to be consumed by the graceless mouths that fed upon him, the milk of human kindness--with which Providence has so bountifully supplied that class of the mammalia called the "Bucolic," and of which our Squire had an extra "yield"--burst forth, and washed away all the indignation of the harsher Adam. Still your policy of half-measures, which irritates without crushing its victims, which flaps an exasperated wasp-nest with a silk pocket-handkerchief, instead of blowing it up with a match and train, is rarely successful; and, after three or four other and much guiltier victims than Lenny had been incarcerated in the Stocks, the parish of Hazeldean was ripe for any enormity. Pestilent jacobinical tracts, conceived and composed in the sinks of manufacturing towns--found their way into the popular beer-house--heaven knows how, though the Tinker was suspected of being the disseminator by all but Stirn, who still, in a whisper, accused the Papishers. And, finally, there appeared amongst the other graphic embellishments which the poor Stocks had received, the rude _gravure_ of a gentleman in a broad-brimmed hat and top-boots, suspended from a gibbet, with the inscription beneath--"A warnin to hall tirans--mind your hi!--sighnde Captin sTraw." It was upon this significant and emblematic portraiture that the Squire was gazing when the Parson joined him. "Well, Parson," said Mr Hazeldean with a smile which he meant to be pleasant and easy, but which was exceedingly bitter and grim, "I wish you joy of your flock--you see they have just hanged me in effigy!" The Parson stared, and, though greatly shocked, smothered his emotions; and attempted, with the wisdom of the serpent and the mildness of the dove, to find another original for the effigy. "It is very bad," quoth he, "but not so bad as all that, Squire; that's not the shape of your hat. It is evidently meant for Mr Stirn." "Do you think so!" said the Squire softened. "Yet the top-boots--Stirn never wears top-boots." "No more do you--except in hunting. If you look again, those are not tops--they are leggings--Stirn wears leggings. Besides, that flourish, which is meant for a nose, is a kind of a hook like Stirn's; whereas your nose--though by no means a snub--rather turns up than not, as the Apollo's does, according to the plaster cast in Riccabocca's parlour." "Poor Stirn!" said the Squire, in a tone that evinced complacency, not unmingled with compassion, "that's what a man gets in this world by being a faithful servant, and doing his duty with zeal for his employer. But you see that things have come to a strange pass, and the question now is, what course to pursue. The miscreants hitherto have defied all vigilance, and Stirn recommends the employment of a regular night-watch with a lanthorn and bludgeon." "That may protect the Stocks certainly; but will it keep those detestable tracts out of the beer-house?" "We shall shut the beer-house up at the next sessions."