But the poor girl, though she was meek, silent, and almost apathetic in her tranquillity, could not even bear the mention of her mother's name.

Her mother had destroyed the father of the child that was to be born to her, her lover, her hero, her god; and in her remembrance of the man who had betrayed her, she learned to execrate the mother who had sacrificed everything,--her very reason,--in avenging the wrongs of her child! Mrs.O'Hara was taken away from the priest's house to the County Gaol, but was then in a condition of acknowledged insanity.

That she had committed the murder no one who heard the story doubted, but of her guilt there was no evidence whatever beyond the random confession of a maniac.

No detailed confession was ever made by her.

"An eye for an eye," she would say when interrogated,--"Is not that justice?
A tooth for a tooth!" Though she was for a while detained in prison it was impossible to prosecute her,--even with a view to an acquittal on the ground of insanity; and while the question was under discussion among the lawyers, provision for her care and maintenance came from another source.
As also it did for the poor girl.