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148, considerably beyond a joke; so that the state of the prisoner's affairs took a very sombre aspect; and the counsel—an old hand—entrusted with his cause, declared confidentially that there was not a chance. But a yet more weighty accusation, because it came from a much nobler quarter, awaited Clifford. In the robbers' cavern were found several articles answering exactly to the description of those valuables feloniously abstracted from the person of Lord Mauleverer. That nobleman attended to inspect the articles, and to view the prisoner. The former he found himself able to swear to, with a very tranquillized conscience: the latter he beheld feverish, attenuated, and, in a moment of delirium, on the sick-bed to which his wound had brought him. He was at no loss, however, to recognise in the imprisoned felon the gay and conquering Clifford, whom he had once even honoured with his envy. Although his former dim and vague suspicions of Clifford were thus confirmed, the good-natured peer felt some slight compunction at appearing as his prosecutor: this compunction, however, vanished the moment he left the sick man's apartment; and after a little patriotic conversation with the magistrates about