"Can nothing be done?" continued Mrs. Wilford, appealing to the
sheriff. "Must he go with you?"

"He must; my duty is as plain as it can be."

The poor woman suggested various expedients to avoid the fearful
consequences; she appealed to the bank director, and begged him not
to prosecute her husband. Mr. Randall, though he had been greatly
irritated by the cruel insinuations of the culprit, was not a
malignant man; and he was disposed to grant the petition of the
disconsolate wife. He had recovered his money, and had no malice
against the ferryman. But the sheriff declared that no such
arrangement could be tolerated. The matter had been placed in his
hands, and, as a sworn officer of the law, he should be obliged to
arrest the offender.

In vain Mrs. Wilford pleaded for her husband; in vain Lawry pleaded
for his father; the sheriff, kind and considerate as he had shown
himself to be, was inexorable in the discharge of his duty. There was
no alternative; and John Wilford must go to jail. The poor wife, when
she found that her tears and her pleadings were unavailing, submitted
to the stern necessity. She insisted that her husband should be
allowed to change his dress, which the sheriff readily granted; and
in a short time the culprit appeared in his best clothes. It was a
sad parting between him and his family, and even the ferryman wept as
he passed out from beneath his humble roof, not again to come beneath
its friendly shelter for many, many weary months.

Mrs. Wilford and Lawry were stunned by the heavy blow. The light of
earthly joys seemed suddenly to have gone out, and left them in the