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"It did not justify—it could not justify—your conduct in publicly branding me with so much precipitation."

"Look you, Sir Charles," interposed the general, who had been thoughtfully pacing the room. "You believe her to be innocent?"

"I do most firmly."

"Very well. You are convinced of it?"

"I am."

"Very well. Then how do you propose to remove the stigma?"

"Why, in the first place, I am anxious for Matilda to return."

"Return!" she exclaimed. "What to live again with you! Never! Never!"

"Very well," said the general; "that's settled. Now you can leave the room."

"I should feel myself degraded—"

"Very well; that'll do. Leave the rest to me."

She then cast a withering glance at Sir Charles, and withdrew with an air of disdain.

"Now, then," resumed the general; "how is this stain to be removed?"

"Why the fact of our living together again would have the effect of removing it."

"No: no such thing. It would be said that, like an infatuated old fool, although conscious of her guilt, you took her back, and forgave her. No, that'll not do. The stain cannot thus be removed."

"What, then, would you suggest?"

"I would suggest to you, Sir Charles, the necessity for acting, as you are bound to act, as a man of honour."

"I am quite prepared to do so. But how do you conceive that I am bound to act?"

"You are bound to declare, both in public and in private, your settled conviction of her innocence."

"In private I have already done so; but how am I to do it in public?"

"Through the medium of the papers. Consult your attorney. He will be able to get your conviction, and the facts which induced it, made known to the world. Let this be done, Sir Charles: let this be done."

"If it be possible, it shall be done."

"Very well. When it is done, we'll see what can be done next; but until it be done, and that effectually, she shall never, with my consent, return."

Resolved on doing all in his power to counteract the effects of the report of the trial, by making her innocence known to the world, Sir Charles then left the house. **** Little now remains to be told; for here the history of Sylvester, as a somnambulist, ends. The means adopted with the view of preventing a recurrence of somnambulism—those of taking much exercise, and living abstemiously—proved to be in his case effectual; and when this