account, as from the distrust with which he
himself was regarded. For his wife's relations
were a set of people alike remarkable for
their good looks (in a certain animal class of
beauty) and their indifferent characters. "With
both men and women, any strict observance
of the marriage vow, either by themselves or
their partners, would have been looked upon
as the height of greenness and superstitious
prejudice. Whenever they did go to church,
it was not for the sake of what other folks
are supposed to go there for. To use the
expression of the neighbourhood, " They did
not care how the pot boiled, so long as it
boiled fat." A successful piece of swindling
horse-dealing, or cheating at cards by the
males, a new wealthy acquaintance, and a
finer dress than became her station, by the
females, was, among their own set, matter for
boasting and vanity, rather than for shame.
In higher life, they would have made the
stuff to rival the infamies of the most disgraceful
epochs of history, English or Continental.
With more courage, they would have
been the agents to commit great and frightful
crimes. Luckily, they wanted that; or rather
unluckily, for society in general; because
their caution enabled them to continue their
career without coming to a check or a
catastrophe. The idea of the hangman always
timely interposed between themselves and any
temptation to clutch at the good things of
life too violently. Utterly abolish the punishment
of death, and they would instantly have
been converted into a gang of Thuggish murderers.
But they had cast aside all honour,
shame, and honesty; to lie, and to stick to it,
was the family maxim; and all that gave
them considerable power.

When Bammant married, no one who
really knew him considered that he had
made a mis-alliance. The match was a very
proper one, they said; like was yoked to
like; better one bad house in a lane than
two. Of his tastes and principles I, therefore,
need say little more.

For some little time, after Bammant
worked at the mill, everything went on as
usual. He was handy, obliging, quick,
intelligent; he never did anything likely to run
counter to the notions or habits of his betters;
he was so full of tact, as to incur the
contempt of one or two blunt, straight-forward
workmen; he was not nice about over-hours,
but, apparently, rather glad to give an
additional hand's-turn late at night, or early
in the morning.

But afterwards, sundry little unpleasantnesses
arose; and no one could trace their
origin. The former cordiality amongst the
men themselves, the old confidence between
them and their master, seemed to be at an
end. The miller now and then put strange
questions to them, in an unaccustomed tone
of voice, which made them stare, and return
short and sulky answers. The short and
sulky answer confirmed the master's suspicion
that there was something wrong about that
particular man who had given it.

Petty thefts were constantly occurring, or
rather were suspected to occur; which, if
actually perpetrated, made up by their sum
total for their apparently trifling amount in
detail. The fruit and vegetables in the
garden, the coals in the shed, the wood in the
stack-yard, the eggs in the fowl-house, were
all seemingly under the spell of some evil
eye; they became less and less, wasting
beneath an invisible agency.

Gates were, therefore, fastened, that had
never been fastened before; doors were
locked, that had not known the touch of a.
key for years. Everybody's eye inquired of
everybody's countenance, " Is yours the face
of a thief? " Everybody's unspoken reply to
everybody's unuttered question was, " I'm no
more of a thief than you are; perhaps not so
much." Bammant alone took things easily;
the only difference that could be observed in
him was, a more glassy twinkle of his green-
grey eye, and, frequently, a suppressed smile
as he turned away his head.

I may as well tell you that he was the
thief; that he was the person who, by artful
words, and looks, and signs, which he
confidentially let escape him now and then, had
contrived to get suspicion cast on everybody
about the premises, except himself.

Early one morning, as he was stealing off,
a few minutes later than was quite prudent,,
with a pailful of coals secreted over-night,
having half-a-dozen eggs lying on the top of
them, he fancied that Rudd, who was coming,
to work, had perceived both himself and the
contrasted hues of the strange contents of the
pail. Rudd, however, was quite innocent of
either discovery. Late one evening, as he
was leaving the garden with some booty, by
climbing over the wall by the aid of a fruit-
tree, he saw Rudd crossing the meadow
homewards. He was obliged to drop to the
ground on the outside of the wall, for he
heard footsteps approaching within. On
alighting, he listened breathlessly, fancying
that Rudd had perceived him a second time,,
and was coming to charge him with the
trespass he had witnessed. He was mistaken.
Rudd had merely stopped a moment
to look around him, and then proceeded
straight on his way. However, to Bammant's
conscious mind, Rudd had him in his
power, and was, therefore, to be undermined
and destroyed; he must try and strike the
first blow. That Rudd's behaviour to him
was the same as it had always been, was, in
his eyes, merely a proof of Rudd's enviable
powers of dissimulation.

A dissipated farmer of the neighbourhood,
an acquaintance, or patron, of one of Bammant's
sisters-in-law had said in his hearing
that, after all, he thought that, present company
always excepted, Jane Raven was the
prettiest girl in the parish; that he would
not mind paying a guinea for the first kiss