He clasped the cold hand in both his own, and, kneeling down beside him, he prayed from his very soul, 'Lord, lay not this sin to his charge.' He could say no more; and Miss Anne, who knelt by him, was silent, except that one sob burst from her lips.

The master stirred no more, but lay still, with his numb and paralyzed hand in Stephen's clasp; but in a few minutes he uttered these words, in a tone of mingled entreaty and assertion, 'God be merciful to me a sinner!' That was all.

An hour or two afterwards it was known throughout Longville, and the news was on the way to Botfield, that the master of Botfield works was dead..