it advisable to be so far confidential with Alice's servant as to take
her aside, and tell her that the inauspicious stranger of the previous
evening had been a very distant relation of Mrs. Butler, who, from a
habit of drunkenness, had fallen into evil and disorderly courses. The
banker added with a sanctified air that he trusted, by a little serious
conversation, he had led the poor man to better notions, and that he had
gone home with an altered mind to his family. "But, my good Hannah," he
concluded, "you know you are a superior person, and above the vulgar sin
of indiscriminate gossip; therefore, mention what has occurred to no
one; it can do no good to Mrs. Butler--it may hurt the man himself, who
is well-to-do--better off than he seems; and who, I hope, with grace,
may be a sincere penitent; and it will also--but that is nothing--very
seriously displease me. By the by, Hannah, I shall be able to get your
grandson into the Free School."

The banker was shrewd enough to perceive that he had carried his point;
and he was walking home, satisfied, on the whole, with the way matters
had been arranged, when he was met by a brother magistrate.

"Ha!" said the latter, "and how are you, my good sir? Do you know that
we have had the Bow Street officers here, in search of a notorious
villain who has broken from prison? He is one of the most determined
and dexterous burglars in all England, and the runners have hunted him
into our town. His very robberies have tracked him by the way. He
robbed a gentleman the day before yesterday of his watch, and left him
for dead on the road--this was not thirty miles hence."

"Bless me!" said the banker, with emotion; "and what is the wretch's
name?"