venting a redundant affection for jesting. Persons felt it rather a sin
to be severe with a man of so merry a disposition; and it was especially
observable that not one of the ladies who had been despoiled by the
robber could be prevailed on to prosecute; on the contrary, they always
talked of the event as one of the most agreeable remembrances in their
lives, and seemed to bear a provoking gratitude to the comely offender,
rather than resentment. All the gentlemen were not, however, of so
placable a temper; and two sturdy farmers, with a grazier to boot, were
ready to swear, "through thick and thin," to the identity of the prisoner
with a horseman who had civilly borne each of them company for an hour in
their several homeward rides from certain fairs, and had carried the
pleasure of his society, they very gravely asserted, considerably beyond
a joke; so that the state of the prisoner's affairs took a very sombre
aspect, and the counsel--an old hand--intrusted with his cause declared
confidentially that there was not a chance. But a yet more weighty
accusation, because it came from a much nobler quarter, awaited Clifford.
In the robbers' cavern were found several articles answering exactly to
the description of those valuables feloniously abstracted from the person
of Lord Mauleverer. That nobleman attended to inspect the articles, and
to view the prisoner. The former he found himself able to swear to, with
a very tranquillized conscience; the latter he beheld feverish,
attenuated, and in a moment of delirium, on the sick-bed to which his
wound had brought him. He was at no loss, however, to recognize in the
imprisoned felon the gay and conquering Clifford, whom he had once even
honoured with his envy. Although his former dim and vague suspicions of
Clifford were thus confirmed, the good-natured peer felt some slight
compunction at appearing as his prosecutor. This compunction, however,
vanished the moment he left the sick man's apartment; and after a little
patriotic conversation with the magistrates about the necessity of public
duty,--a theme which brought virtuous tears into the eyes of those