The persons assembled in the parlour looked at each other in speechless amazement, and the majority of them in the excitement of the moment finished at once whatever liquor they had before them. “Britton!—Britton!” shrieked Maud, “are you not glad to see me? I heard your voice—too well I know it! Oh, oh, I was passing—I was crawling past this door when your voice struck upon my ear. Andrew Britton, I won’t leave you now! Stop, stop—yes, I must do my errand. I had it from one of bright things that live among the stars—I must do my errand.” She fumbled for a time among her strange mass of many-coloured clothing, and produced at length a small piece of paper. She gazed at it for a moment, and then kissed it devotedly. “It saves me from horror,” she said, in a low, unusual tone. “It saves me from cramp and colds, from the frost and the scorching heat, but I am bound to show it to you—all of you shall see it. It is blessed, and was given to poor Mad Maud by the bright spirit. Look, do—you, and you, and you. Are they not brave words—words to save and bless?” She glided among the guests, and held for a moment before the eyes of each the slip of paper that Ada had given her, till she came near the smith, when she replaced it in her bosom, saying,— “Not to you, man of blood—not to you. Ho!—Ho! Andrew Britton, not to you!” The smith had sat till now as if paralyzed; but, when Maud was making for the door, he suddenly cried with a tone of anger, while his face swelled with wild passion,— “Hold—stop that witch! Kill her—tear her to pieces—curses on her!” He rushed forward as he spoke, and would most probably have done the poor creature some fatal injury, had he not been suddenly stopped by a tall, stout man, who rushed from a corner of the room, upsetting several persons in his progress, and placed himself before Maud. “Stop!” he cried, in a voice of command—“touch the woman at your peril.” For a moment Britton paused, while his face worked with fury, and he more nearly resembled some wild animal at bay than a human being. Suddenly, then, collecting all his energies, he sprang forward with a cry of rage; but the stranger adroitly stepped on one side, at the same time that he threw a chair, on which he had his hand, across Britton’s path, who fell over it with great violence. Britton lay a moment as if stunned by the fall, and several of the company began to cry shame upon the stranger, who stood quite calm awaiting the rise of his foe. The landlord, however, who had witnessed some of the affair from the bar, now rushed in in a state of great indignation with the stranger, for not allowing King Britton to do just what he liked. “Troop out of my house,” he cried. “How dare you insult a customer of mine? Troop, I say. Go after your pretended mad woman. You want to rob the house, both of you. Troop, I say.” “Suppose I won’t go?” said the stranger. “Then suppose I make you, you vagabond?” cried the enraged landlord.