brought from old friends in all parts of the State, comforting, consoling, encouraging her to hope here and hereafter.

As the first streaks of daylight made their way into the chamber, and the early chirp of half-awakened birds was heard in the great garden behind the house, the relaxed frame roused itself, and she was able to cry several times, God! God! God!"

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There was something terrible and unnatural in the tone, as if the sufferer was uttering a protest against the infliction of illy-merited pain; but it was soothing still to know her thoughts lay that way.

The last strands of the old thread were now being shorn in twain, the eyes were weakening, but yet carried intelligence, and to Archie the same expression of anxiety for him.

As the sun shed its first light the great deliverance took place in manner as gentle as the removal of an infant from the maternal nourishment and when sleep has overcome the suckling.

Then for the first time the realization of his loss brought to the young man that breaking up of the breast, which follows the free flow of blessed tears.

He went to the garden and walked its long pathways for hours. The breath of the spring morning at last steadied him, and brought to mind a consciousness of his responsibilities.

When he returned to the house the crape was on the hall door, and the dear figure lay in the centre of the old drawing-room, clad in the sober elegance of dress which in life had lent her that lofty grace, that perfect poetry of motion, which even in this solemn time he could not call up except with a sense of earthly pride for which he reproached himself in the very act of harboring it.

On the high hill back of the mansion house, overlooking all that great expanse of fertile valley, by the side of the stout-hearted old Whig politician, her husband, at the feet of her pioneer parents, and close to the clay which covered two of her warrior sons, they laid the mistress of Ravenscroft--the Metella of this tale.

When the will was opened, it was found that, while no incumbrance lay on the property, there was a large overdraw in the bank account, which of late, under Colonel Foley's advice, had been kept with Mr. Pepper in Montgomery.

Archie could now divine why Mr. Pepper was always wanting to lend him money, and perhaps why he wanted him in Europe. Mr. Pepper was not the first man who had laid long pipe to own Ravenscroft.

As soon as propriety would permit he went to Montgomery and found the banker all smiles and sympathy; but before his departure he gave his note for several thousands at twelve per cent a year, and the pleasant Pepper was kind enough to say that he wanted no security. He would only expect this note to be renewed every three months with the interest either paid or compounded.

Moran was now taking his very first lesson in the wisdom of the every-day world. Heretofore he had been only a poor bookworm or the fine fellow of the social board.

He was cutting his eye-teeth after a fashion found to be of great use to him years afterwards.

But he came home with his law license, and not the least value in his eyes of the pretty parchment lay in the knowledge that a lawyer in the South is better hedged against the attacks of a rascal than a man of any other craft would be.

The brethren beat back a usurer, when he comes to fleece their young, in a most noble way and with cunningly contrived learning.

Colonel Paul Foley at once offered him a co-partnership and gently hinted that a judgeship would soon be forced upon himself, after which Archie could step into a large practice.

But the youth, full of that folly, which, it will be remembered, I have ever insisted upon as part and parcel of his life, wanted the sea between him and the recollections of Cornelia.

He accepted the Consulate, and strode yet deeper in the mire of Radicalism.

CHAPTER XX.

A COURT ORGANIZED TO CONVICT.

The tale of old Kroom was found to be true in every detail. Those unclean birds of prey, Maloney and Colwood, were scenting all the air for plunder currents.

Colwood held a travelling Commissioners' Court. Maloney was his marshal, lame Cicero Crites his clerk, and Bartlett Swazey his standing witness and Maloney's standing guard. Hundreds of the Ku Klux were bound over to the U. S. Court.

Scores were blackmailed out of ruinous hush-money—Maloney negotiating the terms brazenly and with a directness that was absolutely staggering.

The bills of costs made "Ossa a wart," and this was only the index of the demands that were to be added when true bills were found.

Moran's admission to the bar saved him from Maloney's service of the summons, especially after the Marshal learned, as he did learn from old Kroom, that Archie knew nothing of the matter, except so much as related to Mr. Swazey's presence in the raid.

The death of Mrs. Moran was excuse sufficient to Gilbert Kroom for his non-attendance in behalf of Jeff; so that what he knew of the transactions in the Ku Klux Court were related to him afterwards by Colonel Paul Foley in about these words: Said the Colonel, as he sat on the portico at Ravenscroft, sipping a claret-punch, the week after the adjournment of the Spring term of the U. S. Circuit and District Court at Montgomery: Why, my dear fellow, there was no more chance for a man to come clear than there was for a turtle-dove to sit beside the moon.

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"The court was organized to convict. Brown was sent out as

Circuit Judge expressly for that purpose, and a more infernal scamp is n't to be found between this and the Rio Grande. Why, sir, he threatened to commit me for contempt of his corrupt court."

"Indeed," said Moran, "You don't tell me so. I am sorry to hear it. And for what?"

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'Why, for advising young Holt to forfeit his bond and make tracks for Texas."

"Tell me all about it."

"Well, after Jeff Kroom and wagoner Charwell and the rest of them had been convicted and sentenced to the Albany penitentiary (I appeared for the whole party) for `terms ranging from six months to five years, Holt's case was called and he failed to answer.

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'Maloney rose and told the judge that Mr. Holt had been in court the day before, and that he was under bond for $5,000.

"Brown then asked the clerk who appeared for Holt. That brought me to my feet, and the Devil himself along with me. I can't tell now what I did say," and the old lawyer's pulse was beating 120 a minute, and his black eyes were a couple of fire coals dancing deliriously.

Moran observed parenthetically, that he had not looked in a newspaper since his mother's death, and was ignorant of all that was going on in the world.

Foley continued, “I arose and said as quietly as I could, that it was apparent to every one, who had observed the proceedings of that tribunal, that my client stood no chance to secure a fair trial. The juries were offered the iron-clad oath, and it was a matter of common knowledge, that no self-respecting Southern man could take that oath. The result had been, that nine of each jury had been ignorant negroes taken from the cotton fields, and the remaining whites were even worse than the negroes in a moral point of view. The District Attorney was persecuting instead of prosecuting, and conviction was had on the unsupported testimony of an accomplice-that white-livered Swazey." “I wonder the judge stood such talk,” said Moran.

"Stood it!" cried old Paul, "he was bound to stand it. It was the truth, and the crowd in the court-house were just aching to hear it told. But the worst is to come," he went on to say.

"I saw Brown setting his teeth, and he tried more than once to stop me, but I would n't be stopped. Finally, he said, 'do you know where your client is, Mr. Attorney?' 'In Texas, I hope, sir, by this time,' was my answer; and then I told him that, strange as it might seem to the court, young Holt was a gentleman, and that I was neither ashamed nor afraid to say, that I had deliberately advised him to forfeit his bail, (for his friends could and would make his bondsmen whole,) and not to risk a trial before a packed jury and a partisan judge.”

"What did he do then?" cried Moran, much excited over the story.

“Oh, he raved. You ought to have seen him. He almost snapped his hooked nose down his throat. Did you ever see him?" ("No, sir," from Moran.)

"He said he would take pleasure in putting me in custody for contempt, and I could show cause at some later time why I should not be disbarred from practice in the Federal courts."

"You don't say so, Colonel!" exclaimed his listener.

"I do say so, and I say more than that. I say that I was then as cool as a cucumber, and had a loaded Derringer in each of my pants pockets. I simply walked from the bar-table where I was standing to within five feet of the bench, and told Brown very firmly that I should not resist the deputy-marshals, and would go to jail; but that the moment he uttered the words ordering me into custody I would certainly kill him in his seat. And he knew that I meant exactly what I said," added the lawyer.

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"Well,” said Moran, “ what was the conclusion of the matter?" "Oh, it blew over, as all such matters do, when you know your man before you raise the breeze. Old Judge Drummond, who before the war held the place Brown now fills, interfered, and asked that the rule to show cause why I should not be 'unfrocked' issue, and that I be given till the next morning to

answer.