- sure of her circumstances forced her to accept this
proposal almost with a sense of gratitude?"
"Yes, sir."
"And, Mrs. Walsingham, you do not believe for one moment that any thought of vengeance ever suggested itself to her mind?"
"Yes, sir."
"You are prepared to swear that?"
"Yes, sir."
"Also, that even in these latter days, when Mr. Barron became cruel and violent in his conduct towards her, she never freed herself from his yoke, never passed from under the spell of a power which, from the first, had been so fatal to her?"
"Yes, sir."
"And that this paltry sum of money which she believed had been left to her in his will, which has proved not to have been the case, could never have counted in the scale of his personal attraction for her, which, sinister, dreadful, tragical as it had proved, had caused her at his behest to forfeit friends, health, virtue, honor, all those things which dignify life?"
"Yes, sir."
"I thank you, Mrs. Walsingham; I have nothing more to ask you."
The poor drab, tottering, faint, dissolved in tears, had to be assisted from the witness-box.
This piece of cross-examination had made a strange impression. The manner in which it had been conducted by the young advocate had exerted a powerful emotion upon many besides the weak and flaccid creature who had been so much clay in his hands. It had had great success as a coup de
