Mrs. Gaunt shivered with repugnance. "I would not have her come for all the world," said she. "For Heaven's sake never mention her name to me. I want help from none but friends. Send Mrs. Houseman to me in the morning; and do not distress yourself so. I shall defend myself far better than you think. I have not studied a hundred trials for nought." Thus the prisoner cheered up her attorney, and soon after insisted on his going home to bed, for she saw he was worn out by his exertions. And now she was alone. All was silent. A few short hours, and she was to be tried for her life; tried, not by the All-wise Judge, but by fallible men, and under a system most unfavorable to the accused. Worse than all this, she was a Papist: and, as ill-luck would have it, since her imprisonment an alarm had been raised that the Pretender meditated another invasion. This report had set juries very much against all the Romanists in the country, and had already perverted justice in one or two cases, especially in the North. Mrs. Gaunt knew all this, and trembled at the peril to come. She spent the early part of the night in studying her defense. Then she laid it quite aside and prayed long and fervently. Towards morning she fell asleep from exhaustion. When she awoke, Mrs. Houseman was sitting by her bedside, looking at her, and crying. They were soon clasped in each other's arms, condoling. But presently Houseman came, and took his wife away rather angrily. Mrs. Gaunt was prevailed on to eat a little toast and drink a glass of wine, and then she sat waiting her dreadful summons. She waited, and waited, until she became impatient to face her danger. But there were two petty larcenies on before her. She had to wait. At last, about noon, came a message to say that the grand jury had found a true bill against her. "Then may God forgive them!" said she. Soon afterwards she was informed her time drew very near. She made her toilet carefully, and passed with her attendant into a small room under the court. Here she had to endure another chilling wait, and in a sombre room. Presently she heard a voice above her cry out, "The King _versus_ Catherine Gaunt." Then she was beckoned to. She mounted some steps, badly lighted, and found herself in the glare of day, and greedy eyes, in the felon's dock. In a matter entirely strange, we seldom know beforehand what we can do, and how we shall carry ourselves. Mrs. Gaunt no sooner set her foot in that dock, and saw tiny awful front of Justice face to face, than her tremors abated, and all her powers awoke, and she thrilled with love of life, and bristled with all those fine arts of defense that nature lends to superior women. She entered on that defense before she spoke a word; for she attacked the prejudices of the court by deportment. She curtsied reverently to the Judge, and contrived to make her reverence seem a wiling homage, unmixed with fear.