The convict departs; his wife follows him; his child and father remain behind. The former is cared for by the daughter of the Earl of Milverstoke, the latter has still the abiding friendship and regard of Mr Hylton. Twenty years elapse. Perpetual banishment was Adam Ayliffe’s sentence, and he is still abroad. His misshapen child has given evidence of commanding abilities, and under another name has been sent, at Mr Hylton’s instigation, to the university of Cambridge, where he is maintained still at the charges of the sweet-hearted Lady Emily. We arrive at the season when the annual contest takes place in the university for its most honourable prizes. The dignity of Senior Wrangler is contested by a young nobleman and a humpbacked youth, of whom little or nothing is known. The rivals, representing as it were the aristocracy and the democracy of the ancient seat of learning, have no unworthy envyings, one against the other; they are friends and friendly co-labourers. The battle comes, the representative of the people is victorious: Viscount Alkmond—for it is he—the son of the murdered man, is beaten by Adam Ayliffe, the offspring of the supposed murderer. The Earl of Milverstoke lives to hear the news! He lives to hear more! A man in a distant part of the country is executed for a robbery. Before he dies he makes a confession. His name is Jonas Handle. He tells the world, for the relief of his own soul, that he, and none but he, twenty years before, did kill and murder my Lord Milverstoke’s son, for which one Ayliffe was taken and condemned to die, but afterwards was transported, and is since possibly dead. He explains minutely how he proceeded to his work; who was his accomplice. He had determined to kill one Godbolt, the head keeper, and, mistaking the young lord for his intended victim, he struck him dead with the coulter of a plough, which coulter he thrust into the hole of a hollow tree hard by. The confession reaches Mr Hylton; the coulter of the plough is sought and found: the exiled innocent is recalled—returns: this also the Earl of Milverstoke lives to hear!