for papa's help, she must have escaped; he now fired the pistol at the
wainscot, to show her it really contained a slug, which he thought she
might doubt, and taking the fellow instrument from his pocket, told
her it was loaded like the other and that, unless she that moment
really and truly confessed who and what she was, and by whom employed,
her hours were numbered.

Trembling and almost gasping for breath, she fell on her knees and
implored mercy.

"It can be shown," said my father "only on one condition, a full
confession of every thing connected with your being here."

"But," faltered she, "if I do shall I be given up to _them_ and they
will surely kill me if I am."

"Tell the truth," said my father, "and if, as I judge from your last
words; you are the tool of others, you shall be protected, and if
deserving, or even repentant, shall be cared for: but stay," said he,
pouring out a glass of wine, "you are greatly agitated, take this and
then sit down. Now, if you will tell the truth, you may dismiss your
fears, and by making the only reparation in your power, a full
disclosure, you may also make a friend of me."

"Indeed Sir I will, for I feel sure you will keep your word."

"You see before you one, who till the last few years, knew not the
ways of sin. I was carefully and tenderly brought up some miles from
here; but forming an acquaintance with a young man, I married him
against the wishes of my parents. I soon found out he was a smuggler,