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expecting my fate, but nothing came; the silence still continued, and at last I crawled from beneath the bed. Then I heard loud voices calling my name. Yes, my husband's voice and that of my sister. I heard them hurrying from room to room, and I knew they were in search of me, but I could not move or speak; with a wild yearning to be with them, and see and feel myself safe in their midst, I was altogether powerless. A violent spasm of pain seized my heart, and for some seconds it ceased to beat, while I gasped for breath, and a cold dew burst over my face.

As suddenly as it had come the pang subsided, my nerveless limbs still shook and quivered, but all at once I heard my baby's helpless wail, and that seemed to restore my strength in some measure. I staggered to the inner door, opened it, and raised my little lady, rosy, refreshed, and (thank God!) safe from the peril that had menaced us. I managed to slip back the bolt of the outer door, but I was too much exhausted to pull the table from it. However, the anxious group below had by this time ascended to the upper story, and in another minute I was in my husband's arms.

It was some time before I could speak coherently, but the devastation below had spoken plainly enough.

The work had certainly been thoroughly done so far as it went: the stout panels of the hall door were rent and shattered, the lower ones being altogether demolished; not a pane of glass in our plate-glass windows was left unbroken; the ponderous inner shutters had been taken down, and lay on the carpets with broken bottles and decanters, fragments of furniture and ornaments, and a significant hatchet and bludgeon. My watch with its appurtenances, and my other ornaments, were of course gone, and, still worse, all our "company" plate. My husband's bureau, which stood in a small room, used by him as a study, and opening from the dining-room, had been broken open, but the robbers had got but a trifle there. Colonel Forrest never kept more money in the house than sufficient for one week, and as Monday was the day on which he was wont to replenish his stock, the Sunday's supply was, of course, very scanty. Poor Rollo lay dead and stiff in the hall, his head literally laid open. Bridget had vanished with her friends; but the losses which seemed most to affect my husband, when his indignation on the score of my fear and danger had somewhat abated, were those of Rollo and the fire-arms, which, always in perfect order, had adorned his study. It was easy to see, by the trampled flower-beds in my lawn-garden, the course taken by the fugitives; they had made a breach in the hedge bounding one side of the lawn, and their trail was plainly visible in the oak wood, but, beyond that, there were but uncertain and misleading traces. Knowing them to be heavily encumbered, however, we hoped to hear of them yet, and no time was lost in setting justice on their track; but though every measure we or the magistrates could devise was taken to apprehend the perpetrators of the outrage, we had at length to resign all hope of seeing our property again. A detective from London, who paid us a professional visit, shook his head gravely when, amid other irrelevant matter, he was told that a coffin, carried in a country cart and followed by a group of afflicted mourners, had been seen on that eventful Sunday on the high road near our house, and about two hours after my husband's

VOL. LVIII.

H

return. When he further eliminated that the people in our neighbourhood did not know any of the mourners, who were all strangers, and that there had been but one woman in the company, which woman, sitting in the cart beside the coffin, had kept her head bowed down, and covered by a hooded cloak, he actually groaned in spirit, and then, bursting into satire, annihilated the rural police by the bitterness of his sarcasms on their blind stupidity.

"That funeral was the funeral of your property, sir," he said to my husband; "a child could see that."

We seemed to see it too, then, when it was too late. By-and-by vague rumours were circulated that Bridget was gone to Australia or America, no one seemed to know which; but whether this were true or not, we never discovered. However, as she never reappeared either in our vicinity or amongst her own friends, who, living in a distant county, were closely watched for many months, the probability is that there was truth in the report. We surmised that the cause of our visitation on that particular Sunday was to be found in the well-known fact that my husband had received a large sum of money on the preceding Saturday, and we presumed that it was thought he had brought it home with him; he had, however, put it in the bank with which he did business within half an hour of its receipt by him. Bridget had evidently been in collusion with the robbers, and had been communicative as to our plate; but, of course, much was altogether matter of conjecture. We had got the girl from a servants' registry-office in Dublin, so that her antecedents (beyond what her papers told) were unknown in our part of the world.

Gradually we began to lose our sense of danger. I must do the people around us the justice to say, that they appeared thoroughly grieved, ashamed, and indignant at the outrage on us, and were (I do believe) quite innocent of any knowledge of it. We had our doors and windows replaced or repaired, and had the former and the shutters sheeted with iron; we were even more careful than formerly in all precautions, and one of our two men-servants (both long tried and thoroughly trustworthy) always remained in the house on alternate Sundays.

Months passed, and, excepting that we sometimes missed what had been carried away, and that I occasionally suffered from that spasm of the heart which I first felt on that terrible Sunday, we had begun to look on my peril as a thing gone by. Christmas was at hand, and we were expecting several relatives and friends from England. On the day before their arrival, I was arranging some matters with my cook, a Roman Catholic, but perfectly honest and well principled. I said to her, "We shall miss our silver covers now. I wish we had them."

"Throth! ma'am dear, we can't well do without them. It bates all that there's nayther tale or tidin's ov them. Athin', why didn't ye spake to his raverence ?"

"To whom?"

"To his raverence to Father O'Driscoll."

"What do you mean?"

"Och! sure, iv the things can be got back at all, he'll get them; them

peelers is no good."

"How could the priest help us?"

"Sure they can do anything; it stan's to rason they can, the holy craythurs."

"How do they manage it?"

"Och! they pray for it, an' then, ov coorse, they get it; but, besides that they pray, they prache, they spake from the althar, an' threaten bell, book, an' candlelight on the villyans that do anything bad, an' one priest spakes to another, an' thin he does his part, an' so on; it goes the rounds, an' whatever it is, it's purty sure to be got back, it or its value."

I confess that this suggestion of Molly's sank into my mind. The more I thought of it, the more I thought it worth a trial. The parish priest was an old man, a highly educated and even accomplished gentleman, one of the old St. Omer school, which is now almost entirely passed away. He was well known to us, as he mingled freely in the society of the county, and was known and respected by all creeds and classes. The result of my meditations was, that I wrote Mr. O'Driscoll an invitation to dine with us, and in the course of the evening I made an opportunity to speak to him unobserved by my husband; for, in truth, I was ashamed to tell him what I meant to do, thinking that he would laugh at me, yet, at the same time, I was resolved to let slip no possible chance of recovering the stolen things. Mr. O'Driscoll looked very grave when I preferred by request.

" My dear lady," he said, "I fear you ask what I cannot do. I know that the robbers were none of the people here, and it is so long since the affair-fully four months now that the chances are your plate and jewellery have made acquaintance with the melting-pot long ere this, but what I can do I will."

I afterwards heard that on the next Sunday, at the close of his sermon, the old priest had solemnly addressed his congregation, reminding them of all my husband and I had done for them, and urging them, under severe penalties, to come forward if they had the faintest clue to the perpetrators of the outrage. No disclosure followed his address, and a fortnight more brought us to Christmas-eve.

Our house was full of old friends, and, despite the absence of my plate and other things, I determined to be very happy, and as the weather was bright and frosty, with a light sprinkling of crisp snow, we enjoyed as many out-door pleasures as the season would allow. On the last day of the old year, we had all set off after luncheon to a lake in a demesne some three miles away, and skated till it was time to return to dinner. Every one was tired in the evening, and but that we wished to see the New Year in, we should all have retired to rest very much earlier than usual. As it was, we only waited for the coming in of our new friend, and were exchanging congratulations and "good nights" in the hall as we took our candles from the table. All at once, one dull loud crash on the knocker stilled every voice, and I know that for myself I turned faint with memory and fear. The knock was repeated, but no answer was made to my husband's loud question as to who knocked, and after a moment's deliberation several of us ascended to my old post of vantage, and Colonel Forrest and another gentleman opened the window and leaned out. We had left our lights in the hall, and were not afraid of being seen from below. The night was a black frost, moonless and still, and when the eyes of the look-out had become accustomed to the darkness, we who were behind were informed that no one was in sight, but that something lay on the door-step, and that the sound of feet in rapid retreat was distinctly audible on the frozen gravel of the avenue. It was decided that two gentlemen should keep watch above to prevent a surprise, and the rest should open the door and examine the heap on the step; so it was done, and, to our joy and delight, we found two large rough willow baskets (such as the country people use for potatoes), containing every article that had been taken from us, with the small exception of one salt-spoon. Yes, everything else was there, black with tarnish, and not a little scratched and bruised, but otherwise quite safe. We conjectured that the things had been buried in the earth, for they were soiled and mirched with clay. Perchance we should never have got them, had not the keenness of the search for them, and its long duration, made the robbers afraid to dispose of them. As soon as the restitution was made public, I had a note from Mr. O'Driscoll congratulating me, and begging me never again to mention the subject to him. Nor did I.

OUR LADY OF FOLGO-AT.

BRETON LEGEND.

BY LOUISA STUART COSTELLO.

[This ballad is extremely popular in Brittany, and the miracles of the Lady of Folgo-at firmly believed. The church was built in the fifteenth century, and the village grew round it. Wigourvez is close by.]

I.

"FATHER! health and joy be thine!"
"Daughter, why so early come?
Why wash that snowy linen fine?

What brings thee, tell me, from thy home?"

"Father, I am here to pray

Thou wilt help me at my need;-
Haste, oh, haste without delay,
Forth to Folgo-at with speed:
Go on foot-nay, barefoot go-
Kneeling if it must be so!
Thou wilt find the ashes there
Of the heart that was thy care!"

"Daughter! what the cause, impart,
That to ashes turns thy heart."

"They found a dead child in the wood,
And call me guilty of its blood!"

II.

The Lord of Pouligwenn one day, Before he dined, went to the chase"Is this a hare?-this bloody prey,

Or is't a dead child in this place! They've hung it on a branch 'tis cold! The cord is round its neck-behold!"

Home to his lady went the knight,

His mien and brow were sad to see: "Poor infant! 'twas a piteous sight! Who may the wretched mother be?" "Good morrow, goodwife, health and hail! The hemp looks flourishing and fair."

"Oh no; the hemp is sure to fail,

66

Your pigeons make such havoc there!"

Why art thou all alone to-day?

Why are thy daughters absent? say."

"Two at the river, washing, stay,
And two prepare the hemp alway:
Two prepare, and other two
Comb, as is their wont to do.

"Marie Fanchonic, poor maid,
My young niece, in bed is laid:
Eight or nine months 'tis ago
Since she lay in pain and woe!"
"Ha! my godchild?-ope the door-
I must see thy niece once more."
"Tell me, little godchild dear,
Where thy pain is most severe."
"In my body, near my heart-
Dear godmother, in every part."
"Rise up, lost child! the truth I guess,
To Father Francis go confess:
Confess thy crime, and have a care,
For great thy peril is-beware!"
"Alas! I have not sinn'd, and less
Than eight days since did I confess."

"Away! to lie do not begin-
For thine has been a deadly sin:
Thou wert this morning in the wood,
And, yet, thy shoes are wet with blood!"

III.

"Little page, what happens, say,
In the street who passes through?"
"Your farmers all from Wigourvez,
The hangman, and your godchild too!"

Alas! hard were the heart and cold
That could at Folgo-at behold
The girl, but fifteen summers old,
The young girl, whom two archers lead
To be hang'd!-'tis so decreed.

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