they may have committed. I am an Antinomian-I have faith-what need have I of good works in this world? I am one of the elect, how then can I forfeit salvation in the next ?" Shuddering as he heard him, Middleton exclaimed, "Now then am I more than ever persuaded that Heaven and the Gospel cannot possibly have sanctioned that doctrine of our tutor, which filled me with despondency and terror, though I was free from offence; while it has seared your heart, and even given you a presumptuous confidence of Divine favour, at the very moment that you have been leading a life of unbridled licentiousness, or meditating schemes of the most remorseless villainy. Caleb Ball, I pity you! Evil instruction hath fallen upon the rank soil of an evil mind, and the growth has been a frightful turpitude, upon which it is appalling to look back, and still more so to anticipate its future consequences. May you awake from the delusions of your superstitious faith, and by a life of future penitence merit and obtain the forgiveness of Heaven! Your offences against myself I have already pardoned, but I will never see you again. We part for ever. Farewell!" With these words he quitted the chamber, the two officers who had been stationed at the door, re-entered it, and the prisoner's first and only demand was for snuff, with which his handcuffs prevented him from supplying himself! Middleton, ever considerate for the feelings of others, even of those who had most deeply injured him, broke to the wretched wife, as tenderly and delicately as he could, the painful predicament in which her husband was placed, suggesting, that as he must necessarily be accompained by the officers of justice, and conveyed to a place of confinement, she would do well to seek some other mode of conveyance, and betake herself to her friends in London. Terrified, humiliated, and almost broken-hearted, the unfortunate woman expressed the deepest gratitude for his kindness, but declined taking his advice, exclaiming in an interval of her sobs and tears, "No, Caleb is my husband -my lot is cast-I deserve it-I will do my duty !" A few minutes afterwards, Ball, his wife, and the two officers mounted a coach and set off for London. Middleton, agitated by contending emotions, and absolutely horrified at the confessions of his cousin, waited till he had in some degree recovered himself, when he rejoined Hargrave, and the friends, still accompanied by Clements, returned together to the metropolis. CHAPTER XI. Whiles a wedlock hymn we sing, How thus we met and these things finish. He, therefore, who retards the progress of intellect, countenances crime-nay, to a state, is the greatest of criminals; while he, who circulates that mental light, more precious than the visual, is the holiest improver, and the surest benefactor of his race! The Disowned. IN a few days, all the legal documents relative to the mortgage having been executed, Caleb Ball was released from his confinement, and, accompanied by his wife, proceeded to the American vessel in the Downs, on board which VOL. III. N he had engaged his passage for New York. An account of their having sailed was shortly afterwards received by Middleton, in a letter of the most fervent and impassioned thanks from Mrs. Ball, who at the same time, wrote the following to Chritty Norberry— "MADAM, "Before the pilot-boat leaves us, and I am conveyed away, not unwillingly, from a country where for several years I have known nothing but humiliation and anguish of mind, I feel myself called upon to perform an act of justice, equally due to yourself, and to the generous, the noble-minded man who, at such a sacrifice of fortune, has rescued his direst enemy from an ignominious death. On interrogating my guilty husband, I find, that in the defamatory letters which he procured to be written to his cousin, he made allusion to certain occurrences at Cambridge, wherewith he was but imperfectly acquainted, and of which none can render a true account but myself and Mr. Middleton. That gentleman has made a vow |