shriek, and clung to the footman.

"Instantly!" added my aunt, with a stamp of the foot.

The picture was pulled down, and from a recess behind it, in which had
formerly stood a clock, they hauled forth a round-shouldered,
black-bearded varlet, with a knife as long as my arm, but trembling all
over like an aspen leaf.

"Well, and who was he? No ghost, I suppose!" said the inquisitive
gentleman.

"A knight of the post," replied the narrator, "who had been smitten
with the worth of the wealthy widow; or rather a marauding Tarquin, who
had stolen into her chamber to violate her purse and rifle her strong
box when all the house should be asleep. In plain terms," continued he,
"the vagabond was a loose idle fellow of the neighborhood, who had once
been a servant in the house, and had been employed to assist in
arranging it for the reception of its mistress. He confessed that he
had contrived his hiding-place for his nefarious purposes, and had
borrowed an eye from the portrait by way of a reconnoitering hole."

"And what did they do with him--did they hang him?" resumed the
questioner.

"Hang him?--how could they?" exclaimed a beetle-browed barrister, with
a hawk's nose--"the offence was not capital--no robbery nor assault had
been committed--no forcible entry or breaking into the premises--"

"My aunt," said the narrator, "was a woman of spirit, and apt to take