
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 145 
 
 Copley, to scare mankind from evil ways and 
 make them love virtue and the game-laws, 
 was buried, ten feet underground, at four 
 crossways, with a stake driven through his 
 body. And to give zest to this treatment of 
 the unsightly slough of that unfortunate and 
 abused wretch, a gibbet was erected over his 
 tomb, and from it was suspended a dead cat ! 
 
 Throughout the days of excitement, I was 
 continually under the eye of Joel Haggart. 
 The villagers never came up to the cottage ; 
 for my master, as I found out afterwards, had 
 given them to understand that he would re- 
 sent it if they dared to hang about his premises. 
 When I was a witness at the coroner's inquest, 
 and on the occasions when I was carried 
 before a neighbouring magistrate to be exam- 
 ined by the wife of the said magistrate, Joel 
 Haggart was my companion. It was his game 
 never to let me out of his sight. He did not 
 treat me unkindly, or with gentleness; he 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 never allowed himself to betray for one second 
 that he wanted me to adopt a particular line 
 of conduct ; he neither caressed nor menaced 
 me, but contented himself with hovering round 
 me, and cutting me off from all intercourse 
 with my neighbours. Every night Joel slept 
 on my father's truckle-bed, while I divided 
 the hours between slumber and wakefulness 
 on my own mattress in the corner. Once, I 
 remember, when it was dark, so that it was 
 not possible to see one's fingers, and as I lay 
 coiled up under my counterpane, there came 
 upon my ear a smart tap against the window, 
 as if the glass had been struck by a minute 
 pebble thrown by a person on the outside. 
 Listening with strained attention I heard a 
 scratching against the thin wall at my head, 
 and I heard, or fancied I heard, a voice in the 
 garden call stealthily to me — 
 
 " Miriam ! — Miriam ! " 
 
 In an instant I slipped out of bed and
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 147 
 
 glided like a mouse to the window, but, ere I 
 could touch the sill, a strong hand clutched 
 my shoulder, and I was flung with great force 
 across the chamber and against the opposite 
 wall. The person who paid me this courtesy 
 was Joel, and he also relieved me of the 
 trouble of responding to my visitor by opening 
 the window himself and taking the interview 
 on his own hands. 
 
 " Who's there ? " he whispered? as if afraid 
 of waking some one. 
 
 " I — it's I — Susan Latchett ! " was an- 
 swered in the same tone. 
 
 " And what are you doing here at this time 
 of night, Susan ? " 
 
 " I want to see Miriam. Why do you keep 
 her so close ? " 
 
 " Hush ! — not so loud — you'll wake 
 her ! What do you want with her ? " 
 
 " I want to know how she gets on — to see 
 her — to ask her if she would like to come 
 
 l 2
 
 148 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 home to me, now it is all settled with the 
 magistrates." 
 
 " Susan Latchett, you are a good soul — but 
 it's a queer time of night to be out on such an 
 errand as this. I'll be down and talk with 
 you to-morrow — which will be Sunday. Come 
 Monday, Miriam is going to leave here, and 
 going to service. She has got a capital place, 
 and a good mistress. But good night now, 
 and go home ; I'll tell you all about it to- 
 morrow." 
 
 He closed the window and returned to his 
 resting-place without saying a word to me, 
 who, having again crept between the sheets, 
 now occupied myself with meditating on the 
 wonderful piece of intelligence I had received. 
 I had got a mistress then — a place at service. 
 Thoughts of the workhouse and starvation 
 had already troubled my little brain since my 
 father's death, and it was with a sensation of 
 relief from an oppressive apprehension of mis-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 149 
 
 fortune, as well as with pride, that I heard that 
 I was forthwith to be a lady's servant. My 
 romantic nature was stirred within me. Of 
 course my future mistress was a lady. I won- 
 dered if she was beautiful, kind, rich — and 
 had all the other enviable qualities Roger 
 Copley had always assured me my mistress 
 should have. How strange of Mr. Haggart 
 not to tell me of the arrangement that had 
 been made for me — of the good fortune that 
 had befallen me ! Of course it was good for- 
 tune — and I glided from the bliss of conscious 
 hope into a land of happy dreams. 
 
 The next morning — it was Sunday — just 
 twelve days since the occasion of my receiv- 
 ing my neighbours who came to condole with 
 me on the loss of my parent — and as I sat - 
 devouring a bowl of bread and milk for my 
 breakfast, Joel Haggart condescended to in- 
 form me of the change that had taken place 
 in my prospects.
 
 150 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " Oh ! I am so glad, Mr. Haggart — so 
 much obliged to you. I shall get on now," I 
 exclaimed, my eyes meanwhile glistening with 
 emotion as I looked up at my benefactor. 
 
 "Well, I am glad to see you pleased, 
 Miriam," responded Joel Haggart, benevo- 
 lently, " and you have reason to be. Your 
 mistress is such a one as it don't fall to every 
 gal's lot to get. She's a sweet lady, and if you 
 only try to do your duty, she'll never part 
 with you." 
 
 " Is she pretty, Mr. Haggart ? " 
 
 "A beauty, my dear." 
 
 " And does she dress splendid, sir ? " 
 
 " Ah ! don't she ? If I was to try and tell 
 you all the fine things she has in her boxes, 
 my tongue would be seized with a palsy from 
 being inadequate to the subject. I know a 
 young woman who was her maid last year, 
 and has left the place only to be married to a 
 young man, and she tells me that whenever
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 151 
 
 she had done her work at all better than ordi- 
 nary, she'd give her sticks of barley-sugar, and 
 speak to her so kind, and sometimes even kiss 
 her/' 
 
 " Oh ! I'll never leave her, Mr. Haggart ! " 
 I exclaimed in a rapture of devotion. 
 
 "Take care you don't try to leave her, ,, 
 replied Joel, with a return of his disagreeable 
 rattle. 
 
 When the afternoon came, Joel told me that 
 he was going away for a couple of hours or 
 so, but that he should certainly return to take 
 his tea at five o'clock. 
 
 When he left me, I found myself once more 
 alone, after having been, without a single break 
 of more than five minutes, in his presence for 
 so many days. It was with a feeling of great 
 relief that I turned round and reflected that I 
 should be sole governess of my own actions, at 
 least for two hours. 
 
 What should I do with myself, my liberty,
 
 152 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 and my time ? The sun was shining cheerfully, 
 and a fresh dancing breeze brought up from 
 the village the music of the church-bells chim- 
 ing for the people to assemble for their afternoon 
 devotions. It would be a pleasant change to 
 go to church — to see all the people, and to be 
 seen. And how should I array myself? In- 
 stantly the vision of the magnificent raiment 
 contained in the box upstairs flashed across 
 my mind, and I drew from its hiding place in 
 my dress the key which I had taken from my 
 father's pocket as he lay dead by the roadside, 
 and which I had ever since guarded as a con- 
 cealed treasure. 
 
 Some of my readers may possibly feel a 
 curiosity to know in what character I first 
 acquired the possession of that key — whether 
 as a thief, or regarding myself in the light of 
 heiress to all my father's possessions. Honest- 
 ly, I am unable to say. Doubtless cupidity 
 inspired me to thrust my hand into his pocket
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 153 
 
 and carry off the key ; but it is a question 
 of uncertainty to me, whether, had I been 
 detected in the act, I should either have 
 admitted it to be, or regarded it as, a dishonest 
 performance. If I could satisfy myself I was 
 actuated by the same motives, unrestrained or 
 unsupported by principle, which induce a pick- 
 pocket to clutch at a purse, I should not 
 hesitate to say so ; for I have a perverse 
 pleasure in letting the world know all the 
 contemptible traits of my character, and am 
 moreover convinced that it is good policy to 
 make oneself appear rather worse than one 
 really is, for by so doing it is effected — 
 firstly, that we enjoy a very considerable 
 security from being unmasked and held up to 
 odium for hypocrisy ; and, secondly, that we 
 are much praised and admired for our candour 
 and freedom from humbug, while all the time 
 we lose nothing in the estimation of good 
 people who save themselves from any chance
 
 154 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 of thinking too well of their neighbours by 
 believing them capable of all evil. 
 
 Anyhow, I had the key in my hand, and with 
 it, ere many seconds had elapsed, I opened the 
 box, and dressed myself to the best of my ability 
 with its contents. It was true I could not 
 wear most of the articles from their being 
 made for a woman, whilst I was only a little 
 girl ; but the bonnet and crimson shawl I 
 made subservient to purposes of decoration ; 
 and very proud of myself, my gorgeous dress, 
 and my liberty was I as I scudded along, be- 
 tween a run and a walk, down the hill and in 
 the direction of the church. My object was to 
 astonish the children ; and I did astonish them, 
 but not exactly in the way I intended. 
 
 I could count on my fingers the number of 
 times I had been to church during the whole 
 course of my life ; for my poor father, though 
 he taught me my catechism and how to read 
 the Bible, was opposed to the ecclesiastical
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 155 
 
 institutions of his country — at least of his 
 parish, and did not like me to accompany his 
 neighbours to the place of orthodox worship. 
 But for this, I should have often visited the 
 church, which had always appeared to me as 
 an agreeable place of re- union, where people 
 wore their best things, listened to music, and 
 wondered what the parson was talking about. 
 And now my vain little heart prompted me 
 to achieve distinction in this assembly. 
 
 It was late — indeed the sermon had been 
 begun — when I entered, and minced up with 
 steps of infinite self-satisfaction to a vacant 
 bench opposite those on which the children of 
 the Sunday School were ranged. Of course I 
 did not deign to take a place with them. I was 
 not a school-child, but a young woman — whose 
 father had died in a distinguished manner, and 
 who was herself already hired as lady's-maid ! 
 Whether they read this disdain in my face, or 
 whether it was only the comical aspect of my
 
 156 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 huge bonnet and crimson shawl trailing on 
 the ground that caused them to entertain sen- 
 timents of derision towards me, I cannot say ; 
 but, certain it is, that immediately I took my 
 seat, they commenced tittering and giggling. 
 My dignity was sorely offended, and my pride 
 cruelly wounded. It was some satisfaction 
 to me to witness the operations of two men 
 with long black wands in their hands, who 
 strove to discharge efficiently their duty of 
 keeping the boys (some five-and-twenty 
 urchins) in order. Every time a boy giggled, 
 one of these officials gave him a whack on the 
 head with his wand — ay, at last, one, two, 
 three, four whacks for each burst of tittering. 
 But this energetic treatment was altogether un- 
 equal to the occasion. The merriment of the 
 boys could not be suppressed. The wands 
 knew no rest, and the noise they made, clatter- 
 ing on the boys' heads, can be compared only 
 to a legion of billiard balls rushing frantically
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 157 
 
 for the same pocket. It was wonderful, too, 
 the difference of the sounds which were pro- 
 duced by the concussions. Sometimes the 
 notes were clear and sharp, and at other times 
 dull and without any ring. I tried to account 
 for this, and wondered whether it was the 
 shape of the head, or the nature of its con- 
 tents, or the direction in which the wand de- 
 scended, or all these causes combined, that 
 caused this difference of reverberation. 
 
 So great was the disturbance, the clergy- 
 man had some difficulty in continuing his ser- 
 mon. At length, however — at great length 
 — he got through it, and after the custo- 
 mary evening hymn dismissed the con- 
 gregation, who soon crowded out into the 
 churchyard, where a considerable assembly, 
 composed of all the children and people of 
 the poorer sort, pressed round me with an 
 uproar that is indescribable. 
 
 " The little wretch ! "
 
 158 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " Where did she get the things ? " 
 
 " She stole 'era." 
 
 " Anyhow, she did not buy them." 
 
 " A crimson shawl, indeed." 
 
 " It's dyed with the gamekeeper's blood." 
 
 " Oh ! would I be a murderer's daughter!" 
 
 Such yells, shrieks, and exclamations of fury 
 here ensued, that I was truly grateful when I 
 saw Joel Haggart push his way through the 
 crowd and appear upon the scene. The as- 
 sembly was much larger than the one he had 
 quelled a few days before, and, moreover, it was 
 not gathered together on his ground ; so, in- 
 stead of attacking the bystanders with sarcasm 
 or menace, he prudently took a firm hold of 
 my wrist, and led me away without a word. 
 No one followed, but as I quitted the out- 
 skirts of the crowd, I heard Susan Latchett 
 say, in a tone of touching commiseration : — 
 
 " Poor orphan child ! 'tis the bonnet and 
 shawl her mother was married in ! "
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 159 
 
 I thought Joel Haggart would scold me for 
 my foolish conduct, but he did not. When it 
 was his humour the man could be calm, as 
 well as he could be ferocious and sullen. 
 
 The next morning, at an early hour, a gentle- 
 man came to the cottage, and asked me some 
 questions in the presence of Joel Haggart. 
 This visitor inquired if I wished to go out to 
 service, and whether I was ready to go and 
 live as a little maid, twenty miles away, in the 
 employment of one Mrs. Muscut. My replies 
 were those of cordial assent, and having noted 
 them down in an official-looking little note- 
 book, my interrogator wished me luck, and 
 went his way, having first nodded to Joel 
 Haggart, and told him with a grim smile, that 
 when she came for me Mrs. Muscut might 
 have me. 
 
 An hour or more passed after this visit, and 
 then there appeared at the garden gate a 
 square cart, in which was harnessed a stout
 
 160 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 clumsy pony, which was driven by a strong, 
 hard-featured woman, who bore a strong 
 resemblance to Joel Haggart. Painted on 
 the back of the vehicle, in large letters, was 
 the following inscription :— u Daniel Mus- 
 cut, Farmer and Higgler." Descending from 
 the cart, the woman eyed me sharply, and 
 nodded to Joel Haggart, who greeted her cor- 
 dially as his sister, and energetically avowed 
 that there never was a woman like her. And 
 he spoke truly, for, in appearance, there never 
 was, I should say, another woman so stern 
 and forbidding ; and her nature did not belie 
 her aspect. 
 
 "Yes, Joel," she replied harshly to the 
 greeting, "lam here to do your bidding, and 
 drag you, as I best may, out of the mess. So, 
 this is your helpmate ! a pretty confederate ! 
 You, Joel Haggart, to go leaguing yourself 
 with a miserable brat like that ! You're a 
 born babe, and one day you'll be hoisted up,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 161 
 
 and I shan't be able to come nigh you to cut 
 you down. — Mark my words." 
 
 " Don't you flurry yourself, sister Anne ; I am 
 an old bird, and have more lives than a cat. 
 But will you take anything after your morning 
 drive?" 
 
 "Yes," she responded snappishly, "yes — 
 that gal — and the sooner the better." 
 
 " Your pony don't look tired." 
 
 " Xo, I rested and baited at " The Pile of 
 Bricks," so there is no need for me to loiter. 
 We must be off. Now, child" (turning sud- 
 denly on me), "get yourself ready — quick." 
 
 " Are you going to take me to my mistress? " 
 I asked timidly. 
 
 She started, and inquired, with an exclama- 
 tion that sounded wondrous like a curse, 
 "What I meant by that?" 
 
 As she spoke, she shot so terrible a glance 
 at me, that I could not answer her ; but Joel 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 162 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 came to my relief by saying something quickly 
 to his sister, that I could not hear, although 
 it was uttered in a tone above a whisper. 
 
 The explanation, whatever it was, had the 
 effect of composing Mrs. Muscut's excitement, 
 for she changed her tone, and said in a matter- 
 of-fact manner, that she had been sent by my 
 mistress to fetch me, and that I must put on 
 my bonnet and prepare instantly for a journey 
 several miles across the country. Whatever 
 fears had begun to find growth in my mind 
 were quieted by this assurance ; and, with a 
 vague notion that Joel Haggart's sister was a 
 trusted but very disagreeable servant of the 
 charming mistress into whose service I was 
 about to enter, I took my seat in the market- 
 cart, timid and startled, but not dispirited. 
 
 Just as we were on the point of starting, it 
 struck me that I should like to have a brief 
 interview once more with Susan Latchett, 
 before quitting the scenes of that childhood on
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 163 
 
 which she had expended so much kindness. 
 Acting on this feeling, I inquired of Mrs. 
 Muscut if she would be so good as to drive 
 by the way of Susan's cottage, and stop at the 
 door for a minute. 
 
 " Whar is this woman the brat talks of?" 
 inquired Mrs. Muscut of her brother, with a 
 growl that did not tend to give me a more 
 favourable impression of her character. 
 
 " She is a busy woman, sister Anne, — and 
 she is very fond of her." 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! — she is a busy woman ; that's 
 bad! And she is fond of her — that is 
 wuss." 
 
 " She has been very good to me, Mrs. 
 Muscut — and she took care of me when I was 
 very little and had no mother," said I, with 
 courageous artifice, throwing into my voice 
 an earnestness and pathos that are found no- 
 where beyond the regions of childhood and 
 opera-boxes. 
 
 m 2
 
 164 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " She had better have wrung your neck," 
 returned Mrs. Muscut, drily. 
 
 There was no good to be attained in 
 urging my petition ; so I held my tongue in 
 silence, and restrained within my breast 
 the rising emotions of disappointment and 
 anger that nearly choked me. In obedience to 
 Joel's directions, the cart was driven through 
 a broken and circuitous by-lane, that diverged 
 from the main road at the bottom of the hill, 
 leaving the village and Susan Latchett's cot- 
 tage on the left. 
 
 It was a long and memorable journey. 
 The weather was bitterly cold for the time of 
 the year, the wind whistling sharply about my 
 ears, and a raw mist, that ever bordered on 
 the quality of downright rain, chilling my 
 slight face, and tiny hands, and uncovered 
 ancles. We travelled slowly, for the pony, 
 a stout rather than a mercurial creature, 
 declined stirring one inch more than five
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 165 
 
 miles an hour. By mid-day I was very 
 weary of the journey, and had exhausted all 
 the means my ingenuity suggested of whiling 
 away the time. I sought amusement in 
 scanning Mrs. Muscut's face — stern, deeply 
 lined, and repellent as to features, selfish and 
 stolidly brutal as to expression. She looked 
 considerably over fifty, but no sign of feeble- 
 ness or decay was visible in her weather- 
 beaten visage. Neither to the right nor to the 
 left did she look ; it was only now and then 
 that she deigned to glance at me, and on 
 those occasions her eyes were anything but 
 pleasant and reassuring; her face was set 
 forwards with an air of stoical endur- 
 ance ; such as certain popular engra- 
 vings inform us Napoleon's wore, as he rode 
 his mule over the snow-encrusted mountains. 
 At one time I wished she would relieve the 
 monotony of our progress by talking, but the 
 following brief passage of conversation inclined
 
 166 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 me to change my mind, and hope for a contin- 
 uance of the silence that ensued. 
 
 " What are you chattering so for ? " 
 
 " I can't help it, ma'am ; my teeth wont 
 keep still. I am so very cold." 
 
 " I ain't cold. I have two shawls on under 
 my cloak, and a rug over my legs. I ain't 
 cold." 
 
 " Might I put that sacking over me that 
 lies at the back of the cart, ma'am ? I think 
 I could make myself warm with it." 
 
 " If you dare to touch it, I'll give you a taste 
 of Tommy, and mark you like a zebra." 
 
 Tommy, I shortly afterwards learnt, was 
 the short stout dog-whip, with which, ever and 
 anon, the stalwart woman whacked the fat sides 
 and haunches of her pony. 
 
 Three times in the course of our prolonged 
 drive, Mrs. Muscut stopped at houses of en- 
 tertainment, where provision for horse and man 
 was offered for a modest consideration. On
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 167 
 
 each of these occasions Mrs. Muscut refreshed 
 her own person and that of her steed, the 
 former with ale and gin mixed, and the latter 
 with water and a handful of oats ; but I was 
 not supposed to stand in need of any such 
 support. Moreover, as the afternoon began 
 to wear on, Mrs. Muscut took from a basket a 
 store of bread and cheese, and, allowing the 
 pony to lag at foot pace up a long hill-range, 
 ate heartily and with much relish ; but she 
 never offered me any portion of her repast. 
 
 " You're hungry," she observed, when she 
 had consumed the last morsel of her stock of 
 food. "I'll be bound, now, you are very 
 hungry. I should not wonder, now, if you 
 have got quite an appetite." 
 
 " I am hungry, ma'am." 
 
 " Well, I'll stop while you get out of the 
 cart,and pick a Swede turnip out of that field. 
 A raw turnip ain't such a bad thing for an 
 empty belly."
 
 168 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 The pangs of inanition were upon me ; a 
 cruel cramp had for several minutes been 
 playing with the internal muscles and coats of 
 my stomach; and I was really grateful for this 
 permission to stay the gnawing torture with 
 a stolen meal that a sheep would have taken 
 as its right. I climbed the gate, plucked from 
 the ground the largest turnip I could see, and 
 brought it back with me, top and all, to the cart. 
 But I had no sooner again seated myself be- 
 hind the pony, that, on an allusion to Tommy, 
 proceeded to make valiant use of its limbs, 
 than I repented having so greedily selected so 
 enormous a root. I had not a knife with 
 which to cut it, and my little jaws were un- 
 able to gape wide enough to bite it with effect. 
 This last straw broke down my courage, which 
 had borne up against hunger, cold, and con- 
 tumely, and, in the bitterness of my vexation, 
 I burst into tears. 
 
 "Yar greedy, guzzling, little divvle — it
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 169 
 
 sarves you right ! " observed my companion, 
 who had watched my trouble with keen and 
 satisfied eyes. " If you had not been such a 
 little hog, you would have had nought to cry 
 about. There, hold your row, or I'll come 
 down on you, and give you a taste of Tommy, 
 just to warm your blood, and put you in a 
 better humour." 
 
 Terror-stricken, I managed to restrain my 
 whining, but not to bring my tears and sobs 
 to a period. But this was not enough to 
 please Mrs. Muscut, who, though she, for 
 the present, restrained herself from applying 
 Tommy to my shoulders, snatched the turnip 
 from my hands, and, grasping hold of the 
 top, banged the root half-a-dozen times over 
 my head and face, and then hurled it over 
 her shoulder into the back of the cart, ob- 
 serving that it would do very well for my 
 supper and spare her swill-tub. 
 
 " My missus," I cried indignantly, and
 
 170 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 with the defiance of rebellion flashing in my 
 eyes, " wont feed me on raw turnips. She's 
 a kind lady, Mr. Haggart told me so. And 
 if you strike me again, I'll tell her how you 
 have treated me, and get you turned off." 
 
 Instead of exhibiting any fear or irritation 
 at this threat, Mrs. Muscut relaxed the stern- 
 ness of her aspect, and after a series of pre- 
 liminary chuckles, burst into a long peal of 
 heavy, harsh laughter. There was very little 
 merriment in the noise she made, but a great 
 deal of that savage ravenous delight with 
 which a nearly famished wolf would pounce 
 on a feeble kid. 
 
 " So you'll tell missus ? " enquired Mrs. 
 Muscut, when the more violent signs of her 
 amusement had passed away ; " you'll tell 
 missus, will you ? " 
 
 And this inquiry she renewed again and 
 again, leering at me with a fiendish grin of 
 mockery every time she repeated the question.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 171 
 
 For one reason I did not object to her doing 
 so, for at the word " missus," my thoughts 
 reverted to the bright warm picture of beauty, 
 splendour, and urbanity that I had formed in 
 my imagination of my future mistress. 
 
 The time was wearing on to three o'clock 
 in the afternoon, when we emerged from the 
 district of small enclosures and high fences 
 that we had spent the morning in traversing, 
 and crossed over a bleak, barren heath, on 
 which nothing save stumpy bushes of furze 
 were able to grow ; then we scraped and 
 jerked our tardy way over a succession of 
 smaller commons, each of which had a com- 
 munity of a dozen geese, a donkey, a few 
 pigs, and a man standing staring into a dull 
 black pond, as if meditating suicide ; and 
 after these bits of unreclaimed waste land, we 
 entered on another heath, wider, wilder, 
 blacker, and more appalling in its rugged de- 
 solation than any scene the terrors and goblins
 
 172 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 of childhood had ever enabled me to con- 
 ceive. 
 
 The wind was fresher and colder, and pro- 
 duced in my nerves, benumbed as they were, 
 a novel and not unpleasurable sensation, but 
 which caused my teeth to chatter more than 
 before. 
 
 " Ah, yar colder," observed Mrs. Muscut, 
 with evident relish for my sufferings ; "it is 
 the sea-air yar feel, and yar'll be colder still 
 before I have done with yar." 
 
 As she said this, far away at a remote 
 corner of the heath, miles distant from any 
 farm, or homestead, or church, rose to sight 
 a cottage and a few sheds. I was debating 
 what kind of people dwelt in such a habi- 
 tation, placed in such an undesirable locality, 
 and flanked by not one stick of tree, 
 hedge, or timber of any kind, whereby the 
 keen blasts of the east wind might be warded 
 off, and I was wondering whether its inmates
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 173 
 
 were more wicked or miserable than those who 
 dwelt in villages, near the voices and hearths 
 of their fellow-men, when Mrs. Muscut broke 
 in upon my musings by pointing with her 
 whip to the object of my meditations, and 
 gruffly informing me that it was to be my 
 future home. 
 
 "What, ma'am, does my mistress live 
 there?" 
 
 " Yes, she does.'' 
 
 " What, ma'am, the nice lady Mr. Haggart 
 told me about ? " 
 
 "Yes, she does. The place is nice enough, 
 ain't it ?" 
 
 A chill crept over me, as I vaguely recog- 
 nised something of the true state of my posi- 
 tion. 
 
 We drew nearer to the dwelling, and, as we 
 did so, I found it to be larger than I had 
 thought it was at first sight. From the num- 
 ber of its windows it clearly contained several
 
 174 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 apartments, and it was considerably higher 
 than the residences of the poor usually are, 
 but over it, and before it, and on all sides of it 
 were speaking signs of the savage nature of 
 those who lived in it. The fence round the 
 garden was broken down, the gate had dropped 
 from its hinges and lay on the bank, fractured 
 and fast mouldering into touchwood. Eank 
 weeds, some of gigantic growth, and some 
 creeping on the ground like noxious vermin, 
 choked the paths, the beds, and the entire 
 space of the garden. The tenement itself was 
 sadly in need of repair, for places in the roof, 
 from which tiles had dropped, were stuffed up 
 with straw ; in every window, paper did duty 
 for glass, and if the wood- work of the structure 
 had ever been painted, the brushes that were 
 used in the operation must have perished be- 
 fore George the Third ascended the throne. 
 
 A meagre, bowed, palsied, crafty-looking 
 old man opened the cottage door, and shambled
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 175 
 
 down the path of the garden to give us greet- 
 ing. 
 
 " Oh ! — that's she — the young warmint ! " 
 observed the venerable man, fixing a pair of 
 keen eyes on me. 
 
 "That's her, Dannell Muscut — and, trust 
 me, if we use her sharp and feed her low, she'll 
 do us a good deal o' work afore she die. Now 
 get out — don't sit there, as if the cart was 
 your right place." 
 
 These concluding words were addressed to 
 me, and, by way of giving emphasis to them, 
 Mrs. Muscut clutched hold of my clothes at 
 my waist, and with a powerful grasp raised 
 me up in her right hand as if I weighed 
 no more than a cat, and flung me on the 
 ground at Daniel Muscut's feet like a bag of 
 meal. The old man aided me to scramble to my 
 feet, by giving me a kick with a boot which 
 was of a much more substantial make than its 
 wearer. My small person having thus been
 
 176 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 temporarily disposed of, Mrs. Muscut pro- 
 ceeded to unload her cart of a hamper, two 
 large baskets, and the sacking which I had in 
 vain begged to be allowed to use as a protec- 
 tion against the inclement atmosphere. When 
 these articles had all been taken from the 
 cart and placed upon the ground, Daniel 
 Muscut led off the pony and vehicle to a shed 
 and stable that flanked the dwelling-house, and 
 Mrs. Muscut, having ordered me to convey, 
 with all proper care and dispatch, the luggage 
 into the living-room of the cottage, moved off, 
 to divest herself of her bonnet and wrappers, 
 and prepare for the abundant meal it was my 
 high privilege to see her soon afterwards 
 take. 
 
 It was no easy task for my chilled fingers 
 to carry the heavy baskets across the garden, 
 but I managed to complete my task by the 
 time Mrs. Muscut descended from her bed- 
 room, relieved of her out-door gear.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 177 
 
 "Then yar har brought em in, har yar?" 
 remarked that amiable lady. "It is lucky for 
 yar yar har. If yar had not, I would har 
 set my old man on yar." 
 
 At this instant Mrs. Muscut's old man sham- 
 bled into the apartment, which was furnished 
 in the ordinary fashion of a peasant farmer's 
 dwelling room, and possibly interpreting Mrs. 
 Muscut's words as an order to commence action, 
 he sidled over to me, and administered to 
 me a succession of cuffs on the head and 
 pinches on the arms. While paying me these 
 hospitable attentions he did not utter any 
 words of anger, or dislike, or pleasure ; but 
 his gray eyes twinkled amiably, as if he dis- 
 cerned a rich field of enjoyment opened to him 
 in subjecting me to bodily torture. He was 
 a remarkably taciturn being, not speaking 
 twice in the four-and-twenty hours, unless it 
 was to reply with the utmost brevity to his 
 wife's questions; but he never wearied of 
 
 vol. i. N
 
 178 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 listening to her observations on men and 
 matters, and my delinquencies which, as I 
 and the Muscuts became more intimate, 
 afforded that lady an inexhaustible source of 
 material for thought and pious ejaculation. 
 At first, this habitual silence on the part of Mr. 
 Muscut troubled me excessively. At the com- 
 mencement of our acquaintance, when he sham- 
 bled up to me, and began to pinch me, tweak 
 my nose, nip my ears, and pull my hair, I used 
 to implore him to inform me of the cause of his 
 displeasure, so that I might conform to his 
 wishes, and escape such disagreeable demon- 
 strations of his ill-will ; but he would never 
 answer a word, or indicate by any sign or sound 
 that he heard my speech, unless the calm per- 
 sistency with which he continued his petty tor- 
 tures might be regarded as a proof that he 
 heeded and was affected by my remonstrances. 
 On the present occasion he let me off easily, 
 and took his seat at the table in the middle of
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 179 
 
 the room, on which a white cloth and knives 
 and forks were spread, ready for the reception 
 of a joint of pork, which Mrs. Muscut removed 
 from the fire, where it had been roasting under 
 the inspection of her husband. Soon the meal 
 was commenced by my master and mistress, 
 which latter personage, after she had taken the 
 edge off her appetite, deigned to address me 
 in the following considerate style : — 
 
 " Don't keep staring at me, you murderous 
 little cat, but take off your bonnet, and eat a 
 meal from that dish of fragments you'll find 
 in the sink in the corner. Eat your victuals 
 there where you find 'em, and thank God for 
 all his mercies. And mind, don't you so much 
 as turn your eye to look at me and my 
 Dannell Muscut. A gal like you har no right 
 to eye her betters, — and if I catch you doing 
 it I'll send a fire-pan at your head. And if 
 you seem to me by your way of standing to be 
 listening to what we talk about, I'll just come 
 
 n2
 
 180 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 across the* room and flay you with Tommy this 
 blessed night, so that you may know who is 
 going to be missus — you or me." 
 
 Obediently to the command, but not from 
 any desire for food, I removed my bonnet and 
 shawl, and went to the sink, whereon I found 
 an old tin candle-box, containing scraps of 
 mouldy bread, refuse meat, tea-leaves, bones, 
 potato- peelings, and that very self-same turnip 
 which I had pulled from the field and Mrs. 
 Muscut had belaboured my head with an hour 
 or so before. In all the poverty of my 
 previous life, and often as I had gone supper- 
 less to bed, I had never before been com- 
 manded to eat a meal that would have scarce 
 been fit for swine ; and now, faint though I 
 was, from having consumed no food since my 
 customary scant morning's breakfast, I was so 
 nauseated with sight of the loathsome mess 
 before me, that I could not find courage to 
 devour a particle of it.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 181 
 
 Too benumbed with terror to entertain any- 
 definite feelings of indignation to those who 
 had kidnapped me, and proposed using me as 
 a slave, I stood unconsciously turning over in 
 my mind whatever scraps of Mrs. Muscut's 
 talk to her husband reached my ears. 
 
 They were a singular contrast, that hus- 
 band and wife ; about as remarkable a couple 
 as it has been my fate to observe. They 
 were out of the common way for several 
 reasons. There was at least twenty years' 
 difference in their ages ; Mrs. Muscut did all 
 the talking, and Mr. Muscut all the listening ; 
 both of them were industrious, Mrs. Muscut 
 as chief, Mr. Muscut, as subordinate, the 
 latter never for one moment seeming to resent 
 the superiority of the former, or indeed giving 
 a thought to it. They never quarrelled with 
 each other, and for years — indeed upwards of 
 a quarter of a century — had led a most har- 
 monious wedded life. She was tall, full of
 
 182 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 figure, athletic, with a stern, stony face; he 
 was slight, decrepid, with long attenuated 
 features, an imbecile expression, and snowy 
 locks that might have adorned a prophet. 
 They were not indigent, nor did they stint 
 themselves of the creature-comforts they had 
 a fancy for. Their occupation was, as I 
 shortly discovered, to rear and fatten poultry 
 for Livermere market, and the trade they 
 drove with their flocks of turkeys and geese, 
 and their scores of other fowls, was a suffi- 
 ciently flourishing one to permit of their in- 
 dulging in the pleasures of eating and intoxi- 
 cation. 
 
 The evening meal of these two worthies 
 went on slowly, and came to end without their 
 deigning to take any notice of me. Mrs. 
 Muscut, when the repast was finished, removed 
 the edibles, and put them and the dishes into 
 the pantry closet, without demanding my 
 assistance. By herself she shortly afterwards
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 183 
 
 got out the tea-things, and made tea for her- 
 self and the silent Daniel. While bustling 
 about on these household duties, she three 
 times passed close by me, the skirt of her 
 dress brushing against mine, but she gave me 
 no heed ; apparently she was not aware of my 
 presence in the dark corner nigh the sink. I 
 heard the tinkling and clicking of the tea- 
 spoons, and cups and saucers, and the sounds 
 called up in my mind a longing for a cup of 
 hot beverage to moisten my cracked lips and 
 dry throat. But no tea — not even a drop — 
 came my way. It became dark in the room 
 where the fire was glowing, as well as in the 
 damp unpleasant corner where I still con- 
 tinued to stand with my eyes turned to the 
 blackness where, at an earlier period of the 
 afternoon (or evening), I had been able to 
 discern a few grimy shelves, and a jack-towel 
 that seemed meant for me to strangle myself 
 with. After awhile Mrs. Muscut lighted a
 
 184 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 candle, and then, having seated herself once 
 more, and chatted for another ten minutes in 
 the same husky voice in which she had all 
 along made her confidential communications 
 to her husband, suddenly exclaimed in a harsh 
 shrill tone, as though she wanted to make 
 herself heard a mile off: — 
 
 " Miriam Copley, quick — come here ! " 
 The period of my neglect had been so pro- 
 tracted, that I could scarcely credit my ears 
 when at length Mrs. Muscut condescended 
 to address me once more. There was no 
 doubt, however, left in my mind, when Mrs. 
 Muscut impatiently reiterated her request that 
 I should quit the corner and approach her 
 more honourable quarter of the room. 
 
 Opening my contracting eye-lids as wide as 
 possible, so as to appear lively and wide-awake 
 in the presence and before the terrible gaze of 
 Mrs. Muscut, I compelled my aching legs to 
 move briskly across the brick floor of the
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 185 
 
 apartment. The candle that was alight on the 
 table contrasted so brilliantly with the black- 
 ness of the angle in which I had been standing, 
 that my sight was dazzled by its splendour, 
 and I had to wait a few seconds ere I could 
 distinguish the different objects before me. 
 When however my visual powers were restored, 
 I remarked with a quickness of observation 
 which has been one of my most unvarying and 
 useful mental endowments, that Mrs. Muscut's 
 face was flushed, and that Mr. Muscut's eyes 
 gleamed with singular brightness, and that 
 amongst two tumblers, two spirit-bottles, and 
 a sugar-basin, there stood on the table a small 
 stumpy glass-stopped bottle, containing a black 
 fluid, and bearing across its plethoric shape a 
 paper, on which was printed " poison." My 
 surprise and horror may be imagined when I 
 saw Mr. Muscut proceed to pour some of the 
 contents of this horrible bottle into his tum- 
 bler of brandy-and-water, and after nodding
 
 186 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 at me with fearful significance, drain off the 
 mixture with relish. So much exhilarated 
 was he with the effects of this performance 
 that, as he threw himself back in his chair, 
 and stroked his long white hair with his feeble 
 hands, he closed the paralytic lids of his right 
 eye with a movement that aimed at being a 
 jaunty wink. 
 
 " Have you eaten your supper ? " inquired 
 Mrs. Muscut. 
 
 " I couldn't eat any, ma'am," was my 
 timid response. 
 
 "Yar couldn't? — Is this the way yar treat 
 the wholesome food I, Ann, and Dannell my 
 husband, Muscut put before you? Do yar 
 mean to say yar been so owdacious as to put 
 on the sulks, and har refused yar victuals ! " 
 
 1 began to cry. 
 
 " Hold yar whimpering ! Cease yar 
 whining — or yar'll have summut to whine 
 for. And now tell me what has put your
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 187 
 
 blood up in this way. What have you to 
 blubber about ? " 
 
 Without any definite hopes that good would 
 result from a courageous line of conduct, I 
 replied boldly, " I am unhappy because Mr. 
 Haggart told me you would take me to a kind 
 rich missus, and I thought when I started off 
 with you this morning that you were going to 
 carry me to a fine house, where I should be 
 brought up honestly, and see beautiful things 
 —and— " 
 
 Here I paused abruptly, and allowed a 
 burst of genuine tears — that had all the art 
 and none of the artifice of eloquence — to tell 
 what my tongue could not say. But I was 
 addressing an audience who had no tender 
 emotions for the feeble wretched child they 
 had got into their power. 
 
 " Dannell Muscut," exclaimed Mrs. Muscut, 
 in a guttural tone. 
 
 Daniel raised himself from the recumbent
 
 188 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 position, and leaned forward in his chair, 
 looking me steadily in the face with eyes 
 that twinkled venomously, and stretching his 
 right hand out in the direction of the fire- 
 place. 
 
 "Dannell Muscut," repeated my mistress, 
 
 " Dannell Muscut, do you sit by, and hear 
 your wife insulted by a grasshopper like 
 that?" 
 
 The taunt aroused all the manly courage of 
 the venerable Daniel. He snatched a stumpy 
 hearth-brush from the fire-place, and struck 
 me with all his force on the top of the 
 head. I screamed with fear as much as pain, 
 and cried aloud for mercy; but again the 
 thick handle of the brush descended — this 
 time giving me a blow just behind the left ear 
 — and I dropped upon the ground sense- 
 less.
 
 189 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 SERVITUDE. 
 
 When my senses returned to me, I was alone 
 in a small room, or rather closet, that had no 
 furniture whatever save a piece of ragged 
 matting, and a square yard of rough cloth 
 such as is used to make the commonest horse- 
 clothings of. The former article, it appeared, 
 was my bed, and the latter its coverlet; at 
 least I conjectured so, as it soon became clear 
 to me that I had passed some hours in slumber
 
 190 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 under one and upon the other. The walls 
 of the chamber, once white, were green with 
 the effects of damp, and the one window, that 
 could not boast a single unbroken diamond 
 of glass, was crossed and laced by strong iron 
 bars. There was a fireplace, and, half uncon- 
 sciously, I crept to it, and looked up the chim- 
 ney — possibly hoping to find in it the means 
 of access to the roof of the house, and thence 
 to liberty ; but two stout bars, fixed in the 
 brick-work, made it evident that escape 
 through that passage was not to be effected. 
 Next I tried the door, but that, of course, was, 
 as I had anticipated, bolted. 
 
 Putting my hand to my head, which was 
 stiff and sore with the blows of the previous 
 night, I found that it was bandaged tight with 
 a kerchief tied in a knot at the top of my fore- 
 head, but the stain of the blood on my dress 
 informed me that the wound given by the 
 second blow had bled profusely. I was doubt-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 191 
 
 less weak with fasting and maltreatment, for 
 my brain began to reel, and my knees to totter, 
 so that I felt the only way to save myself from 
 falling would be to lie down. I therefore 
 returned to my lair on the dirty mat, and I 
 drew the rug round me to fence off the chill 
 air. Prudently, too, I tried to sleep, but my 
 efforts were unsuccessful, and I lay for at least 
 two hours watching the cold grey dawn stream 
 in through my prison window, and waiting 
 sullenly the misery which I felt was in store 
 for me. 
 
 It did not tax my keen wits to recognise 
 the exact nature of my position. For an infant, 
 I was strangely sharp in reading character, 
 and detecting the motives of those whose 
 actions aroused my attention; and now every 
 turn and point in the game of the last few 
 days that had before been obscure to me lay 
 out in the full light, uncloaked and without 
 misrepresentation. My father had committed
 
 192 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 no murder, for I had seen him struck dead 
 by the very man whose life he was supposed 
 to have taken, and the gamekeeper had been 
 shot by Joel Haggart. All this I knew, had 
 been an eye-witness of — had been the only eye- 
 witness of, with the exception of Jack Tandy, 
 whose interest would keep him quiet about 
 the matter. I was the only person whom Joel 
 Haggart had to fear ; as long as I was unable 
 to reveal the truth concerning the fray at 
 Melton Stubbs, he was secure from detection. 
 But once let me have the will and the power 
 to give evidence against him, and it would not 
 be long ere the gallows would be raised at 
 Clumford jail, and the literature of our 
 country be enriched with the last dying speech 
 and confession of as clever a knave as had 
 ever adorned a virtuous rural district. Pru- 
 dently, therefore, had he made me over to the 
 care of his sister. Would she be true to him, 
 and keep me prisoner all the days of my life ?
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 193 
 
 Undoubtedly she would. Quickened in wit 
 by the alarming circumstances of my case, I 
 saw that Mrs. Muscut would be induced by a 
 combination of motives to perform with fidelity 
 the task she had undertaken — by pride, love 
 of money, and cruelty. Of course she would 
 not wish to see her brother hung, and have 
 his name become a bye-word for shame. Joel 
 Haggart also was rich enough to pay liberally 
 anyone who rendered him courageously dan- 
 gerous service ; and a sister's love to her 
 brother is a powerful and active sentiment, 
 when he is able, and in the mind, to pay hand- 
 somely for it in money. Moreover, I doubted 
 not Mrs. Muscut would enjoy her possession of 
 me ; would gladly use me as a drudge ; and 
 take pleasure in taunting, and starving, and 
 beating me, till, emaciated in body, and stupe- 
 fied in mind, I should sink down cold and 
 dead, — dead as poor Roger Copley. 
 
 "With what admirable cunning had Joel 
 VOL. I.
 
 194 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Haggart played his part! how adroitly had 
 he managed to commit the crime and avoid 
 the penalty ! and with what exquisite dex- 
 terity had he blindfolded a poor child with 
 fear, and made her lips utter the perjury that 
 had saved him from exposure and destruction. 
 And was such the reward of falsehood ? — not 
 my falsehood, but his ? It never occurred to 
 me to regard my lamentable plight as a 
 punishment for the lies I had deliberately told 
 the magistrates ; but I fixed my thoughts on 
 the immunity from chastisement that had 
 attended Joel Haggart's crimes. I saw in it 
 only the natural result of consummate du- 
 plicity. All my misstatements, prevarications, 
 and deceitful reticence were the consequences 
 of his strong will and cunning acting on my 
 ignorance and alarm ; they were his faults, 
 not mine, — and they went to swell the amount 
 of his iniquities. Such, then, was the reward 
 of clever lying — freedom from a disgraceful
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 195 
 
 death, and the power of acting according to 
 one's wish for good or harm. How was this ? 
 Was it possible that all the abhorrence I had 
 heard expressed for falsehood was only a trick 
 by which the rich and gentle scared poor 
 folk from adopting a line of conduct that 
 would infallibly be most beneficial to them ? 
 It seemed so. And I embraced this as the 
 lesson experience had given me ; and, 
 as I crouched on my dirty mat, and 
 gnawed my nails to the quick, I resolved 
 in after life, should I ever escape from 
 my present captors, to profit by the teachings 
 I had received. Clearly, I was a very wicked 
 child — seeing what was set before me, and 
 counting two and two as four ! 
 
 A key turned in the lock of my dungeon, 
 and Mrs. Muscut entered, grim and slatternly. 
 She stood over me without speaking, examined 
 my head, taking off the bandage and replacing 
 it, felt my pulse, ordered me to put out my 
 
 o2
 
 196 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 tongue, and then, with a satisfied nod of the 
 head, left the room. In a few seconds, she 
 returned with a liberal supply of wholesome 
 bread, and a tin mug full of table-beer, which 
 she curtly ordered me to consume. I did so, 
 and, as a consequence of my obedience, expe- 
 rienced a sensation of gladness and confusion, 
 that was both novel and indescribably plea- 
 sant ; in fact, the small quantity of alcohol 
 contained in the table-beer had got into my 
 head, and made me slightly tipsy. This 
 agreeable state had no sooner been arrived at, 
 than Mrs. Muscut, who had again absented 
 herself for the few minutes during which I 
 made my repast, returned and stood over my 
 bed. 
 
 " Whar are yar lying so late as this i' the 
 morning ? " 
 
 "I did not know I was to get up, ma'am — 
 and till just now the door was locked." 
 
 " No answering, yar huzzy — no wording or
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 197 
 
 maundering — yar must know me better than to 
 think of doing so, and now is as good time as 
 any time for beginning to teach yar." 
 
 "Indeed, ma'am, I'll do whatever you 
 wish." 
 
 "Will yar? But yar lie, yar little brat; 
 yar want to run away — I see it in yar eye ; 
 but yar sha'nt. There are bars on yar win- 
 dow, and bars up the chimney, and every 
 night yar shall be locked up here, and I'll 
 turn the key on yar, and yar shall never be 
 let out save to do work under my own eye — 
 and precious hard I'll work yar. I have had 
 three gals as occupied this room, one arter the 
 other ; and I warked 'em, and flogged 'em, and 
 starved 'em, and made 'em live in filth till they 
 died — died by inches. And so I'll do to you. I 
 like pauper brats, for the law lets you treat 
 'em as you like, and as there's none in the 
 house save me and my old man, I can feed 'em 
 as I like, and use 'em as I like, and yet there
 
 198 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 are no words made the country through. — Ah, 
 yes, we are nice and lonely here ; it's a sweet 
 place for making away with a parish brat. 
 And, now, tell me what yar mean by shamming 
 as yar did last night, and pretending to fall 
 down stunned just because my Dannel tapped 
 you on the head playful-like with a small 
 wand ? " 
 
 " I did not sham, ma'am." 
 
 " What ! yar say yar did not sham, when I 
 say yar did ! yar dare to contradict me ! yar 
 dare to tell me I tell lies ! yar dare to use 
 such language to yar lawful mistress ! I never 
 heard o' the like !" 
 
 Having thus ingeniously argued the case till 
 she had put me in the position of a rebellious 
 and insolent girl calling her a liar, Mrs. Muscut 
 seized me by the neck with her left hand, and 
 drawing from behind the skirt of her dress 
 her right hand, that had up to this point 
 of the interview been concealed, waved
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 199 
 
 and brandished over me the terrible lash of 
 Tommy. 
 
 I will not weary or vex the reader with a 
 minute recapitulation of all the barbarities 
 that formed the ingredients of my cup of bit- 
 terness whilst I was under Mrs. Muscut's 
 dominion. I must be believed when I say 
 that that energetic lady was as good as her 
 word. In every particular my life was such as 
 she graphically declared it should be. Every 
 night I was locked up in the cold closet, and 
 kept in under key, and bolt, and bar, during 
 the hours of darkness. Every day I was 
 taken out of this dungeon, and made to work, 
 under the lash and eyes of my merciless task- 
 master and mistress, attending the fowl-yard, 
 plucking the fowls and preparing them for 
 market, tilling the miserable garden, and 
 doing the drudgery of the house. Never a 
 day passed that I was not beaten with greater 
 or less severity.
 
 200 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 For two years I was never permitted to stir 
 off the premises ; and never was I left alone 
 during the hours I worked in and about the 
 house. The bold savage eye of the woman, or 
 the feeble cruel one of the man, peered on me 
 from some corner, wherever I was and what- 
 ever I chanced to be doing. It was soon 
 manifest to me that they apprehended I should 
 attempt an escape ; and at the end of the 
 first fortnight of my captivity they took a 
 most comical measure against any design I 
 might entertain of flitting. 
 
 The wash-house, as it was termed, which 
 with the kitchen (I mean the ordinary 
 living-room of Mr. and Mrs. Muscut) con- 
 stituted the ground-floor of the house, was 
 entered by a doorway, the posts of which 
 were made of massive oak. Into one of 
 these posts a stout staple, passing through 
 an extreme link of a heavy iron chain, was 
 driven. The other end of this chain termi-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 201 
 
 nated in a bright steel fetter, which, regu- 
 larly as the day came round, was fitted to 
 my ancle, and locked with a key which it 
 was Mr. Muscut's peculiar delight to cherish 
 in his waistcoat pocket, and on the barrel 
 of which he would, in moments of hilarity, 
 whistle tunes derisive of all degrees of bond- 
 age. I was thus securely tethered to a point 
 in the centre of the domicile, and my owners 
 could turn their backs upon me, while I 
 performed my tasks in either apartment, 
 without any fear of my taking to my heels 
 and compelling them to pursue me, or let 
 me depart at the risk of public scandal. 
 But they were too cautious ever to leave 
 me unwatched. It was a very rare occur- 
 rence — not oftener than once in a fortnight 
 that anyone approached the house ; and 
 even so, in nine cases out of ten, the 
 intruder was a messenger from a higgler in 
 fowls with an order for some of the articles
 
 202 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 in which the Muscuts dealt, who took him- 
 self off speedily after having executed his 
 commission. But, few and far between as 
 were these visits of strangers, they were 
 still frequent enough to impress on my cap- 
 tors the necessity of being provided for them, 
 and of never letting anyone by any chance 
 know of my forming a part of the household. 
 To avoid any such disclosure, therefore, 
 either my master or mistress always hovered 
 round me when I was engaged " below- 
 stairs;" and immediately any stranger drew 
 nigh to the habitation — if even Mrs. Mus- 
 cut's little house-dog was uneasy and barked, 
 as though the scent of unknown wayfarers 
 irritated his nerves — I was hurried across 
 the wash-house, pushed into the coal-closet, 
 and had the key turned upon me in a 
 twinkling. Every Wednesday, before dawn, 
 Mrs. Muscut went off with a store of poultry 
 to Livermere market, and never returned 
 till night.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 203 
 
 When I reflect on this period of suffering, 
 I cannot understand how it was I lived 
 through it all, much more how I survived 
 it with unimpaired mental faculties. Un- 
 questionably it robbed me, beyond a possi- 
 bility of redemption, of the more delicate of 
 my moral endowments, and rendered me 
 incapable of arriving at that goodness which 
 I am compelled, in spite of an envious and 
 detracting spirit, to own I have witnessed 
 in some few mortals — men and women — 
 whom I have regarded with mingled feelings 
 of wonder and dislike, cordial affection and 
 degrading self-humiliation. Never for one 
 minute till I had freed myself from this 
 horrible servitude did I lose a vivid con- 
 sciousness of the wrongs that had been done 
 me, or cease to burn for vengeance. Night 
 and day I fretted my brain to discover 
 means not only of escape, but also of pay- 
 ing back the injuries I had received. When
 
 204 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 I had fits of muscular spasms, attended with 
 foaming from the lips, they were the con- 
 sequence of my futile rage at being 
 worsted in a deadly struggle, and in not 
 being able to bite and suck the life-blood 
 from those who grasped me round the neck. 
 It was intolerable to think that I should 
 pass away without making terrible reprisals 
 on my captors. I deemed that I could die 
 happily if I might only first be permitted 
 to see Joel Haggart swing from a gallows 
 before Clumford jail, and know that Ann 
 Muscut rued the day she ever raised hand 
 to oppress the poor orphan child. 
 
 I believe this passion for vengeance had a 
 most beneficial influence on my physical con- 
 dition, that it nerved me to endure a weight of 
 suffering that I must otherwise have sunk under, 
 that it supported me against, and assisted me 
 eventually to triumph over the combined 
 forces of exposure to inclement atmosphere,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 205 
 
 loathsome diet, incessant toil, cruel contumely, 
 and constant stripes. For I grew in stature. 
 Thin, cadaverous, hideously emaciated, I 
 clung to existence, and climbed up it — as a 
 scarlet runner, or a hop springing from a 
 thirsty soil, twines round a pole. 
 
 A year of my captivity had slowly worked 
 itself round ; cruelty had not stupefied me ; 
 on the contrary, my intellect, from continually 
 dwelling on my wrongs — and searching out a 
 way to avenge them — instead of being cloud- 
 ed and feeble, was morbidly active and self- 
 reliant. Weird, cunning, secretive, revengeful, 
 I harboured in my little breast a legion of 
 devils that never ceased to sting and fillip 
 my brain. 
 
 One day I was crouching over a basket in 
 the wash-house, plucking a pair of chickens, 
 when I heard behind me a harsh rattle in a 
 human throat that made me jump as if an 
 adder had stung me. My chain rattled and
 
 206 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 clanked on the bricks of the wash-house floor, 
 as I sprung forwards ; then my tether checked 
 me, and turning round I confronted Joel 
 Haggart. The year had much altered him ; 
 he was even yet more corpulent, and his 
 enormous cheeks were pale and dropped over 
 the sides of his thick neck ; and in his red 
 eyes, with bleared lids, and in his swollen 
 palsied lips that were unable to give precision 
 to his utterances, I detected at a glance the 
 inroads of constant intemperance. I observed 
 this in an instant ; and to my dying day I 
 shall remember the dreadful pang that seized 
 my heart, as it flashed across me that he 
 might die ere I should be able to kill him. 
 
 " What, you're not dead yet ?" he exclaimed 
 with an oath as he laid a heavy hand on 
 my neck, and, swinging me round, shook me 
 till my teeth chattered. 
 
 On a table at the other side of the kitchen 
 lay a long bright pointed knife that was used
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 207 
 
 to cut the throats of chickens and dress 
 poultry with ; my eye fell upon this weapon, 
 and in a second of time I calculated the 
 possibility of springing to it, snatching it up, 
 and striking right to the heart of my enemy. 
 
 But with lightning rapidity the thought 
 vanished as it had come ; I saw that it would 
 be absolute madness to attempt such a plan of 
 vengeance, and I rejected it instantly. But 
 he saw what had passed through my mind ! 
 the fury of my flashing eyes had told him my 
 diabolical purpose, and cowed by me — the 
 feeble, starved, chained victim of his barbarity, 
 he staggered speechless and pallid away, 
 through the dwelling- room into the garden in 
 front of the house. 
 
 Joel Haggart stopped till a late hour that 
 day ere he departed. He dined and drunk 
 with his brother-in-law and sister at noon, and 
 he supped and drunk with them at about 
 seven in the evening; and after supper he
 
 208 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 continued his potations for full three hours, 
 during which time he contrived to take into 
 himself an astounding number of tumblers of 
 rum-and- water, or of gin poured out of a tall 
 bottle and diluted with scalding hot water 
 poured out of a jug. Arm Muscut took part 
 in the jollifications, but not to excess ; she was 
 a self-indulgent creature, but was prudent 
 enough, if not virtuous enough, never to 
 wander far beyond the limits of sobriety. 
 Daniel Muscut also joined in the festivity, and 
 without ever stirring a muscle, save when he 
 mixed or sipped his beverage, or when he 
 raised his shrivelled hands to stroke down his 
 long white locks, imbibed enough ardent 
 drink to put courage into an entire regiment 
 of Russian soldiers. And I had to watch 
 this symposium, standing at my servile post 
 in the dark corner, nigh the sink, with the 
 iron fetter round my ancle, and the chain that 
 tethered me to the wash-house door lying
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 209 
 
 coiled on the kitchen bricks like a sleeping ser- 
 pent. It was as dull, heavy, lifeless an occa- 
 sion of hilarity as it is possible to conceive; there 
 was no laughter, no song, no pledging of 
 health, no toast, no attempt to make the tongue 
 utter the language of merriment, no manifesta- 
 tion of any taste, sentiment, or relish of any 
 kind, save a lethargic inclination for the stu- 
 pefaction of drunkenness. I noticed that every 
 time Daniel Muscut filled his glass, after mix- 
 ing the sugar, and spirit, and hot water, he 
 added to the potion some of the dark fluid out 
 of the small stout bottle, labelled Poison, that 
 had attracted my attention on the first night 
 of my seeing him, and which many weary 
 nights since that time, I had looked at, as a be- 
 charmed gazer regards a rattle-snake, and had 
 pondered upon, while a vague purpose, tending 
 to a horrible crime, dimly took form and sub- 
 stance in my wretched existence. And as I 
 then stood a spectator of that melancholy orgy, 
 vol. i. p
 
 210 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 I speculated on whether it was possible for me 
 to use that small stout bottle, containing dark 
 fluid, and labelled poison, as a means of work- 
 ing liberation for myself and vengeance on my 
 enemies? Could I by any sleight of hand, 
 any exercise of adroitness, bring it about that 
 Daniel Muscut should mistake the poisonous 
 tincture for the less noxious spirit, and compose 
 a draught of deadly power ? Was this any- 
 how to be effected? The proposal took hold 
 of my fancy, it aroused my imagination, it 
 bewitched me with ghastly hideous hopes, the 
 blood at my heart leaped quickly to and fro, 
 and I saw a vision before me of a still, silent 
 farm-house kitchen, and a table in it covered 
 with materials for a rude debauch, in which a 
 mysterious bottle — empty — and a huge glass 
 beaker — empty also — figured conspicuously; 
 I saw also on the table a stinking candle, with 
 clotted wick and rancid fat guttering down 
 into a winding-sheet; and sitting in chairs
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 211 
 
 beside the table, one on one side and one on 
 the other, two figures — two human creatures, 
 a grey-haired man and a huge herculean 
 woman — slumbering heavily with thick ster- 
 torous breathing. Soon their breathing became 
 louder, more laboured, more spasmodic ; then 
 the rattling, and retching, and quick starts 
 became feeble sobs and sighs; then the struggle 
 between mechanical life and the drug ceased 
 — the foul candle went out in darkness, and 
 so did the lives of two mortals, whom I had 
 night and day, for many nights and days, 
 prayed God to remove from the thorny tangled 
 spot of the vast life-forest into which, away 
 from all human mercy and justice, weak, power- 
 less, and alone, I had strayed. 
 
 Hush ! there was muttering over the table. 
 Daniel Muscut was leaning back in his chair 
 with closed eyes and nodding head, dallying 
 with the stupor that was his liveliest enjoy- 
 ment ; but Ann Muscut and her brother in 
 
 p2
 
 212 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 hoarse confused whispers were conversing. 
 They did not intend me to hear, and they 
 lowered their voices so as scarcely to be 
 audible to each other ; but I, in my distant 
 corner, distinguished every syllable — the life 
 of suffering and watching, endurance of evil, 
 and preparation for escape that I had led for 
 months had made my body deceitful as well as 
 my mind; my nerves were as well fitted as my 
 will to overreach my tyrants. 
 
 " Sister Ann, I must be going, and I hope 
 I shall live to come round and look at you 
 another year." 
 
 " Yar will, if yar take care of yarself, and 
 don't allow foolish fancies to cast yar 
 down." 
 
 " I can't help the fancies ; they will come 
 on one, and I cannot drive them away. I have 
 never, since that night at the Stubbs, been the 
 same man that I was before ; I drink, but the 
 drink don't cheer me — however much I take,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 213 
 
 I can't manage even to lose my senses ; my 
 hand shakes, I have no heart to eat as I used, 
 and at night — oh, God Almighty ! in the dark 
 night — I roll from side to side, and if I turn 
 one way, there is Roger Copley — him ! and 
 if I turn the other, there is Miriam Sandford 
 —her ! " 
 
 "Joel Haggart," responded Ann Muscut, 
 with something of sisterly tenderness modula- 
 ting her harsh words, whispered though they 
 were, " yar a born fool. Don't be a weak blub- 
 bering babe. Don't let the three counties say 
 that Joel Haggart's heart failed him at last, 
 and he died a whining, canting, snivelling 
 coward of his own fears, instead of the gallows 
 — Jack Tandy can't hurt yar, and that gal 
 there will never trouble yar; so cheer up, and 
 don't think of the past." 
 
 " But I do think of the past, and I must. 
 And, Ann, I do think, and can't help thinking, 
 that if life was to come over again, I would be
 
 214 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 an honest man, working at a trade, and living 
 like a Christian." 
 
 There was a pause in the conversation, of 
 two or three minutes' duration, during which 
 Daniel Muscut's head continued to rise and 
 fall, as he alternately waked and dozed again. 
 Joel Haggart drained off the liquor that 
 remained in his glass, and Ann Muscut eyed 
 her brother keenly, as if examining the very 
 fibres of which his face was composed, 
 and endeavouring to detect, lurking amongst 
 them, the seeds of decay and dissolution. 
 
 "Ann Muscut/' observed Joel Haggart, 
 putting down his glass, and resuming the con- 
 versation in a louder, a more husky, and a more 
 unpleasant undertone, " if I come again next 
 year, I should like to find one less in the party." 
 
 Ann Muscut started, as her brother stopped 
 and pointed significantly to the corner where I 
 was standing. 
 
 " She can't hurt yar, Joel Haggart."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 215 
 
 " She can. She's alive." 
 
 " And let her. She can't harm yar." 
 
 " I did not think, sister Ann, when I sent 
 her here she'd have lived so long. She is a deli- 
 cate-made child, and I did not think she'd 
 have stood it. You must have used her 
 gently." 
 
 "Have I? Have I? I flog her as I 
 wouldn't flog my market hobby ; Dannell is 
 always knocking her about the head and 
 worrying her; I starve her — she don't live 
 so well as one of yar pigs ; and however cold 
 the weather may be, she has scarce rags 
 enough to cover her nakedness." 
 
 "She don't look as if she went through 
 all this. She is alive ; she grows ; she's thin 
 enough — but she don't look thick in the skull 
 and dunderhead, as a suffering child ought to 
 look ; she ain't wandering and dull in her wit, 
 she ain't heavy and stupid, she has got her 
 understanding better than you or I have."
 
 216 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 "Has she? May be. But, Joel, if she 
 have, I'll knock it out of her between to- 
 night and this time year." 
 
 " I don't want you to do her a violence, 
 Ann, but if the life as well as the understand- 
 ing could be taken out of her, I should be 
 easier. — As I said afore, if I come here again 
 next year, 1 should like to find one less in the 
 party. Only mind, Ann, no violence." 
 
 " She is a good servant, and does a lot of 
 work." 
 
 "Well." 
 
 " And I am not myself so strong as I used 
 to be, and if I lost her, I must have another 
 gal in her place, — and most likely if I had 
 any other gal, she'd have friends whom I 
 should be forced to let come about this place ; 
 and in that case, I could not feed her so cheap 
 as I do this one, and besides, I should most 
 likely have to pay her a wage. — And you 
 know, Joel, I am not rich."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 217 
 
 " But I am, Ann Muscut ; at least I have 
 something tidy to leave behind me, and as I 
 have made no will, and don't intend to make 
 any, you'll have all at my death ; but — mind — 
 mind me, Ann Muscut, if I come here next 
 year, and have reason to think you are not such 
 a good sister as I have always thought you, 
 why, I may take it into my head to make a will 
 you wont over much like. — Now you see what 
 I am driving at. Only, take care — no vio- 
 lence." 
 
 " Brother Joel, I have always been a good 
 sister to you, and I'll mind your words now. 
 I don't promise anything ; and of course I am 
 not going to do anything to bring it about ; 
 but somehow I think that that child's health 
 is not so good as yar fancy it, and I should not 
 be surprised if yar hear, when yar come here 
 this day year, that she is under the churchyard 
 green." 
 
 Joel Haggart made no reply to this
 
 218 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 response. He rose without a word, put on 
 his coat and hat, and walked out of the 
 room and house steadily as if he had drunk 
 nothing but water. He did not say fare- 
 well to Daniel Muscut, who, at length sound 
 asleep, did not on his part think it incum- 
 bent on himself to rise and bid his guest 
 and brother-in-law " God speed." Ann 
 Muscut, however, followed her brother out 
 of the house, and accompanied him to the 
 stable to assist in harnessing his horse and 
 putting it in his cart ; and when the affec- 
 tionate couple had left the room, I was 
 alone with the stupefied, drugged, uncon- 
 scious Daniel Muscut. 
 
 Had I not been chained I would have 
 made an attempt to recover my freedom, 
 but the weight of the iron on my ancle 
 reminded me that such an achievement was 
 beyond my power. As it was, I turned 
 my energies to accomplish whatever I might
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 219 
 
 be able to effect, within the limits of uiy 
 confinement, that might work for my bene- 
 fit sooner or later. Within my range was 
 the fireplace, with its heavy poker and other 
 irons, not to mention the brush that had 
 once felled me bleeding to the ground. 
 With one of these weapons, or with one of 
 the knives that lay shining on the table, I 
 could have approached Daniel Muscut, and 
 sent him to render an account to his Maker 
 for all the barbarities he had exercised on 
 me ; and it occurred to me that it would 
 be an unspeakable happiness to see his 
 snowy locks dabbled with his own crimson 
 blood, and to look down on his hated form 
 lying prostrate and vanquished at my feet. 
 But the reflection that this partial vengeance 
 would not secure to me the great object 
 that I had in view, restrained me from any 
 such foolish and intemperate course. But 
 still, I was alone, unwatched, the mistress
 
 220 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 of my own actions in those lower rooms, 
 and so in all probability I should remain 
 for a few minutes. Surely, here was an 
 occasion that I might turn to profitable 
 result. Once more my eye fell on the stout 
 bottle of dark fluid labelled poison, and 
 quickly I hit on the means of getting a 
 powerful instrument into my hands. 
 
 To some it may seem strange, but to 
 those who have made human nature a sys- 
 tematic study it will appear natural, that 
 in the degradation and abject wretchedness 
 of my captivity, I nursed with me a strong 
 love of having — a passion for acquiring — an 
 intense craving for property. With no 
 more liberty or power than a cowed house- 
 dog, that is only tenant of his kennel at 
 the will of his master, I was ever longing 
 to secure for myself the possession of some- 
 thing — anything ; and, in obedience to this 
 impulse, I constantly kept my eye out for
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 221 
 
 strays and waifs, contemptible bits of rub- 
 bish, that a Parisian chiffunnier would scarce 
 deign to stoop for, and, wherever I found 
 them, I did my utmost to get them within 
 my grasp and secrete them. The ingenuity 
 I displayed in concealing my pickings and 
 stealings astounded Mrs. Muscut, and gave 
 terrible shocks to her moral sense. That 
 good lady, although she had stolen me, was 
 surprised and enraged beyond expression 
 when she discovered that I too had a taste 
 for stealing — bits of thread, old corks, glass 
 vials, potatoes, feathers, ends of rush-candle, 
 the lead from the window-frames, pieces of 
 rusty nails, pins, handles of knives, and 
 such other rubbish. Mrs. Muscut was of 
 opinion that this tendency in one so young 
 was positively dreadful to contemplate, and 
 would, unless it were checked, lead to pro- 
 digious crime. And on stopping the evil, 
 ay, on eradicating it, Mrs. Muscut virtu-
 
 222 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 ally resolved; and, in the hopes of accom- 
 plishing her determination, she put in force 
 for my benefit every species of terrorism 
 and bodily infliction that all the investi- 
 gators of, and authorities upon, juvenile 
 delinquency have advocated. She laid traps 
 for me, watched me, detected me in the 
 very performance of theft, and of the yet 
 greater enormity of having successfully 
 guarded from her vigilance for weeks, in 
 clefts of walls, fissures between bricks, 
 artificial crypts in the garden, treasures 
 illegally acquired. Her acuteness, however, 
 was baffled, and her perseverance was of no 
 avail ; in cunning and secretiveness I was 
 more than a match for her, and I stored 
 away several precious articles that she did not 
 even suspect me of having made prize of. 
 Amongst these was a small stout stone 
 bottle, capable of holding when full an ounce 
 of fluid, or slightly more ; it had originally
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 223 
 
 been used, I should think, as a receptacle for 
 ink, and had been thrown away as valueless. 
 I had turned it up when digging in the 
 garden, and joyfully had made it my own ; to 
 wash it, cleanse it of all defilements, and 
 furnish it with a cork gave me a world of 
 pleasureable excitement ; and to bear it 
 hidden, in a pocket I had cleverly contrived 
 in the band of the petticoat I wore the whole 
 time of my captivity, to toil with it concealed 
 there, and to cherish the flattering con- 
 sciousness that I had shielded it for months 
 from the lynx eyes of my persecutor, gave me 
 an enjoyment that surely none but Anne 
 Muscut and her husband would have grudged 
 me. 
 
 And now it was to do me important 
 service. Lifting my chain up in my hand, 
 so that its noise should not notify to Mrs. 
 Muscut out of doors that I was moving, or 
 waken the sleeper, I proceeded warily to the
 
 224 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 table, letting out at each step only enough of 
 the chain to admit of my advancing another 
 pace. I reached the table without creating the 
 disturbance of a pin-fall; Daniel Muscut slept 
 heavily ; in a trice I took my little bottle 
 from the band of my under-dress, whipped 
 out the cork, filled the vessel full of the black 
 liquid poison from Daniel Muscut's bottle, 
 returned the latter vessel to its station on 
 the table, and the former, after corking it, to 
 its old place of concealment, and retraced my 
 steps to the dark corner. 
 
 In another instant Anne Muscut returned, 
 and coming up to me with a candle in her 
 hand, eyed me with a scrutiny and a cruelty 
 of aspect that well befitted the woman who 
 had just closed a compact with her brother to 
 murder me — without, violence I No wonder 
 that my heart beat fast, my knees shook, and 
 a cold sweat stood on my forehead, while a 
 death-like pallor rested on my emaciated 
 face.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 225 
 
 Anne Muscut, too, was colourless, and 
 showed more signs of mental disturbance than 
 I ever witnessed in her before or afterwards, 
 as she observed gruffly : — 
 
 " Yar not like yarself. Something has 
 frighted yar, for yar as white as a sheet. 
 Tell me true, as yar vally a whole skin — har 
 yar heard ought I and Joel Haggart har 
 been saying ? " 
 
 " I heard nothing, ma'am." 
 
 " What ! — yar har not been listening ? " 
 
 " I listened, but you spoke so low I could 
 hear nothing." 
 
 My dissimulation satisfied her (or at least 
 appeared to do so) that I was not aware of 
 the atrocious agreement she had entered into 
 with Joel Haggart. Without a word, she 
 stooped and released my foot from the gyve, 
 placed her heavy hand on my quaking frame, 
 and conducted me upstairs to the garret 
 closet that was my dormitory. She did not 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 strike me on the way, as was her custom ; 
 possibly she was thinking how she was to 
 strike me that last blow — which was to be free 
 from violence! On reaching the summit of 
 the stairs, as she pushed me into the closet, 
 she so far softened to her victim as to utter a 
 gruff good-night, after which unwonted effort of 
 politeness, she closed the door on me, locked 
 it, bolted it, and trod heavily downstairs 
 to her husband. 
 
 And I, in the pitch-darkness of my pri- 
 son, sate cold and shivering, huddled up in 
 the corner on my rug, speculating how long 
 a time would elapse ere I should be stretched 
 upon it, ghastly and lifeless as the poacher 
 who fell at Melton Stubbs, and debating 
 whether to drink off the fatal draught I 
 bore about my person would not be putting 
 it to its best possible use. 
 
 To such unnatural and hideous thoughts 
 had my childhood become accustomed !
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 227 
 
 Think of this, good people all, if, as you 
 know more of me, you should feel con- 
 strained to judge me severely. 
 
 Q2
 
 228 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 LIBERATION. 
 
 And now the sternest part of the conflict 
 between me and Ann Muscut began, and 
 continued for well-nigh another year. A 
 fortnight had not elapsed since her brother's 
 visit, ere she commenced operations that 
 were manifestly intended to lead to the 
 result Joel Haggart had at heart. My 
 work was made more laborious, my treat- 
 ment became harsher, and the fare on which
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 229 
 
 I supported life became daily more unwhole- 
 some ; the means of retaining any approach 
 to personal cleanliness was denied me. There 
 was also another step that Ann Muscut 
 took for the accomplishment of her purpose, 
 which, for cold-blooded calculation of the 
 best means to the end in view, surpassed 
 all her other atrocities. She had the window 
 of the closet, in which I passed my nights, 
 boarded up, and she also closed with bricks 
 and rubbish the chimney of the apartment, 
 so that, by excluding fresh air and light, 
 she might render the atmosphere of the 
 dormitory noxious to the last degree. Winter 
 came, and my chilled limbs broke out with 
 unsightly blains, that threatened to mortify 
 and of themselves terminate my existence ; 
 and Ann Muscut inspected the sores daily 
 as if she had a vested interest in them, 
 since they might possibly relieve her from 
 the necessity of performing an act from
 
 230 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 which she shrank. But starving winter pas- 
 sed away, and I remained. Spring came 
 with protracted east winds, and a cold 
 settled on my chest, and a cough racked 
 my lungs day and night; and Ann Muscut, 
 with an affectation of maternal solicitude for 
 my health, was continually forcing me to 
 make deep inspirations, and inform her how 
 much they hurt my side, and the exact 
 spot at which the pain was worst. Know- 
 ing her game, I exaggerated my sufferings, 
 and induced her to believe that it was im- 
 possible for me to live till the May-flowers 
 blossomed. When she had satisfied herself 
 that my case was desperate, it amused me 
 to notice how her manner softened to me. 
 She flogged me less frequently; she some- 
 times excused me a portion of my diurnal 
 toil; she would even at times let me sit unmo- 
 lested on a stool near her fire ; and on two 
 or three occasions she liberally bestowed on
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 231 
 
 me a basin of hot oatineal-gruel before I 
 went to bed. With exquisite benevolence 
 also she prepared me for the change, which 
 she anticipated would soon take place in my 
 condition, and made me furbish up out of a 
 prayer-book my reminiscences of the church 
 catechism ; but faithful to leading resolu- 
 tions, she ordered me one cold night, after 
 I had learnt and said to her before the 
 blazing kitchen fire my duty to my neigh- 
 bour, to go across the yard in the pelting 
 rain, with no bonnet, and see if the door 
 of the hen-house was securely fastened. 
 
 The good woman soon talked to me about 
 death, and whether I had repented of my 
 sins and was ready to die. With much 
 crying I answered that I thought I could 
 die with composure if she (Mrs. Muscut) 
 would be good enough to pardon me all my 
 offences to her, and forgive my having been so 
 wicked as I had been. Whereupon Mrs.
 
 232 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Muscut unctuously assured me that she for- 
 gave me all my sins to her, freely and from 
 the bottom of her heart, and explained to me 
 that she had never beaten me out of irritation 
 or malevolence, but solely for the sake of my 
 own moral welfare. I said that I was con- 
 vinced of the truth of her assertion, and this 
 so pleased her that she comforted me by say- 
 ing she had no doubt I should go to heaven, 
 and should always behave myself properly 
 when there, and concluded by bestowing on 
 me an enormous plateful of pork-pie. It 
 tickled me to watch Mrs. Muscut as she 
 shuffled about and made herself believe that 
 she was an eminently virtuous English matron 
 and adorned her sex not less than she bene- 
 fited me. And the woman was sincere in her 
 self-commendations. She honestly regarded 
 herself as an unquestionably honest, well-in- 
 tentioned, and praiseworthy woman, — ay, she 
 did so, even while she kept snugly packed at
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 233 
 
 the corner of her most secret heart-recess a 
 resolve to send me to another world ere the 
 close of the year, if I did not of my own ac- 
 cord take my departure sooner. Of such con- 
 tradictions are we composed ! Have I not in 
 my course through life found the very bad al- 
 most always able to delude and humbug them- 
 selves into a belief of their excellence and pro- 
 bity ? and have I not as frequently found the 
 very good — the pure and stainless ones of 
 the earth — ready to lament their own defi- 
 ciencies, and to weep over themselves as cor- 
 rupt and abominable ? 
 
 But I lived on. Spring softened once more 
 into summer, and my cough disappeared. In- 
 furiated at the trick which had been played upon 
 her, Ann Muscut redoubled her cruelties. What 
 she aimed at was to dispose of me in such a 
 manner that she might, while reflecting on her 
 death-bed upon her past life, be able to per- 
 suade herself that 1 had died in the ordinary
 
 234 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 course of nature. Unfortunately I was too 
 tenacious of existence for her plan, and, strange 
 to say, as the struggle between us went on, 
 my spirits rose, and a sense of superiority to 
 my antagonist inspired me with courage and 
 powers of endurance. On some important 
 points I had the whip hand of her: I knew 
 what her game was, while she was ignorant 
 that I possessed this knowledge; I was always 
 on the look-out for some means of rescuing 
 myself, while she had conceived that I was re- 
 signed to my fate ; and, lastly, I had in my 
 possession that which would send her promptly 
 to Hades if at any time I could administer it 
 to her. 
 
 The best use to which I could put the poi- 
 son I had in my keeping was a subject that 
 ever occupied my thoughts ; and as summer 
 melted away into autumn, and the chance of 
 my meeting a violent death from Ann Mus- 
 cut's hands became more imminent, I was
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 235 
 
 strongly impressed with the necessity of coming 
 to a conclusion. 
 
 Eventually my doubts were terminated by 
 a chain of circumstances over which I had no 
 control, but from which it need not be said 
 I was ready to accept the advantages they 
 offered. It happened that Ann Muscut, so 
 strong and so unmerciful to the weak, was 
 attacked with illness ; she did not take to her 
 bed, or lose bodily strength from her indispo- 
 sition, but she suffered violent spasms of the 
 body, and in her agonies uttered groans and 
 cries that made the days bright and cheerful 
 to me. Her malady was consequent on indul- 
 gent living, and the doctor she consulted at 
 Livermere having directed his chief and first 
 attention to the central portions of the trunk, 
 whereat Blucher ordered his soldiers to direct 
 their guns when aiming at their foes, gave her 
 a bottle of soothing mixture. This compound 
 was black and muddy, and had a most offensive
 
 236 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 smell ; its taste also was extremely nauseous. 
 I had frequent opportunities for knowing that 
 it had these properties ; as twice a-day — 
 morning and afternoon — I had to uncork the 
 bottle which held it, and pour out under the 
 sick woman's eye her appointed dose, which 
 she would drink with a sufficiently bad grace, 
 and then solace her offended nerves by making 
 me suck slowly down a tea-spoonful of the 
 mess, and watching my grimaces as I did so. 
 Ann Muscut would not have been so willing to 
 let me have such free access to her medicine 
 bottle, if she had known all the thoughts that 
 came into my head whenever I fixed my eyes 
 upon it. Perhaps, too, if she had known the 
 fierce passions and resolution that lay con- 
 cealed in the meagre body of her slave, she 
 would have deemed it prudent to conciliate 
 her, to soothe her with kindly words, to en- 
 deavour by tardy charities to obliterate from 
 her mind the memories of past cruelty, — at
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 237 
 
 least to abstain from further irritation and 
 wrong. But Ann Muscut did not see well 
 enough for this ; and she went on — as we all 
 are wont to do — raising up an avenging fate 
 and stern retribution out of the very trifles 
 and adjuncts of her existence, which she held 
 in the liveliest contempt. 
 
 In short, I had determined to murder Ann 
 Muscut; and I was only looking about for the 
 best occasion and fittest means for doing so. 
 I had satisfied myself, by observing Daniel 
 Muscut's daily potations, that I held in my 
 possession enough poison to kill outright the 
 woman I wanted to rid myself of. It is worthy 
 of remark that when I had resolved on taking 
 this step, much, indeed almost all, of the indi- 
 vidual antagonism I had for months cherished 
 to her vanished, and I regarded her with 
 that calmness and freedom from passion with 
 which I might now look on an obstruction of 
 lifeless matter, a barricade, raised across a
 
 238 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 street, I wished to drive down ; and her 
 destruction appeared to me only as something 
 which it was requisite to accomplish, as with- 
 out it I could not even commence a journey 
 that I was desirous of accomplishing. The 
 point I really aimed at was the exposure and 
 death of Joel Haggart. To effect this I was 
 quite ready to sacrifice myself; and without 
 sacrificing myself it was clearly beyond my 
 power to achieve it. The scheme of my oper- 
 ations had already taken definite shape and 
 form in my mind. Before the fatal opening 
 of October, when Joel Haggart would reappear 
 and find one less in the party, I would take 
 advantage of the absence of Daniel Muscut, 
 who had lately commenced attending a market 
 several miles distant, on Fridays, and would 
 by hook or by crook administer poison to his 
 wife. This done, I should have time for 
 breaking off the fetter from my chained ancle 
 and escaping before the old man's return. 

 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 239 
 
 Freedom once attained, I would hasten over 
 the heath, and walk along till I came to a 
 town, and there I would find some one willing 
 to listen to my story, to whom I would make 
 a full and courageous revelation of my crime, — 
 stating how I had committed murder, and 
 why I had perpetrated such an atrocious act. 
 It was true that in due course I should be 
 condemned to death and be hung ; but so — 
 would Joel Haggart ! 
 
 It would be wrong in me to say that no 
 twinges of conscience mingled with these me- 
 ditations, that no doubts as to the rectitude 
 of my contemplated conduct disturbed me. 
 But I reasoned myself out of all weakness ; 
 and I constructed a series of arguments to 
 fortify me in my resolution, which were 
 strangely beyond the intellectual range com- 
 mon to most children of my years, and which 
 then took such a firm hold of my mind, that 
 no after nurture, no after conviction of the
 
 240 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 duty of submitting patiently to the pain and 
 wrong worked by the wicked in this world, no 
 after acquaintance with the lovely and noble 
 of my kind, sufficed to free me from their ty- 
 ranny. Whenever in my future career the 
 tempter whispered to me to be rid of my 
 enemies, and break free from the chains of 
 cruel circumstances, the same devilish sugges- 
 tions have arisen in my mind, urging me to 
 resolute, unflinching, unscrupulous, criminal 
 action. 
 
 Time went on — my plans were matured — 
 the very day for taking the critical and awful 
 step was fixed in my mind, when intelligence 
 reached me that suddenly made me falter in 
 my purpose, and indeed for a few moments ap- 
 peared to have removed the necessity of it. 
 On the very morning previous to the day de- 
 voted to assassination, Ann Muscut received a 
 letter. It was a rare occurrence in those days 
 for the postman to visit any secluded farm-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 241 
 
 stead, and my mistress was a person less liable 
 than most persons of her class to the inflictions 
 of correspondents. With a curiosity natural 
 to my sex, and laudable in one circumstanced 
 as I was, I put my eye to a crevice in the door 
 of the coal-cellar, into which, according to 
 custom, I had been thrust on the advent of 
 the letter-bearer, and through the aperture I 
 saw Ann Muscut tear open the letter and read 
 it with eagerness and agitation. Her aspect 
 as she did so was a spectacle ever to be re- 
 membered. , Pale and trembling she laid the 
 paper on the table of the wash-house, and 
 turning to her husband, who happened to 
 enter the apartment, said in a deep voice : — 
 " Dead, Dannel ! — dead ! — struck dead ! " 
 " Stephen Mutlock?" responded the laconic 
 Daniel, uttering with interrogative accent the 
 name of a neighbouring dealer, to whom, I 
 afterwards found, he owed a large sum of 
 money. 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " You dolt ! no money-lender, but the only 
 man of my own flesh and blood the wild world 
 contained. Joel Haggart has fall'n dead, 
 struck dead with the 'plexy; and his soul, with 
 all its sins upon it, is afore the awful judg- 
 ment seat of God." 
 
 The stern and brutal woman, as she said 
 this, sank on the wooden form beside which 
 she was standing, and throwing her face for- 
 ward on the table, sobbed violently. 
 
 For a few seconds Daniel regarded her, 
 silent and astonished ; then he turned away 
 into the next room, and fortified his nerves 
 with a dram of his accustomed cordial. When 
 he returned from this wise and prudent ex- 
 cursion, he found his wife still struggling in 
 her strong agony of grief. 
 
 " Hist, woman," said he, attracting her at- 
 tention by roughly pulling her shoulder, and 
 then pointing to the door of the coal-cellar, 
 " she'll hear yer."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 243 
 
 " And let her hear — and she shall hear it 
 from my own lips," replied Ann Muscut fu- 
 riously, rising and approaching the door of 
 the dungeon in which I was confined ; " and 
 if she so much as by a smile or brightening of 
 her eye thanks God, by all the devils that are 
 in me, I'll murder her." 
 
 So saying, she slipped the bolt of the door, 
 and swung it open ; and I, calm and with a 
 new view of life rising before me, stepped out 
 and approached the enraged woman. My 
 sense of sudden relief, as I saw, in imagina- 
 tion, a natural and innocent way of extricating 
 myself from my calamitous position, over- 
 mastered for a moment all considerations of 
 misfortune in having Joel Haggart rescued 
 from my grasp by death, and with a sudden 
 lightness of heart I trod the bricks of the 
 room unconscious of the iron that encircled my 
 ancle. 
 
 " Mrs. Muscut," I said, softly ; I will not 
 
 R 2
 
 244 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 triumph over you, I will not thank God for 
 taking from the earth Joel Haggart, I will 
 even be sorry for you.- But now let me go. 
 He is dead, and no harm can fall on him from 
 the idle words the wretched girl who watched 
 the fight at Melton Stubbs can utter. It was 
 natural in him to do all in his power to ren- 
 der it impossible for me to injure him; I do 
 not even blame him for his conduct ; I can 
 almost pardon him for the pain and suffering 
 he has put on me. All that is of the past, and 
 I will forget it, at least not revenge it on you 
 or on him by blackening his memory. You can- 
 not want my life now ; my blood can do him 
 no good, even if you killed me outright and 
 let it run down upon his grave. You need 
 not seem astonished at my words. For all 
 this year past I have known your cruel inten- 
 tion to kill me, and you never took a step to 
 fulfil it that I did not observe and understand 
 it ; and you never tried to hide from me what
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 245 
 
 you were resolved on, but I saw through your 
 pretence and artifice. I heard you, that last 
 night Joel Haggart was here, agree with him 
 to murder me. — You see, I know everything. 
 But now, let me go, and I promise, when I 
 have once wandered away from you into the 
 wide world, never to tell man, or woman, or 
 child, of your wickedness and cruelty — never 
 to tell any one that I am aware such a one 
 as you are is on the face of the earth. — Let 
 me go." 
 
 I cannot positively aver that I used these 
 very words ; but on my sacred honour I can 
 declare that I felt clearly, literally, and exact- 
 ly what they signify, and that promptly and 
 without hesitation I gave expression to my 
 thoughts in an unbroken period of language 
 similar to the above. 
 
 I had no reply in words to this address ; 
 but it struck home. With the bound of a 
 savage beast the woman leaped towards me,
 
 246 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 knocked me down with her fist, and trod upon 
 me. With an alacrity and a degree of courage 
 I had not given him credit for, Daniel Muscut 
 threw his arms round his wife's body, and did 
 his best to drag her away and to protect me. 
 
 "Let me go, Dannell — let me go. I will 
 kill her," screamed the woman. 
 
 "Hold, Ann, hold — wary, be wary," an- 
 swered Daniel, — "do what you like, but no 
 violence ! Joel told you not to use violence. 
 Remember the law, as you said to me in the 
 night I all but murdered yon starved cat. 
 The law is an awkward thing. Remember 
 the law." 
 
 His interference was so successful, that 
 after a long altercation with the wife of his 
 confidence, he managed to lead her out of the 
 wash-house, into the front room. They 
 closed the door behind them, and left me in 
 the inferior apartment to spy at them through 
 the key-hole, and catch any stray words I
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 247 
 
 could of their conversation. The storm 
 having subsided, they talked reasonably, pru- 
 dently, and with their habitual cunning. 
 Before all things it was clearly necessary 
 that one of them should without delay make 
 a journey across the country to bestow the 
 honours of sepulture on Joel Haggart's corpse, 
 and to look after the property he had left be- 
 hind him. For this task Ann Muscut truly 
 declared herself unequal ; the cramp might 
 seize the muscles of her body at any moment, 
 and disable her for performing, with proper 
 presence of mind and regard to her own inter- 
 ests, the duties of a sister at and after her 
 brother's funeral. 
 
 It was therefore determined that Daniel 
 Muscut should omit to attend the next day's 
 market, and taking the pony and cart should 
 make the journey to his deceased brother-in- 
 law's house, and remain there in guard over 
 all goods, documents, moneys, stock, furniture
 
 248 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 and other chattels, until Ann Muscut joined 
 him shortly after the funeral. 
 
 The fact that Joel Haggart's death promised 
 to put good fortune in the way of my perse- 
 cutors exasperated me beyond measure. It 
 was bad enough to know that he had gone be- 
 yond the reach of my vengeance, and would 
 never smart under the ignominy I was pre- 
 paring myself to cover him with ; it was no 
 small addition to my trouble to learn that my 
 captors had no thoughts of letting me go free 
 now that the original object of my imprison- 
 ment had been served, but that they intended 
 in self-defence to pursue a line of action they 
 had commenced in defence of another. Far 
 more galling, however, than these considera- 
 tions was the reflection that Daniel Muscut 
 and his wife were about to acquire wealth, 
 while I, their contemned drudge, was even 
 more luckless than before. — But they should 
 not enter on the enjoyment of the prize !
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 249 
 
 1 would strike ! and all the deadly purpose, 
 which for a few minutes I had dismissed from 
 the list of my resolves, again returned to hold 
 dominion over my mind. 
 
 Early the next day Daniel Muscut depart- 
 ed on his mission of " important family busi- 
 ness ; " and in the afternoon of that same day 
 Ann Muscut was visited with one of her terri- 
 ble spasmodic attacks. She called me to her 
 side, and bade me rub the parts where she 
 suffered the most pain ; I administered her a 
 dose of medicine from the bottle of filthy 
 mixture that has already been mentioned, but 
 the remedy was powerless. At the end of 
 half an hour she demanded another glass of 
 the abominable compound, and I poured it out 
 for her and watched her drink it ; but it had no 
 more effect on her suffering than the former one. 
 Soon she clamoured for more of the composing 
 medicine ; but as I measured out the third 
 draught for her, I watched my opportunity
 
 250 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 and poured into her glass the entire stock of 
 laudanum I had carried about concealed on my 
 person for twelve months. In another instant 
 she had swallowed enough poison to kill three 
 women in sound health. 
 
 "What har yar done?" she exclaimed the 
 next moment. " What har yar done ? the 
 physic don't taste the same. Yar har put 
 some trash in it, yar little brat." 
 
 " The cup was quite clean, ma'am, when I 
 poured the stuff out of the bottle." 
 
 She did not heed my reply, for she was al- 
 ready drowsy with the first influence of the 
 poison. She sunk back on the pillows that 
 propped her up on the bed on which she was 
 reclining, and composed herself for slumber. 
 Then after the lapse of a few more moments 
 she rose up, and called out in a tone of 
 fright, "Miriam Copley! Miriam Copley! 
 What har yar done ? — what har yar done ? 
 Yar have given me the wrong stuff — yar 
 brat."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 251 
 
 " Ann Muscut," said I, in thin, clear, mea- 
 sured tones, " listen to me. Listen to me, 
 woman, for you are fast dying, and in a few 
 moments, perhaps, you won't know one of my 
 words from another, and I wish you to know 
 what you are dying of. I am a poor, weak, 
 feeble, ill-used child, and you meant to take 
 away my life ; but I have been too quick for 
 you — for I have killed you. I have poisoned 
 you with the black poison out of Daniel Mus- 
 cut's bottle. Ann Muscut, you'll meet Joel 
 Haggart in hell — tell him who sent you there, 
 for he'll gnash his teeth when he hears it ! " 
 
 With a scream the wretched woman tried 
 to spring from her bed ; but the deadly 
 stupor already had control over her nerves, 
 and she tumbled back an unconscious mass. I 
 watched her breathings gradually become 
 slower — and slower — and slower ; I remarked 
 a still tranquil calm steal over her harsh fea- 
 tures, reducing them to womanly gentleness,
 
 252 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 even childish serenity of expression, and 
 as she lay in that deep, unspeakable 
 repose, something of humanity within me 
 made me shudder at the awful deed I had 
 done. Then another change came o'er my vic- 
 tim. Her breathings became so laboured and 
 rare that I questioned if each one would not 
 be her last; and her countenance, a few 
 seconds before so mild and placid in its 
 unwont rest, became hatefully frightful as 
 the muscles dropped down in ghastly, hideous 
 relaxation. Horror-struck, I turned away, 
 and could not find courage to look at her 
 again. 
 
 The fetter was still at my ankle, the 
 length of my chain permitting me to range 
 over the whole ground-floor of the house, 
 and also to mount up the staircase into 
 my mistress's dormitory. With a shudder, I 
 hurried from the chamber, and hastened 
 downstairs, the chain clanking after me.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 253 
 
 Quickly I burst opeu Ann Muscut's work- 
 box, and took from it the key of the fetter, 
 and in a twinkling I was at liberty. It 
 was fast growing dark, but though I knew 
 Daniel Muscut would not return, and that 
 there was no chance of anyone else breaking 
 in on the solitude of the house, I could not 
 think of remaining one unnecessary moment 
 in the neighbourhood of the terrible object 
 that tenanted the sleeping room upstairs. I 
 snatched up a scanty supply of bread and 
 meat, and with no more clothing than the 
 rags that ordinarily attired me, I ran forth 
 over the heath that surrounded the home- 
 stead — into the blackness, and rain, and 
 tempestuous winds of a stormy night.
 
 254 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 RAWLEIGH UFFORD. 
 
 Beyond a vague and unpleasant memory of 
 screaming winds, and driving rains, and 
 Egyptian darkness, I have no recollection of 
 my flight from the home of the Muscuts. I 
 cannot recall what I felt in my mind as the 
 warring elements beat upon me. I cannot 
 even say whether I thought at all of the past 
 or present, or future. Most probably I 
 battled my way across the heath, as most 
 mortals, after the departure of youth's sun-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 255 
 
 shine, make the journey of life — under an in- 
 stinct impelling me to flee from the evil be- 
 hind, rather than under any confidence or 
 hope in that which lay before. 
 
 After long toil, I fell down exhausted on 
 the wet soil, and slept soundly — as though 
 the ground had been a cradle, and the storm 
 a mother's love-song. This much I am at 
 liberty to surmise, for the first period of dis- 
 tinct consciousness, after my departure from 
 the house of my captivity, commenced when I 
 opened my eyes, and found myself lying on a 
 bank that bordered a piece of meadow-land, 
 with a magnificent landscape before me, and 
 a bright sun over-head driving away the lin- 
 gering mists of morning, and warming the 
 fresh air. I had just time to notice the love- 
 liness of the distant scene, to realise to myself 
 a sensation of bodily refreshment and exhila- 
 ration, and then to remember the principal 
 events of the previous day, when a voice —
 
 256 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 such a one in its clear, rich melody as had 
 never before fallen on my ear — observed : — 
 
 " Well, young lady, and how are you after 
 your night's rest ? I hope your bed was 
 warmed to your mind, and that you had 
 enough clothes on. Would you like me to 
 ring for your maid ? " 
 
 I turned my face with surprise, and then 
 rose up hurriedly as my eyes beheld the most 
 superb object they had ever witnessed. A 
 gentleman was standing alone before me, and 
 I had approached him, and knelt to him on 
 one knee before I was aware of having even 
 risen from my recumbent position. 
 
 " Most theatrically performed ! " observed 
 he to whom I had rendered this natural obei- 
 sance. "Most eifective! Who taught you 
 
 that?" 
 
 I did not understand him, but continued 
 to look at him with delight. He was not 
 more than six-and-twenty years of age, he was
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 257 
 
 tall, gracefully formed, dressed in the hand- 
 some black velvet and white-legged costume 
 that was generally fashionable in the last 
 generation with aristocratic sportsmen when 
 out on a shooting excursion. In his hands 
 he held a brightly-burnished gun, and two 
 pointers stood near him, wistfully gazing at 
 his face. Perhaps he was somewhat clumsy 
 in the upper part of his trunk, too wide and 
 thick in the chest, and too broad in the 
 shoulders, for perfect elegance. It might even 
 have been objected to him that his shoulders 
 were high as well as broad. But these were the 
 only defects in his shape, and the many good 
 points in his head atoned for them. His features 
 were bold — not moulded by nature merely to 
 please women, but to govern men ; it was 
 strange how such softness and regularity were 
 infused in the prominent brows, large nose, 
 pointed chin, and more than ample cheek- 
 bones. His lips were thin, and small, and 
 vol. I. s
 
 258 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 not hidden by the waves of moustache 
 which rippled off into the bulk of his 
 whiskers that were as black, and as silky- 
 soft as the curls rising from his white, 
 broad, high forehead, and falling in snaky 
 profusion over the back and sides of his 
 head. 
 
 Of course the feeble child who cowered 
 before this splendid creature — so stalwart 
 in his manhood, and at the same time so 
 replete with the grace and tender roundness 
 of youth — was not able then to analyse his 
 beauty. All she could do was to kneel 
 and look up at him with emotions which, 
 in their admiration and gladness, were adora- 
 tive. 
 
 " Heaven bless me, poor child/' he began 
 
 (when he saw how genuine and unstudied 
 was my attitude of respect) with a kindness 
 that no other voice on earth could have 
 
 commanded, and which might well consti-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 259 
 
 tute the music of the blessed in paradise, 
 "had you no better home than that bank 
 last night? Why, the very rabbits skip- 
 ping about yonder are better off than 
 you/' 
 
 " They are, sir," I answered. 
 
 "Think you so, little philosopher?" he 
 rejoined, smiling in a manner that encouraged 
 me to proceed, and assured me that his 
 ridicule was not for the weak ; " come, now, 
 tell me why you think the rabbits, or those 
 partridges there (by Jove, what a splendid 
 covey ! but I wont fire) are better off." 
 
 " They seem to be happy now, sir, and by 
 and bye some gentleman like you will shoot 
 them — and kill them— and then there will be 
 an end of them—" 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " But a poor girl has neither happiness in 
 this world, nor a way out of it without the sin 
 of murdering herself," 
 
 s2
 
 260 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " Would you like me to shoot you? " 
 
 "Ay, sir — if you think it would be best for 
 me, and no wrong in you to do it." 
 
 " Where is your home, child ? " 
 
 " I have none, sir." 
 
 " Good ! then you are not bored to death 
 with family quarrels. Where do you live? 
 How do you live ? " 
 
 I was silent. 
 
 " Can you read ? " he continued. 
 
 "A little." 
 
 " Do you say your prayers ? " 
 
 " I used to — but — but I dare not now." 
 
 " What a funny child you are ! I 
 know a good lady in London who fudges 
 about prisons, who'd give a hundred 
 pounds for you, for the pure pleasure 
 of converting you, and writing your life 
 in a tract. Come, you and I must 
 know a little more of each other ; and 
 you must tell me what the row is all
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 261 
 
 about. Is my guess a right one? — You 
 have got a cruel mistress ; and after starv- 
 ing and beating you for a twelvemonth, 
 she has turned you out of doors ? or, 
 perhaps you have run away from her? 
 No — is that what you mean by shaking 
 your head ? " 
 
 " I have murdered her, sir/' 
 
 He did not start with surprise at this 
 announcement, but he looked earnestly at 
 me — with a scrutiny that made me feel 
 as if my life was leaving me and going 
 into him : — his dark violet-coloured eyes 
 were so large, and burned with such pa- 
 thetic force ! I have never known such 
 eyes in any other man. When moved by 
 the deep passions of their owner, they were 
 at one and the same time so vehement and 
 yet so compassionate. 
 
 " It is true, sir," I went on ; "I could 
 not bear my life longer. She tried to mur-
 
 262 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 der me, she was bent on taking my life ; 
 and there was nothing for me but to kill 
 her." 
 
 "And how did you kill her?" 
 
 "With poison." 
 
 "You are a very singular young lady — 
 about as extraordinary a one as it has been 
 my good fortune to meet for many a day. 
 If you are acting, you act well ; if you are 
 in earnest — by all the tutelar deities of 
 the lawless, I shall be sorry to see you 
 hung." 
 
 As he said this, he dismissed from his 
 eyes that strange scrutiny, in which pity 
 overpowered amusement, and assumed an 
 easy carelessness of expression, that, made 
 his countenance accord with the sportive- 
 ness— perhaps the levity of his words. 
 
 "So you killed her, did you? Well 
 done. It served her right. But you 
 must tell me everything about it."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 263 
 
 Uttering these words inviting me to 
 further confidence, he sat down upon the 
 grass, and beckoned me to take up the 
 same attitude near him. I did not do so ; 
 but rising from my kneeling posture, I told 
 at full length, with becoming words, and 
 flashing eyes, and with my thin bare arms 
 gesticulating wild emphasis into my state- 
 ments, all my melancholy tale. I spoke 
 of the fatal night at Melton Stubbs, and 
 the part I had taken in it ; I gave a 
 graphic description of the fray, the man- 
 ner in which my father was struck down 
 and the keeper was shot by Joel Haggart. 
 Of my horror and perplexity, I put before 
 my auditor, as he afterwards assured me, a 
 vivid picture ; and I revealed to him how 
 I had been terrorized into a labyrinth of 
 falsehood and perjury, and had then been 
 kidnapped and borne away to undergo, as 
 a punishment for my wickedness, two long
 
 264 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 years of oppression and cruel slavery. I saw 
 him shudder as I dilated on the barbari- 
 ties of Ann Muscut ; and a thrill of proud 
 joy crossed my breast, as I beheld him 
 tremble, and turn white, and clench his 
 fist. It was an intoxicating triumph for 
 me to discern my power to move that 
 handsome, kingly gentleman to sympathy 
 with my sufferings and indignation at my 
 wrongs ; and I redoubled my efforts to 
 render permanent the impression I had 
 created. Nature had fashioned me for an 
 actress, and evil treatment had thoroughly 
 educated me in hyprocrisy ; but art and 
 artifice were alike innocent of aiding me 
 to the burst of bitter weeping into which 
 I fell at the conclusion of my narrative. 
 He quieted me with a hundred sooth- 
 ing words; he bade me dry my tears, 
 patting and caressing and cheering me as if 
 I had been a beautiful and petted playmate,
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 265 
 
 and not a wretched girl, sordid alike in 
 person and raiment. 
 
 "I do not want to escape punishment, 
 sir," I assured him, when a few minutes' 
 silence had composed me ; "I bargained 
 upon dying ; I had death before my eyes 
 when I killed her; but if you could help 
 me to justice — I mean to righting my 
 father — and showing that he didn't do the 
 murder, heaven would reward you, sir." 
 
 "Then you believe in heaven, youngster?" 
 he asked, smiling. 
 
 "A little, sir." 
 
 "Who taught you?" 
 
 "My father, sir." 
 
 " What was his name ? " 
 
 " Roger Copley ! my name is Miriam ! " 
 
 At this the gentleman made an exclamation 
 and whistled as if a thought had struck him ; 
 and then he cried out : — 
 
 " Ah, now I recollect all about it. To be
 
 266 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 sure — Copley ! — that was the name ! I heard 
 the head of my house wax eloquent about the 
 enormity of the case. Tell me, my poor little 
 water-rat, have you ever heard of the Earl of 
 Linton-Stetchworth ? " 
 
 " Father used to say the Earl was very hard 
 on poachers, and that perhaps he would one 
 day repent he had not kept a few other laws 
 besides the game-laws/' 
 
 " Admirable ! " observed the gentleman, 
 several times, and he laughed heartily as if he 
 thoroughly meant what he said ; and then, 
 once more becoming graver, he told me to go 
 and sit down on the ground about six_ yards 
 before him, for he had a mind to make a pic- 
 ture of me. 
 
 " There — that's it, right opposite me — and 
 pull that snaky hair away from the back of 
 your neck, and bring it forward over your 
 shoulders. I wonder Mother Muscut did not 
 cut it off, before you cut her off. The fool
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 267 
 
 did not know how much it was worth, or she 
 would have sold it to a hair-dresser. You see 
 I am a bit of an artist ; and, if I am not mis- 
 taken, I'll put you in the Academy next year 
 as a portrait of the eldest daughter of a noble- 
 man." 
 
 So speaking, he took from one of his coat- 
 pockets a small note-book, and in another 
 minute was hard at work putting my semblance 
 on one of the white leaves. While proceeding 
 with his task, he did not cease talking in the 
 same strain of banter and sound sense in which 
 he had previously indulged. 
 
 " You see, very probably there will be a 
 little public interest ere long attached to 
 your portrait. For instance, if, after 
 due consideration, I shall think it right to 
 have you hanged for the murder of Ann 
 Muscut, it will make the fortune of a print- 
 seller to bring out a decent engraving of you. 
 And very possibly I shall have to string you
 
 268 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 up, just by way of giving society an example ; 
 for you must know I am rather a great fellow 
 in a small way — or a small fellow in a great 
 way — a deputy lieutenant and possible sheriff 
 for the county, and if the Earl of Linton- 
 Stetchworth gives me the nod, I shall send a 
 line up to Jack Ketch, and he and I will 
 soon settle your business. Are you hungry, 
 you meagre vixen ? " 
 
 "Very hungry, indeed, sir." 
 
 "Well, wait awhile, and you shall have 
 some grub." 
 
 During the next few minutes, which he em- 
 ployed with shading in the portrait he had 
 taken of me, I occupied my thoughts with 
 wondering where the gentleman's grub was to 
 come from, and thinking he was as superb 
 and glorious a gentleman as Miriam Copley in 
 the most lawless nights of her imagination had 
 ever conceived. The question about the pro- 
 vision was soon settled, for all on a sudden
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 269 
 
 there was a cry of " Bravo, here you are ! " in 
 the distance, and then appeared a magnificent 
 fiery bay horse, cantering up the green sward 
 of the hill, and bearing at his heels a light 
 cart in which sate two other gentlemen. The 
 vehicle dashed up to us, and was checked by 
 the side of my companion by the driver — a 
 tall slight man, with pale face, sharp features, 
 dull, grey eyes, and lank, straight hair, which 
 was brushed close and was of a light reddish 
 colour. This stranger was smoking an enor- 
 mous cigar, and notwithstanding his accurate 
 and quiet costume of black and grey he had a 
 dissipated appearance; he was continually put- 
 ting into his eye, and letting fall from it, a re- 
 markably small eye-glass. I soon had reason 
 to remark that he garnished his words with a 
 liberal proportion of oaths, and almost inva- 
 riably attempted to enhance the importance of 
 his most trivial speeches with an appeal to 
 Omnipotence ; at the same time he spoke de-
 
 270 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 liberately, and in a low voice, and was in most 
 respects of style a gentleman — though an un- 
 pleasant one. 
 
 "Kawleigh Ufford," observed this new comer, 
 jumping from the cart, " I trust you are well 
 this very fine morning which almost makes 
 me ashamed of this cigar, and penitent for that 
 second bottle of Burgundy last night. What 
 sport have you had, Eawleigh? and where the 
 deuce did you find that little scare-crow who 
 is sitting there, as much like a witch in child- 
 hood, as any creature I have ever seen ? " 
 
 " As to sport, I can say but little, save that 
 I have loaded my gun, and had a good morn- 
 ing's walk. In reply to your second question, 
 I can only answer that I found our little scare- 
 crow sound asleep on the bank. But she is a 
 very pleasant companion, and has an amount 
 of histrionic power in her somewhat attenuated 
 person that will one day make her celebrated. 
 She has, moreover, a fund of moral qualities
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 271 
 
 that will insure her success — I mean her ulti- 
 mate elevation in life. Allow me to make 
 you known to each other. Miss Miriam Cop- 
 ley ! permit me to introduce to you my friend 
 and Mentor, Mr. Charles Millicent. There are 
 those that call him a scoundrel ; I only think 
 it. I trust one day to see you married to him." 
 
 "Watson," said Mr. Millicent, who sat down 
 on the ground, with a horse-rug under him, 
 and did not deign to address me directly, 
 " take my brandy-flask out of my wrapper- 
 pocket, and make the little beggar drink. I 
 should like to see her topple about ; it would 
 be deuced good fun." 
 
 Mr. Watson, the third of the trio, was a grave, 
 common, smug, respectable-looking gentleman, 
 dressed in black, and adorned with a white 
 cravat ; he was, upon the whole, of a clerical 
 aspect, save that he looked too intelligent to 
 be a parson. His forehead was low, but broad; 
 his eye-brows were dark, bushy, and promi-
 
 272 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 nent, and they shaded a pair of ferret's eyes, 
 with which he keenly watched Messrs. Milli- 
 cent and Ufford, as if they were two balls on 
 a billiard-table and he were bent on making a 
 difficult cannon off them, and sending his own 
 ball with the same stroke into the pocket. 
 
 Mr. Watson grinned his satisfaction with 
 the commission he had received, and leaving 
 the bay horse that stood quiet as a lamb, has- 
 tened to act on Mr. Millicent's amiable sugges- 
 tion. 
 
 " Watson,'' said Mr. Rawleigh Ufford, with 
 an air of quiet authority and decision which 
 made Mr. Watson's grin give way to that in- 
 tense absence of expression with which prudent 
 people cut their poor relations, " you'll be kind 
 enough not to offer any impertinences to Miss 
 Copley, — give me the brandy-bottle ; and do 
 you with all speed heat the kettle, and make 
 some good strong coffee. The young lady 
 will enjoy a cup of it, and the sooner you give
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 273 
 
 her some breakfast the more reason I shall 
 have to thank you. Be quick. 
 
 " Certainly, sir, — immediately," replied Mr. 
 Watson, obsequiously. 
 
 It soon broke upon me that Mr. Watson 
 was the servant either of Mr. Charles Millicent 
 or Mr. Ufford ; at first my suspicion that this 
 was the case was almost dissipated by the 
 consideration that neither of these gentlemen 
 addressed the man abusively, or kicked him, 
 or struck him with a whip, as Joel Haggart or 
 Ann Muscut would have treated a servant. 
 But in due course, as I watched Watson spread- 
 a cloth on the turf, and preparing a breakfast 
 of hot coffee, ham, eggs, arid rolls, and perform- 
 ing every part of his multifarious duties with 
 singular adroitness, never for one instant allow* 
 ing his white cravat to be ruined, or both his eyes 
 to quit the other two men who lay stretched at 
 their ease on a rug which Mr. Millicent had 
 taken from the cart, I had no doubt as to the 
 
 vol. I. T
 
 274 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 relation existing between the prompt servitor 
 and those on whom he waited. And this 
 point being settled, I had occasion to re- 
 flect on the difference between the manners 
 of these masters, and all others my very- 
 small experience in life had brought to my 
 notice, and to muse how well I should 
 like to be employed as constant attendant on 
 so noble and kind a gentleman as Mr. Kaw- 
 leigh Ufford. 
 
 While breakfast was being prepared Mr. 
 Ufford lay back on the rug, as I have al- 
 ready described him reclining, and read 
 quickly several letters which his friend, 
 Mr. Millicent, had brought him. It made 
 me wonder to see him pass his eye over 
 the closely-written sheets so rapidly, and 
 then push them all crumpled into his 
 pockets, as if he would neither trouble 
 himself with reading them, every line, nor 
 with folding them up neatly before putting
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 275 
 
 them away. I imagined lie must be very 
 much liked by his friends, or he would not 
 get such long letters from them. 
 
 "That's all right — seven letters, and not 
 one of them from a tradesman," observed 
 Mr. Ufford, indolently, twirling his mous- 
 taches, and turning to his friend ; " but the 
 worst of it is the seven friends will require 
 answers, whereas, if they were tradesmen, 
 they would not be such fools as to expect 
 any. I wish Watson was a gentleman, for 
 then I would make him reply to them; or, 
 better still, I wish, Milly, you were my 
 servant — for then I would use you as a 
 secretary." 
 
 "As it is, I shall be happy to obey your 
 orders," observed Mr. Millicent, compla- 
 cently. 
 
 For an instant I thought Mr. Ufford 
 would have shown some contempt for his 
 friend's extreme readiness to oblige him ; 
 
 t2
 
 276 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 but he did not — possibly he was too good- 
 natured. Mr. Watson, however, was not 
 the victim of any such amiability ; for a 
 sneer of bitter mocking contempt took pos- 
 session of his unpleasant countenance as he 
 heard the words come from Mr. Millicent. 
 The man's expression was such a novel 
 one to me, and contained not merely such 
 a forcible declaration of scorn for the last 
 speaker, but also such unmistakable indi- 
 cations of a strong will and determined 
 nature, constrained under the obsequious 
 bearing proper to his menial vocation, that 
 from that time I did not fail to observe 
 him with attention. His face was pale, 
 and his forehead low, but both were broad ; 
 he was a thin and careworn-looking fellow, 
 yet he had every appearance of physical 
 vigour and strength ; his mouth was enor- 
 mously large ; and his eyes, quick, sharp, 
 cunning, eager, had the strange effect of
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 277 
 
 being able to gaze in every direction at 
 the same time. Possibly the silence, which 
 it was his duty to observe in the presence 
 of his master, aided the keen activity of 
 his eyes in making him seem to me the 
 impersonation of the sly and secretive. 
 
 It is no lying fancy or cheating imagi- 
 nation, fashioning dramatic positions and 
 sensations out of after-experience, but a 
 clear, vivid, unfading memory of this event- 
 ful morning, which emboldens me to say 
 that, as I, a miserable, outcast, sinful child, 
 sat watching those three men, a mysterious 
 and alarming conviction stole over me that 
 my destiny and theirs were inseparably 
 connected. Lapped and bedded in misery, 
 and utterly ignorant of what "life" meant 
 to most of my own kind, I still could re- 
 cognise, with a painful throb of surprise 
 and unreasoning terror, that I had fallen 
 upon those who were to fashion my career
 
 278 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 for me. Some power fell upon me also 
 that enabled me to read the character of 
 each of those men — not perfectly, but well 
 enough to discern how they would affect me, 
 for good or for evil ; which of them would be 
 my bane, and which my blessing. Had I 
 obeyed the impulses that chased each other 
 through my heart, I should have run up to 
 Eawleigh Ufford and nestled at his feet, I 
 should have fled with terror from Charles 
 Millicent, but as to Stephen Watson — I 
 would have sprung at him, fixing my fangs 
 in his throat, and tearing out his villain eyes. 
 
 " But the letters are all well/' again be- 
 gan Mr. Ufford, resuming, after a pause, the 
 subject of his letters, " and the one last read, 
 the most important. I am no longer a sol- 
 dier, Charley ; to-morrow I will shave off all 
 this elegant superfluity of hair, and begin 
 life again as a young civilian." 
 
 " You'll be prime minister in ten years."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 279 
 
 " Thank you. And in the same time you 
 will either be a secretary of state, or have 
 been prosecuted half-a-dozen times for libels 
 inserted in your rascally papers." 
 
 "By the way," he added, "what news from 
 the hall this morning ? No one was up when 
 I left." 
 
 " Nothing had transpired before I left, 
 except that Lord and Lady Penistoun, and 
 little Miss Agnes, had received a summons 
 to London, and they are off. — You know Mrs. 
 Wingfield and the amiable young lady of the 
 same name, who has paid Providence the 
 compliment of accepting an estate worth two 
 hundred thousand pounds, will be there to- 
 night, and stay for a fortnight ? " 
 
 " Of course I do." 
 
 "Fair Goddess, combining all the good 
 qualities of Venus and Minerva ! — I see her 
 game." 
 
 " Indeed ! — and what is the game that
 
 280 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Charles Millicent is so sagacious as to be 
 watching, before it has been commenced ? " 
 
 Mr. Millicent lowered his voice, so that 
 Watson should not hear ; but Watson heard 
 every word that was uttered — as clearly as I 
 did — whose ears were preternaturally sharp. 
 
 " She would make a pretty countess ! What 
 a glorious leader amongst the beauties of the 
 peerage ! — I presume she is not careless about 
 advancement. We are all ambitious of some- 
 thing or other. What can she want ? It is 
 impossible that she can be bent on getting 
 money alone ; she has too much of that 
 already." 
 
 " Possibly she is ambitious of poverty ? " 
 
 " Ha, ha ! — no ; it's rank she will aim at." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " She will wish to connect herself with a 
 strong set in her own county — and a stronger 
 one in London." 
 
 "Surely you must be in her confidence?"
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 281 
 
 " Mark my words, and judge me ere long 
 as a true prophet or a false one, — she will 
 bring down Charley, your lucky cousin (I 
 wish he might break his neck to-morrow at 
 Burnop-field), and in due course she will reign, 
 not at Braden Manor, but in a far grander 
 castle as the Countess of Lint on- Stetch worth." 
 
 " Fudge ! — here, Watson, coffee and break - 
 fast." 
 
 Clearly Mr. Millicent, although he had a 
 smart way of talking, and assumed an absurd 
 tone of knowingness, was not a very keen 
 observer, or he would have discovered how 
 unpalatable his suggestions were to his com- 
 panion, and would have desisted at the outset 
 from this outburst of prophecy. Clearly also 
 Stephen Watson saw farther in the game that 
 Charles Millicent and Eawleigh Ufford were 
 playing than either of them ; for I saw — not 
 in the muscles of his face, but in the changing 
 light of his crafty eyes — that he fully compre-
 
 282 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 hended the nature of the blunder of the one 
 and the vexation of the other. 
 
 " Thank you, Watson," said Mr. Ufford to 
 his servant, when the latter put before him 
 his coffee and other materials for making a 
 good breakfast, — " and now look after that 
 poor little girl there. Give her a good hearty- 
 meal ; I dare say it is a long time since she 
 has had one, — What? you haven't a cup? 
 then give her my saucer. Don't keep her 
 waiting : she is as hungry as I am, and, what 
 is more, my guest, and I will not break bread 
 before she does." 
 
 I was still in the same place and attitude as 
 I was in when Mr. Ufford sketched me, and 
 Stephen Watson had to make several paces to- 
 and-fro to bring me my breakfast from his 
 culinary stores. His task, it was easy for me 
 to detect, was ungrateful to him, for he moved 
 slowly to me, and regarded me with dogged 
 ill-humour as he waited on me. A large alloy
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 283 
 
 of the tyrant must have been lurking in my 
 disposition, for I enjoyed being waited on by 
 a great grown-up servant for the first time in 
 my life ; and my satisfaction was increased, 
 instead of diminished, by the evident reluctance 
 with which the services were rendered. 
 
 "You eat enough," Stephen Watson 
 growled out, taking an opportunity to insult 
 me, when his master was too much engaged 
 with his breakfast to observe our proceedings. 
 
 " I do — I am hungry." 
 
 " What's your name ? " 
 
 "What's that to you?" 
 
 " You little insolent beggar, is that the way 
 you behave when a gentleman is so good as to 
 feed you ? " 
 
 " You don't feed me ; you wouldn't give 
 me a crust if you could help it." 
 
 " That I wouldn't." 
 
 " But then you're only a servant." 
 
 " Anyhow, you sha'n't have any more."
 
 284 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " If you don't give me some more, I'll tell 
 Mr. Ufford." 
 
 " What ! picked up his name already ? " 
 
 " Yes, and I shall pick some other things 
 up before I have done with you." 
 
 The man's astonishment at my behaviour 
 was great. He could not refrain from expres- 
 sions of surprise ; but I saw that he respected 
 me, lean and covered with rags though I was, 
 for making such a resolute stand against his 
 oppression. 
 
 " Hang me, but I can't blame you. If you 
 were a lord's child, they would make a fuss 
 about you ; but as you are only a poor, wan- 
 dering brat, every servant like me thinks he 
 may put his foot on you." 
 
 The man was called away by the gentlemen, 
 but before he left me he apportioned me a 
 fresh supply of provision. 
 
 When the breakfast had come to a conclu- 
 sion, Mr. Ufford said in a clear voice that was 
 audible for yards round : —
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 285 
 
 " Watson, I want your opinion. If an en- 
 emy took possession of you, and carried you 
 off, and, having thrown you into a dungeon, 
 kept you there in chains, what would you do ? " 
 
 " Try and get out, sir," replied Watson 
 with a comical grin. 
 
 " Suppose that, after racking your brains in 
 every way to find a means of escape, you were 
 brought to the horrible conclusion that you had 
 no prospect of ever recovering your liberty, 
 but must, till your dying day, lie on the straw 
 of your loathsome dungeon, counting the slow 
 moments, and goaded in your heart by the 
 wrong your enemy had done you. Tell me, 
 what thought would most frequently come in- 
 to your head ? What hope would you con- 
 sole yourself with, as your body became 
 weaker, your mind feebler and more confused, 
 but your sense of misery and injury more 
 acute?" 
 
 Watson's eyes shot out flashes of fire ; the
 
 286 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 muscles of his pale face were as fitful in their 
 action and as ghastly to look on as the 
 movements of a galvanised corpse, and he 
 clenched his fist in the exasperation he felt at 
 the bare imagination of being subjected to such 
 treatment. 
 
 "Sir," said he slowly and harshly, "I would 
 crouch down at the door of my dungeon, and 
 hope that one day my tyrant might be led to 
 come and visit me, to gloat over my brutal 
 condition, and that when he came I should 
 have strength enough and liberty enough to 
 spring up at him, to close round him, to clutch 
 his throat in my hands, and strangle him. I 
 would not ask to live longer, I would not ask 
 to recover my freedom, if only we might die 
 together." 
 
 " Good ! " observed Mr. Ufford, slowly, and 
 as if he was called on to criticise a theatrical 
 performance. " You have feeling, Watson, 
 and imagination, and considerable power; your
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 287 
 
 face is livid with rage. Prisoner at the bar, 
 you are acquitted. Watson, pack up the 
 things in the cart, and be off to the hall. I 
 shall be home at dinner. Here are the 
 keepers." 
 
 As he said " Prisoner at the bar, you are 
 acquitted," I observed that Mr. Ufford ex- 
 changed glances with Mr. Millicent, and I 
 then knew they had been discussing my story 
 while I was at my breakfast. 
 
 I looked round, and saw slowly ascending 
 the hill two keepers, with guns in their hands, 
 bags slung over their shoulders, and a brace 
 of sleek, clean pointers meekly following at 
 their heels. On this addition to our party 
 approaching within a few paces, Stephen Wat- 
 son accelerated his movements, packed up the 
 breakfast-things in a twinkling, and having 
 received a few more orders from his master, 
 disappeared down the sloping meadow with his 
 horse and cart.
 
 288 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " Wait here, I shall be back in an instant," 
 observed Eawleigh Ufford to the keepers and 
 his friend, Mr. Millicent, and, beckoning me to 
 follow him, he strode along the hedgerow, 
 turned to the left, and then walked, perhaps 
 a hundred yards, further up the ascent. 
 
 With my eyes fixed on him, I pursued him, 
 and when he stopped I was close upon him, 
 with all my powers of vision concentrated on 
 his handsome face, form, and limbs. He 
 turned to me and looked at me, smiling at 
 the same time a smile that said with the irre- 
 sistible force of manly greatness — " look at 
 me, little maiden; you may well enjoy the 
 sight, for never before have your eyes rested 
 on such a lovely object ; and, know it, I am 
 lord of you for ever ! " 
 
 And I obeyed that imperious smile ; and as 
 I feasted my eyes with his royal comeliness, I 
 saw the prospect behind him widen, and the 
 ground beneath him, as it were, fall away, and
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 289 
 
 a vast interminable field of azure glory, sparkle, 
 and dance with white-foamed, creamy wavelets 
 between him and the horizon which was lost 
 to sight in a still, tranquil field of brilliance. 
 
 Something of surprise and delight in my 
 countenance, as the fresher breeze blew round 
 me from this novel prospect, struck my master, 
 and he said in his grandest way : — 
 
 " What ! have you never seen this before ? " 
 
 * What is it, sir ? " 
 
 " It is the sea — the wide, wide sea. You 
 have heard of it ? " 
 
 "I did not know it was like this ; I did not 
 know it made one feel like this to look at it ; 
 no one ever told me that it would make me so 
 giddy, and strange, and happy to see it. But 
 where are the ships ? Father used to tell me 
 that men went down to the sea in ships, and 
 did their business on great waters." 
 
 " Yonder, little girl ! — far out — where the 
 water is brightest, you may see some. The 
 
 VOL. I. U
 
 290 MIRIAM GOPLEY. 
 
 little spots on the water, those little specks 
 which are now black, and now bright white, 
 as the sun chances to strike them, are ships — 
 and each one of them contains a great many 
 men." 
 
 "How small the men must be!" 
 " No — they are as great as I am." 
 "What, sir, and are then great men so 
 very small ? " 
 
 " It seems so. We find it out, little 
 woman, when we get at a distance from them, 
 and some few are clever enough to see it 
 without the help of distance." 
 
 And as he slowly uttered these words his face 
 became more thoughtful, and I felt sure there 
 was such a merciful greatness in his soul that 
 it was impossible for him to hurt any living 
 thing that was weaker than himself. 
 
 "But I may not waste my time here. 
 The important task of killing small birds, 
 imposed by a tyrannical public opinion on
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 291 
 
 members of the aristocracy, must be attended 
 to. — Now, child, give me your hand, and 
 let me lead you down the cliff to the 
 beach." 
 
 I put out my grimed hand, and he took it, 
 not with disdain, or a cold pity, or an affecta- 
 tion of equality — but with a respectful move- 
 ment of his body, as if, without knowing it, 
 he was compelled to express his gratitude for 
 my so confiding in him. And even as you 
 then, with courtly homage, acknowledged the 
 dignity of humanity in the person of a poor 
 beggar-child, so, in after life, Rawleigh 
 Ufford, — not to me alone, but to all who 
 looked to your strong hand for help, — 
 did you offer that respect which is to 
 the poor more precious than any alms ! 
 
 " Now," said he, when he had conducted me 
 down the rugged cleft which the storms of 
 the heaven, and the beating of the ocean, 
 and the rain-torrents descending from the 
 
 U2
 
 292 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 drenched uplands, had worked in the cliff, 
 " mind me, you're at present in considerable 
 danger. But I'll do all I can to help you. 
 Before twenty-four hours are over I'll know 
 all about the Muscuts, and what it is best to 
 do for protecting you from any charge of 
 murder. But I can't take you avowedly, just 
 at this crisis, under my wing ; unless there is 
 occasion for it. — This is what you must do. 
 Start off that way, and walk along under the 
 cliff, making the ocean your guide, and by 
 nightfall you will come to Aldeburgh — a 
 little seaport town. Here is your dinner, and 
 here are a few shillings. When you come to Al- 
 deburgh, ask your way to the George Inn, and 
 when you get there, beg to see the landlady. 
 Perhaps you'll have a little difficulty in getting 
 access to her, but if you tell the servants you 
 must see her, they'll take you to her. She is 
 a good, kind lady. As soon as you are alone 
 with her, show her this card, and say, l The
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 293 
 
 Earl's nephew gave me this card, and told me 
 to show it to you, and beg you to keep me 
 quiet, and secret, and unquestioned, till you 
 hear more from him/ She knows who I am, 
 and will be glad to oblige me. — Moreover, if 
 you see anyone on the beach, as you walk 
 along, avoid them, unless it be to ask for your 
 comfort how many miles it is along the shore 
 to Aldeburgh ; but if anyone molests you, 
 and you are not allowed to proceed quietly on 
 your way, show my card and say, • The Earl's 
 nephew has sent me on an errand to Alde- 
 burgh ; and he'll make any man repent it 
 who wrongs me.' — Will you obey me, little 
 woman ? " 
 
 " I will, sir." 
 
 " What ! if I order you to drown yourself 
 in the sea?" 
 
 " I will, sir." 
 
 " If I tell you to give yourself up to the 
 law, and get hanged for murder ? "
 
 294 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " I will, sir." 
 
 " You're a strange child — we must know 
 more of each other. We must see each other 
 a great deal." 
 
 "Oh, sir, I hope we shall," I said 
 earnestly. 
 
 "Well! — and what are you thinking of 
 now ? " 
 
 I did not know I answered this question ; — 
 but long afterwards — years afterwards — he 
 told me that, my eyes meanwhile burning 
 with an almost unearthly expression of 
 mental anguish and of love for him, I made 
 reply in a voice such as he had never heard 
 proceed before from human lips, " Don't ask ? 
 — it can't be — the damage cannot be undone 
 — oh, sir, if I had but known you before ! if 
 I had but known you from the time I was 
 born." 
 
 I was not aware that I said this ; I fancied 
 I made no answer at all ; the sum of what I
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 295 
 
 remembered of those moments of my existence 
 was — that the eyes of Rawleigh Ufford be- 
 came full of tears, as they gazed at me with 
 unspeakable tenderness, that he turned from 
 me slowly, and slowly moved out of my sight, 
 and that I sat down under the cliff, on a small 
 clump of wave-worn crag, and cried bitterly, 
 as I thought how different I might have been 
 had I known that noble gentleman from my 
 birth, living under his rule and obeying him 
 in all things.
 
 296 
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 ALDEBURGH. 
 
 Old as I was for my years, I was still 
 young enough to rise against the weight of my 
 pressing grief, and throw it from me. I soon 
 ceased weeping, rose from my rest on the 
 clump of crag, and proceeded on my way to 
 Aldeburgh. At first I kept under the shadow 
 of the high cliffs, and contented myself with 
 admiring the contrasts of the dull grey, red, and 
 dusky purple and yellow strata of which they
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 297 
 
 were composed ; and I debated why they were 
 not all made of one colour. Growing bolder 
 and more curious, I emerged from the beating 
 brows of the main-land, and striking across a 
 wide bed and two billowy ridges of large 
 stones, I came upon the smaller pebbles of 
 the beach, through which the receding tide 
 was perpetually seeking its backward way, 
 with long, lazy, drowsy, sociable whispers. 
 Solace and hope, and treasures of learning, were 
 in this melody of murmurs, at the same time 
 soothing and harsh, voluptuous and inspirit- 
 ing ; and as I listened, a conviction seized me 
 that there were powers in the universe capable 
 of changing sterner and stronger things than 
 the life of a frail infant like myself. And if 
 they did not effect that change, why, still 
 they were great and everlasting, — and, lost in 
 the vague contemplation of that which I could 
 only guess at, I forgot my own miserable 
 little existence.
 
 298 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 Soon something of childishness possessed 
 me. I became pleased and charmed with the 
 novel objects which littered the wet shingle. 
 I marked the downy flakes of foam, now long 
 as snakes in their serpentine windings, and 
 now minute and delicate as feathers, that 
 fringed the sleepy surge, and creamed along 
 the lips of the shore. I picked up seaweeds, 
 some broad and shining like riband, and some 
 of fine and intricate network, star-fishes, 
 stones that shone, whilst they were wet, as if 
 they must be precious, and shells innumerable. 
 The poor children of this generation are taught 
 to classify all these strange objects, and call 
 them ugly names, which I don't know how to 
 spell, and therefore shall not write down. I 
 wonder if such highly-favoured children see 
 more beauty, or find more joy in the wonders 
 of the ocean, and all its fantastic waifs and 
 strays, than I did on first beholding them in 
 utter ignorance of their nomenclature. If they
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 299 
 
 do, then — kind heaven ! make me a charity- 
 child in a coast-town, and give me the " Little 
 Child's Yade Mecum to the Marvels of Science," 
 written by the muscular clergyman whose 
 habit it is to publish scientific treatises in the 
 shape of novels, and novels like scientific trea- 
 tises, mixing his intellectual pleasures, as I have 
 heard idle young men say they like to treat 
 their hot beverages. 
 
 I met few people on the shore. I passed a 
 small fishing- village, about an hour after the 
 commencement of my journey, when a few 
 burly sailors, watched by their wives and chil- 
 dren, were putting off to sea in a boat, on a 
 fishing excursion ; and I thought — why, I 
 know not — on the miraculous draught of fishes, 
 of which, in the almost forgotten calm of 
 years before, I had read in the New Testament. 
 A mile or more further on, I fell in with a 
 party of beautiful and well-dressed children, 
 taking the benefit of the sea-breezes under the
 
 300 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 protection of their nurses. The children came 
 round me, looking at me with mute curiosity 
 and an air of fearful speculation ; and I liked 
 them, partly on account of their beauty, and 
 partly because they were yowig ladies and 
 gentlemen; but I entertained no amiable 
 feelings to the nursemaids, for they angrily 
 warned their charges that if they kept looking 
 at me, I should make them as dirty as 
 I was myself. This sarcasm hurt me very 
 much ; and in my vexation I forgot all 
 about the wonders of the sea-shore, and was 
 unable to recover my philosophic composure 
 until darkness fell upon the earth, and I, 
 weary and alarmed, was still toiling on with 
 much labour, and many stumblings under the 
 cliffs. 
 
 I had eaten the dinner Mr. Kawleigh Ufford 
 had given me, and I was again hungry ; but I 
 had nothing with which to stay my craving for 
 food, except the three shillings he had given
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 301 
 
 me, and it was clearly impossible to eat the 
 shillings without the convenient aid of com- 
 merce. I was debating how, when, and where 
 I could buy food, when I came upon a second 
 small fishing-village, composed of a few huts, 
 illuminated by half-a-dozen rush candles that 
 shone out brilliantly on the black day-close. 
 Entering one of these habitations, I asked a 
 clumsy lad, its only occupant, firstly, how far 
 it was to Aldeburgh, and was told two miles ; 
 I asked the lad, secondly, that he would sell 
 me some bread. He requested me to show 
 him my money ; on which I unguardedly dis- 
 played my three shillings. 
 
 " Whar are you ? " said he. 
 
 " A girl," was my not inappropriate answer. 
 
 " Where do you live ? " 
 
 " Nowhere." 
 
 " Who's your father ? " 
 
 " I have not got a father — or mother 
 either."
 
 302 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " Where's your relations ? " 
 
 " Haven't got no relations." 
 
 " How did you come here ? " 
 
 "A gentleman down far ayont has sent 
 me on an errand to Aldeburgh, and I am 
 afraid I shan't get there in time to-night." 
 
 " Oh, you'll get there fast enough," observed 
 my interlocutor, seizing my hand, and twisting 
 the money out of it with a dexterity a Scotch 
 banker would have admired. In another in- 
 stant I was hustled out of the cottage, and 
 had the door slammed against my expostula- 
 tions. 
 
 I reflected on this incident with feelings not 
 more amiable than those which animated the 
 gentle breast of Oliver Goldsmith, when " the 
 rude Carinthian boor " declined to gratuitous- 
 ly supply " the houseless stranger " with bed 
 and supper. But, as I was of a philosophic 
 turn of mind, it helped me to the discovery of 
 a great law, governing the affairs of men.
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 303 
 
 The man who had forcibly taken my money 
 was dressed in the garb of poverty, and wore 
 a fustian coat ; Joel Haggart, though he was 
 generally reputed to be rich, usually wore a 
 fustian coat; Daniel Muscut did the same. 
 My three great enemies had all worn fustian. 
 I resolved never again to trust a man so appa- 
 reled. And, I am proud to say, I have ever 
 acted up to this resolution ; though possibly an 
 enlarged acquaintance with the world has in- 
 duced me to extend its application to the 
 wearers of other fabrics. 
 
 My bones began to ache ; and my head was 
 affected with dizziness ; and I felt going mad 
 from being compelled to look mentally on a 
 multitude of objects at the same time — child- 
 ren, nursemaids, fishermen, pointer-dogs, star- 
 fishes, poachers, shells, gentlemen, murdered 
 women, ink-bottles, fustian-coats, shillings, 
 coffee-cups, Watsons, Joel Haggarts, Muscuts 
 — but on I went, and in the right direction.
 
 304 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 I passed a martello-tower built for crushing the 
 uncle of our dear ally, the Emperor of the 
 French ; I passed a battery raised for the same 
 un-Christian purpose ; I diverged, without 
 knowing I did so, from the beach, traversed a 
 bit of arid waste land whereon the Aldeburgh 
 donkeys supported existence with sand and 
 vegetable filaments — and then, all of a sudden, 
 without any preparation for so successful a 
 close to my day's march — I found myself in 
 the principal street of Aldeburgh, a snug little 
 town, remarkable, as I first entered it, for 
 straggling houses, cold blustering winds, a 
 strong smell of tar, and a total absence of 
 street-lamps. 
 
 Another trouble fell on me now. I was 
 under the delusion that Mr. Ufford had told 
 me to go to the " Queen's Head," whereas, 
 " The George " was the name of the tavern to 
 which he had directed me ; and in beggiug the 
 few wayfarers I encountered, to inform me of
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 305 
 
 the locality of the " Queen's Head/' I got into 
 considerable difficulty, for, strange to say, the 
 Queen had no head in the town. The people, 
 instead of commiserating me for labouring 
 under so perplexing a mistake, were very 
 angry with me for my misfortune; and one 
 gentleman whom I had the boldness to accost, 
 and who, as I afterwards learnt, was the mayor 
 and principal merchant of the borough, declared 
 with several oaths, that I was an impertinent 
 little brat, and ought to be sent to the work- 
 house or prison. 
 
 I was beginning to think that perhaps it 
 would be better to give up my search for the 
 appointed hostel, and content myself with 
 resting one more night in the open air, when 
 I wandered out of the main street, round the 
 corner of what seemed to me a very magni- 
 ficent red-brick house, and sauntered down a 
 yard leading to some stables. There was life 
 going on in the yard ; stables with doors open, 
 
 VOL. I. X
 
 306 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 through which I saw lanterns burning hospi- 
 tably, and men bedding up or rubbing down 
 horses with much hissing and many snatches 
 of ballad-singing ; and two house-dogs chained 
 to kennels placed on opposite sides of the 
 yard, each dog barking furiously at the other, 
 and growling for a bone which neither could 
 get. I crept up this yard, and at the top, 
 where it narrowed, I found myself in a blaze 
 of light from windows that opened on either 
 side of a small paved court. On my right 
 were two windows and a half-opened door, 
 which belonged to what I lived to know was 
 a billiard-room ; and on my left was one large 
 window through which I discerned all the ap- 
 pointments of a cosy tap-room — rows of pic- 
 turesque spirit-bottles, a highly-polished ma- 
 hogany counter with brass fittings, a glorious 
 fire, two snug arm-chairs, and a fine black cat 
 which accorded well with the warm carpet on 
 which it laid. There were two persons also in
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 307 
 
 this tap-room ; a happy, smiling, buxom lady, 
 with a cap on her head, and a greater weight 
 of honest fat than carking care on her 
 shoulders. Talking to this dame was another 
 person, of the same sex, whom I loved at 
 first sight — and loved ever afterwards. She 
 was a young lady, at the most not more than 
 one or two-and-twenty years old, of a slight, 
 delicate figure, which the winter walking-dress 
 in which she was habited did not prevent me 
 from seeing was elegant. She had on her 
 head a bonnet of black beaver, on which was 
 fitted a dark veil, that was drawn up and 
 gathered in folds round the front of her head- 
 dress, so as just to leave visible to me a face 
 of very remarkable attractions. It was not a 
 particularly small face, but the delicacy of its 
 features gave it the effect of a size less than 
 common ; its complexion was fair and trans- 
 parent ; its lips were made to laugh, chatter, 
 kiss, beseech — indeed to do anything except 
 
 x2
 
 308 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 pout; but in its blue eyes lay its leading 
 charm — God had put in them the light of 
 simplicity, trustfulness, fervour, spiritual firm- 
 ness, mental strength. Tell me, everlasting 
 warden of mysteries, why God sends a few 
 such angels, and only such a very few, to such 
 a world as this ! Is it to remind us of what 
 we have lost ? or of what we may win ? Heaven 
 grant it may not be the latter ! for I would 
 have none bid the game farewell rejoicing, 
 when it is my fate to leave the tables bankrupt. 
 I took my eyes from the tap-parlour, with 
 its warm welcome of bright lights and plea- 
 sant inmates, and proceeded to inspect the 
 billiard-room and its occupants. The ivory 
 balls were rattling over the green cloth, under 
 the guidance of two young men, articled 
 clerks to the principal attorney of Aldeburgh, 
 who were playing a match in the presence of 
 their bosom-associates, the two pupils of the 
 leading surgeon of the town and an old gen-
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 309 
 
 tleman who sat in a chair drinking brandy-and- 
 water very fast. 
 
 This veteran, at the first glance, attracted 
 my attention. He was the wreck of a magni- 
 ficent man, of a noble presence, and Herculean 
 proportions. In his haggard, deeply- lined 
 face, prominent brows, vulture nose, and 
 white locks, there were properties any art- 
 student would pay liberally for in a model ; 
 but the dull gaze of senility was in his eyes, 
 and " drunkard " was branded on his palsied 
 lips, which were covered with a stumpy growth 
 of hair. He leaned forward in his seat, his 
 right hand continually raising a large tumb- 
 ler from the table to his lips, and his left 
 clutching, and resting on, an enormous blud- 
 geon of black-thorn. 
 
 One of the medical pupils kept the score 
 for the players ; the other, with a cigar in his 
 mouth, conversed in a deferential manner with 
 the old man.
 
 310 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " A good game, sir?" observed the student. 
 
 " Ay — Higgins will get it," responded the 
 veteran, taking another pull at his brandy-and- 
 water. 
 
 "No, sir, he can't. See, Smith has made 
 another cannon ; and, by Jove, there's 
 another." 
 
 " Pooh ! " exclaimed the old man angrily, 
 thumping his stick on the ground, "fluke, 
 only a fluke. Higgins will have it." 
 
 "What will you bet, sir?" 
 
 " Two to one — in — in sixpences." 
 
 "Done, sir." 
 
 " Done." 
 
 A few more strokes and flukes were made 
 by the fortunate Smith; and speedily the 
 game was decided in his favour, and against 
 the old man, who fumbled in his waistcoat 
 pocket for a few seconds, and eventually took 
 from it a sixpence — evidently his last. Then 
 he deliberately felt in all the other pockets of
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 311 
 
 his dress, and succeeded in rummaging out of 
 them four pence, and as many half-pence. 
 
 " There's your money — a shilling," he re- 
 marked, tendering, as he spoke, this collection 
 of the realm's current coin in payment of his 
 debt. 
 
 " Oh, pray, sir, don't do that — don't incon- 
 venience yourself, if you please, sir — I had 
 rather not take the money — it's nothing to me 
 — and what's more, I don't really deserve the 
 bet, for, you see, I saw how the game was 
 going, and you didn't," blundered out the lad, 
 who was too much of a gentleman to relish 
 accepting the poor old ruffian's last pence, and 
 at the same time not gentleman enough to 
 know that he ought to take them without any 
 words. 
 
 " What ! you jackanapes— you dirty appren- 
 tice to a cheating druggist ! you dare to re- 
 fuse my money ! " exclaimed the old man, 
 dashing on the floor his empty glass, and run-
 
 312 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 ning towards the offending student, with the 
 blackthorn cudgel sweeping right and left in a 
 most perilous style. 
 
 With a duck of his head, a dodge, and a 
 hasty run backwards, the menaced apprentice 
 escaped his adversary, who was immediately 
 seized by the other three young men present. 
 
 "Really, sir, you are mistaken," they all 
 three exclaimed, at the same time ; " Tomlin- 
 son did not mean to insult you. All he meant 
 was that perhaps you would rather settle the 
 little bet to-morrow. We all know you too 
 well to think you would shirk a debt of 
 honour." 
 
 " Exactly, sir," exclaimed Tomlinson, clutch- 
 ing at this means of pacification; "I know 
 there is often a good deal of irregularity 
 about your rents coming in, and I thought 
 that till you had seen your solicitor, I — that is 
 you—" 
 
 "You lie," roared the old man, struggling
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 313 
 
 to free himself from his three detainers, and 
 emitting a volley of exclamations, which, as I 
 am a lady, I may not write down. " You 
 mean to insult me, because I happen to be a 
 little out at elbows. But I'll let you know 
 who I am. I am a peer's son ; I may be 
 a peer myself one day — not an earl (I have 
 never married a — ) but a viscount ; and I 
 hunted the county hounds for forty years, and 
 my name stood high at Newmarket, and no 
 man played with better fellows at Crockford's 
 — by heavens, I'll let you know who I am. 
 I'll shoot you dead, slap through your skull, 
 as I did Lord Tilbury, who called me a — a — 
 swindler. You dog, I'll be equal with you." 
 
 The uproar in the billiard-room became so 
 great that I was terrified, and shrinking back 
 from the doorway I retired into a dark angle 
 of the court. As I did so, the stout buxom 
 lady (landlady she turned out to be) passed 
 quickly from the passage, into which the
 
 314 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 parlour-bar opened, crossed the yard without 
 noticing me, and entered the noisy apartment, 
 closing the door behind her. Her influence 
 speedily restored quiet ; and in less than three 
 minutes she recrossed the yard (having how- 
 ever again closed the billiard-room door), and 
 re-entered her parlour. I followed her unob- 
 served up the passage, and both saw and 
 heard what passed between her and her guest, 
 the beautiful young lady. 
 
 "There, there, Miss Ufford, dry your eyes, 
 there's nothing to fear or cry about. Your pa' 
 was not exactly quarrelling ; indeed, I may say 
 he was not at all quarrelling. The fact is, 
 miss, he was a little merry, and is in one of 
 his funny humours, and took it into his head 
 to act a part, you see, miss, in a kind of tra- 
 gedy way, just to amuse the other gentlemen. 
 But I told him that I hoped he'd be gracious 
 enough not to make quite so much noise, and, 
 like the gentleman that he always is when his
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 315 
 
 enemies leave him alone, he fell off instanterly 
 — into the quietness of a mouse/' 
 
 The young lady smiled at this, but the tears 
 were still bright in her eyes, as she looked 
 into the benevolent face of her companion, and 
 enquired : — 
 
 " Don't you think, kind Mrs. Cookesley, you 
 could get him to come away with me now ? 
 If you whispered to him that his tea is ready 
 for him, and that I shall be very lonely all the 
 evening if he does not come to me, don't you 
 think you could lead him away ? " 
 
 "What a beseeching way you have with 
 you, Miss Ufford ! I could not say you 
 straight ' no,' if you asked me to burn the 
 house down the night before the corporation 
 dinner. But it isn't no good trying to bring 
 the honest gentleman off yet. You may trust 
 to me for having him home as soon as possible. 
 And asking your pardon for taking such a 
 liberty with a gentleman who is the Earl's
 
 316 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 brother, and an honourable hisself, let alone 
 his being your pa', Miss Ufford, which is more 
 to me than any other consideration; but, 
 knowing that he was rather fanciful about not 
 stirring till a certain hour, I managed just 
 now, unbeseen, to put on the clock a couple of 
 turns." 
 
 " It's very good of you, Mrs. Cookesley, to 
 help me so," returned the young lady. 
 
 "Lord, Miss Caroline, don't call it good, 
 it's only duty. Wasn't I for five-and-twenty 
 years your grandma's housekeeper? And 
 didn't my lady and all the family always 
 treat me kind, and always seem to re- 
 member that as a girl I had married a ten- 
 horse farmer, and didn't look to servitude as 
 the walk of life into which it should ever 
 please God to call me ? So, dear Miss Ufford, 
 do you now go home, and you may rely on 
 my walking at the proper time with your pa' 
 to his door, and taking as much care of him
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 317 
 
 through the dark streets as if he was the re- 
 putation of the ' George Inn/ hotel, tavern, 
 and posting-house, and the best wines at mo- 
 derate prices." 
 
 " I wish I had a cat like yours, Mrs. 
 Cookesley," observed Miss Ufford, changing 
 the subject ; "I want a companion sometimes, 
 and your cat would be a first-rate friend and 
 counsellor." 
 
 "Lor, Miss Ufford, you'd find him very 
 dull. You'd soon want something more 
 human." 
 
 " Oh ! of course I would rather have some- 
 thing a little more like myself. I often think 
 I should like to adopt a poor child, and bring 
 it up, and assist it to become a good woman." 
 
 " What a strange notion, Miss Ufford." 
 
 " Perhaps it is so. But it is what I would 
 do if I had a little money. And sometimes I 
 think, that as it is, I might contrive to ac- 
 complish it. You see, the child's food and
 
 318 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 clothing would not cost much ; and I shouldn't 
 educate her as a lady, but as a lady's-maid. 
 Till she was able to be my maid, and keep my 
 little house neat, I could manage with an 
 hour's help a-day from some poor woman. 
 Now, is not this a pretty scheme ? " 
 
 " Here's an opening in life? why shouldn't 
 the pretty young lady adopt me ? I wouldn't 
 murder her," thought I ; and boldly tapping 
 at the door, I entered the parlour, and pre- 
 sented myself to Mrs. Cookesley and Miss 
 Caroline Ufford. 
 
 "No, no, child, it's no use begging here. 
 Go home to your mother," said the former. 
 
 " I am not altogether a beggar, ma'am," I 
 responded, meekly, "but I am sent here by a 
 gentleman. This is " The George Inn? " 
 
 " Yes — and I am the mistress of it." 
 
 " Then, ma'am, I have to show you this, 
 and ask you to take care of me till you hear 
 more from him."
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 319 
 
 So saying, I held out the card which had 
 been given to me in the morning. Mrs. 
 Cookesley read it, and made a few hasty ex- 
 clamations of unmitigated astonishment. 
 
 "Why, Lord bless me, Miss Caroline, this 
 is Mr. Kawleigh's card ! " 
 
 " What ! cousin Rawleigh's ? " 
 
 "Ay, dear, the same." 
 
 " Then the child is for me to take care of, 
 and not for you," exclaimed Miss UfFord, with 
 a flushed face. 
 
 "My dear miss, — this one wont suit you. 
 
 " Why not ? » 
 
 " It's so dirty, miss." 
 
 " You shall have her washed." 
 
 " It's so ragged, miss." 
 
 " I'll clothe her." 
 
 " It's so lean, miss." 
 
 " I'll fatten her." 
 
 " She's too tall, miss, — in two years she'll 
 be a woman."
 
 320 MIRIAM COPLEY. 
 
 " All the better. She'll all the sooner be 
 fit to be my maid." 
 
 So far, so good. On entering the room, I 
 had made up my mind to quarter myself on the 
 one or the other of the benevolent women. 
 The numbness, exhaustion, and giddiness, con- 
 sequent on the hardship and toil I had recently 
 undergone, had suggested to me the probabi- 
 lity that I should soon faint away, and the ap- 
 prehension that such an accident might befall 
 me, put it into my mind that such a catastro- 
 phe might be a very good way of compelling 
 them to act charitably to me, if they discredited 
 the card and suspected me of trying to impose 
 upon them. I had therefore, in a few rapid 
 seconds of thought, resolved on feigning a fit 
 of unconsciousness if they manifested any in- 
 clination to reject my appeal. It did not how- 
 ever take long to show me that such hypocrisy 
 would not be required ; but just as I had arri- 
 ved at this satisfactory conclusion, I dropt
 
 MIRIAM COPLEY. 321 
 
 naturally into the condition that I was prepared 
 to simulate ; the heat of the parlour, instead of 
 reviving, seemed to choke me ; the lights and 
 objects in the room whirled around me; there 
 were at least twenty, instead of two, merciful 
 women looking upon me with pitiful eyes; 
 and, throwing my arms upwards in a paroxysm 
 of alarm, and exclaiming, " I am not pretend- 
 ing — indeed, I am not pretending," I fell 
 fainting into Miss Ufford's arms. 
 
 END OF VOL I. 
 
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