the drooping tone, the bravado and fierce strut which sought to
dissemble all this. Not one amongst all the witnesses, assembled on
that side, had (by all agreement) the bold natural tone of conscious
uprightness. Hence it could not be surprising that the storm of popular
opinion made itself heard with a louder and a louder sound. The
government itself began to be disturbed; the ministers of the sovereign
were agitated; and, had no menaces been thrown out, it was generally
understood that they would have given way to the popular voice, now
continually more distinct and clamorous. In the midst of all this
tumult, obscure murmurs began to arise that Barratt had practised the
same or similar villanies in former instances. One case in particular
was beginning to be whispered about, which at once threw a light upon
the whole affair: it was the case of a young and very beautiful married
woman, who had been on the very brink of a catastrophe such as had
befallen my own wife, when some seasonable interference, of what nature
was not known, had critically delivered her. This case arose 'like a
little cloud no bigger than a man's hand,' then spread and threatened
to burst in tempest upon the public mind, when all at once, more
suddenly even than it had arisen, it was hushed up, or in some way
disappeared. But a trifling circumstance made it possible to trace this
case:--in after times, when means offered, but unfortunately no
particular purpose of good, nor any purpose, in fact, beyond that of
curiosity, it _was_ traced; and enough was soon ascertained to
have blown to fragments any possible conspiracy emanating from this
Barratt, had that been of any further importance. However, in spite of
all that money or art could effect, a sullen growl continued to be
heard amongst the populace of villanies many and profound that had been
effected or attempted by this Barratt; and accordingly, much in the
same way as was many years afterwards practised in London, when a
hosier had caused several young people to be prosecuted to death for